The GPP Scene: Year 2, Week 4

by Justin Van Zuiden (stlcardinals84) Last Updated 2015-05-13 16:04:29

Hey everyone, welcome back to another week of the GPP Scene. It’s hard to believe that we are already a month into this year’s MLB season, but alas, here we are! In case you are unfamiliar with this series, let’s get the background out of the way:

Here’s the way it will work. I will enter the $10 FanDuel Line Drive GPP five days a week with three different teams, and only those three teams. The teams will be composed of the following:

Team #1 – Two-team stacks with 4 hitters from each team, finished off by whatever pitcher I like best that fits within my remaining cap. ¹
Team #2 – My favorite expensive pitcher of the day with a team of lesser hitters.
Team #3 – A total punt at pitcher surrounded by a team of better hitters.

¹ – This is my general GPP strategy on FD.

I’ll document the results of each team along with my profit and loss and return on investment as the days go by, with some final analysis for the week at the end of the article. Let’s get to the fourth week of results!

MONDAY, APRIL 27

Look, let’s get this out of the way now. This week was a nightmare for me, and it wasn’t just the teams I put together for this article series. I was simply on the wrong bats and the wrong pitchers all week. The 15 teams for this week had gross winnings of exactly zero dollars. Hey, that’s pretty consistent! Enjoy the random video clips I have linked in the article this week, because I needed some humor.

Team #1 – I will stack against Jason Marquis any chance I get, and that’s even true when it is the woeful Brewers offense. I paired this stack with a Tigers mini-stack, and the Tigers bats totaled two points. Since I wanted to use David Price as the pitcher here (the 4-3-1 stack I talked about last week), I used Steven Souza as a replacement for the 4th Detroit bat. Whatever the case may be, the stacks didn’t do diddily poo.

• FINISH: 27.83 PTS / 1451 OF 2298 FOR $0.

Team #2 – Big Game James Shields was my choice of ace today because Price was on Team #1. Shields got to face the strikeout-happy Astros, and he did provide some strikeouts here. He also gave up some home runs and took a loss on the day. Yoenis Cespedes was the only noteworthy bat here as he cracked a home run and a double. As for the rest of the bats, please refer to the diddily poo clip above.

• FINISH: 32.25 PTS / 1077 OF 2298 FOR $0.

Team #3 – My strange affinity for Tyler Matzek when he’s on the road showed up here, and he was the punt choice of the day despite pitching in hitter-friendly Arizona. This worked out okay as he scored 10 points, but the bats were all quiet. Only two of my batters (Tulowitzki and J.D. Martinez) had more than 1.5 FanDuel points! Swing and a miss.

• FINISH: 21.75 PTS / 1855 OF 2298 FOR $0.

TUESDAY, APRIL 28

Team #1 – Potential gas cans J.A. Happ and Ross Detwiler were facing off against each other in hitter-friendly Texas, so I mini-stacked both teams in this game with Anibal Sanchez at pitcher. The game with the stacks finished 2-1. Swing and a miss.

• FINISH: 16.00 PTS / 2240 OF 2298 FOR $0.

Team #2 – Clayton Kershaw was the ace of the day, and he was outpitched by Madison Bumgarner again. There were a few Detroit bats on this team, as well. They got shut down by Cy Mike Pelfrey. Swing and a miss.

• FINISH: 27.75 PTS / 1824 OF 2298 FOR $0.

Team #3 – This was actually my best team of the day with boom-or-bust pick Rafael Montero as the punt pitcher against the Marlins. He actually pitched into the 6th inning and locked down six strikeouts, though he did not get a win. The bats showed some life, too, as Matt Adams, Matt Carpenter, and Nelson Cruz all connected for extra-base hits and 6+ FanDuel points. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite good enough to cash.

• FINISH: 39.66 PTS / 897 OF 2298 FOR $0.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 29

Team #1 – I mini-stacked Cardinals and Dodgers against Aaron Harang and Ryan Vogelsong, respectively. This allowed me to fit Gerrit Cole at pitcher. The Dodgers hit four home runs, but they were hit by four different players and I only had two of them. Gerrit Cole was brilliant, too. My Redbirds let me down, however, as they scored five relatively punchless runs and gutted out a 5-2 victory without much fanfare. This was the closest I got to cashing all week.

• FINISH: 41.75 PTS / 598 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Team #2 – Felix Hernandez was my choice for ace of the day, and I used a new path here. I paired him with two expensive bats in Paul Goldschmidt and Nelson Cruz with the other six bats all costing $2,500 or less. This worked to some extent. Hernandez was solid and earned a win. Goldschmidt and Cruz both had great nights with 8+ fantasy points each. Unfortunately, none of the cheap bats came through. Swing and a miss.

