The GPP Scene: Year 2, Week 5

by Justin Van Zuiden (stlcardinals84) Last Updated 2015-05-20 15:09:23

Hey everyone, welcome back to another week of the GPP Scene. After last week’s nightmare of a performance, I was ready to wipe the slate clean and start fresh with the first full week of May. On the bright side, there was no way it was going to get any worse than it did in Week 4! 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 fifth week of results!

MONDAY, MAY 4TH

Team #1 – Atlanta (vs. Aaron Harang) and Tampa Bay (vs. Clay Buchholz) mini-stacks with Clayton Kershaw at pitcher vs. Brewers. The Atlanta and Tampa Bay bats were both extremely cheap on FanDuel, so I was able to fit Kershaw in easily with these two stacks. The stacks were decidedly average, as both teams scored five runs but didn’t rack up many extra base hits. Keeping with the trend, Kershaw had an average start and the bullpen blew his win after he was taken out of the game. Where did this team end up? You guessed it: average! Actually, it was in the 75th percentile of this tournament, but it wasn’t quite good enough for a cash.

• FINISH: 33.83 PTS / 714 OF 2712 FOR $0.

Team #2 – As Kershaw was on Team #1, I opted for Madison Bumgarner as my ace of the day. I am trying a somewhat new philosophy here at times, in which I don’t mind taking an ace that I think is going to be available at a low ownership percentage. That will allow this to be more of a “GPP team” as opposed to an example of a “cash game” team. I figured Bumgarner would be available at a much lower ownership percentage than Kershaw, and I was correct in that line of thinking. He tossed a solid game and ended up with 17.33 FanDuel points. The bats were led by a great night (including a grand slam) from Stephen Vogt. Matt Holliday chipped in with a solid game, and I finally had a good night. I’m still scratching my head at how this high of a finish only pays out 4x my buy in, but I’ll take the cash nonetheless. I looked at the payout structure and realized that even a 26th place finish (top 1%) in this tournament would have only paid out $50 on this night. The Line Drive is extremely top heavy this year.

• FINISH: 46.83 PTS / 84 OF 2712 FOR $40.

Team #3 – I covered my eyes because there were no viable punt pitchers, and I stomached the ability to click on Ross Detwiler’s name, even though he was facing a Houston team that has been hammering the baseball against left-handed pitching. This worked like a charm, as Detwiler tossed a solid game and put up 13 points. The expensive bats, on the other hand, totaled negative one point. That’s right, negative points. The group collectively had just two hits. My highest scoring bat had 1.25 points, and four guys were in the negative.

• FINISH: 12.00 PTS / 2620 OF 2712 FOR $0.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 6TH (EARLY GAMES)

This was the Bryce Harper 3-HR day, and it was one of the highest-scoring short slates I have seen in a long time. This slate actually earned the “high score” of the year for each of the three teams, and Team #3 didn’t even cash!

Team #1 – I mini-stacked the Nationals (with Harper, thankfully) and three Padres with Ian Kennedy