• FINISH: 38.41 PTS / 836 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Team #3 – I used Mat Latos here. Mat Latos! Three of the bats on this team hit home runs, and none of them were especially bad, but I couldn’t make up for Latos only scoring five points. The punt pitching options were bad on this day, but I am still not sure why I chose a struggling Latos.

• FINISH: 31.00 PTS / 1332 OF 1724 FOR $0.

FRIDAY, MAY 1

Team #1 – The Yankees loaded up on left-handed bats against Justin Masterson, which was a brilliant move. The A’s were facing gas can Colby Lewis in a hitter-friendly park in Texas. What could go wrong stacking up these two teams? Well, the Yankees couldn’t hit a guy that allowed a .400 wOBA to left-handed bats last year and has seen his velocity drop by 2 MPH so far this year. Oakland got seven runs, but they all came in the same inning and the one guy who hit a home run wasn’t on this team. Matt Harvey was solid as the pitcher on this squad, but the offenses didn’t quite do enough.

• FINISH: 28.50 PTS / 2631 OF 5356 FOR $0.

Team #2 – With Harvey on Team #1, I went with Max Scherzer as the ace of the day. He was also solid in the 1-0 game, though he got the loss at the hands of Harvey. How meaningless is the win stat in fantasy baseball? Well, Scherzer has a 1.26 ERA and he is 1-3. That tells the story. Joc Pederson was my best bat here, as he put up 9.5 FanDuel points. This team was in a decent position to cash, but the rest of the bats fell apart. Outside of Dustin Pedroia and Pederson, all my bats were under 8% owned. I’m just over-thinking it at this point.

• FINISH: 36.00 PTS / 1056 OF 5356 FOR $0.

Team #3 – Carlos Frias performed reasonably well as the punt choice with 12.33 points, and he earned a victory in this one. None of the bats scored more than 4.25 points, with Giancarlo Stanton being the highest scorer. On the bright side, this team also finished in the top half! This was my best day of the week — and these teams were all decent for cash games — but it just didn’t have enough juice for tournaments.

• FINISH: 30.83 PTS / 2086 OF 5356 FOR $0.

SUNDAY, MAY 3

Team #1 – Brewers and Cubs mini stacks were the choice of the day with the wind blowing out at a healthy 15-20 mph at Wrigley Field. Ah yes, this was the slump buster right here! Wrong. The game huffed along to a mediocre 5-3 finish, and the Cardinals bullpen blew a win for Michael Wacha late. It wouldn’t have mattered.

• FINISH: 32.91 PTS / 926 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Team #2 – Anthony Rizzo scored 4.25 points. The other seven batters and the pitcher on this team combined for 4.25 points. Go Anthony! Johnny Cueto did not have his best stuff on this day, and 23.4% of owners were crying in their drinks watching him struggle through six innings while allowing five runs and striking out just two. Outside of Rizzo, the bats had just one hit.

• FINISH: 8.50 PTS / 1708 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Team #3 – In what was a perfect cap to the week, I used Tyler Matzek as my punt pitcher in spacious Petco Park. I actually like the talent that Matzek has, and I target him occasionally in this space when the Rockies are on the road (like I did, say, on Monday above). There was one problem here: the Rockies re-shuffled their rotation to start Matzek on Monday and Kyle Kendrick on Sunday. I didn’t notice this until after roster lock, and it was too late to do anything about it on FanDuel. I even left him in a lineup on DraftKings. For what it’s worth, the big bats didn’t do much either.

• FINISH: 16.50 PTS / 1608 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Final Results – Week Four

My Analysis

Sometimes, it takes some pride-swallowing to write this piece, especially with the numbers not looking the best. This was without a doubt the worst week of DFS MLB that I have had in 3 1/2 years of playing the game — and that’s not easy to put in print. It’s even more disappointing when it comes on the heels of a really solid run. However, perspective is important when you consider the nature of GPP play. That $30,000 GPP win on FanDuel two weeks ago has been enough to keep my overall results looking fine for the first month of the season, even though the last seven days have been extremely frustrating. That’s just the nature of the tournament beast.

Hot streaks and cold streaks do exist in this game, though a lot of it is mental. Look at the awful decisions I started making toward the end of the week. If anything, writing this article helped me assess the faults in my game over these five days. My results were terrible, but my decisions were terrible, too. It wasn’t just bad luck. I stunk. You play to win the game, and I didn’t win the game this week. Sometimes you get the bull, and sometimes the bull gets you. The bull got me this week.

There’s probably not much you can learn from my play this week, other than to realize that everyone playing this game is human. If you’re struggling, take a step back before you get too deep into a hole. Assess the things that you are doing wrong. Ask for help. Wear your cap inside out. Find a slump-buster. Take a few days off. Go for a walk. Get away from it all for a minute. That really can help! As for me, I will blindly cover my eyes and submit this article. Let the bloodshed end.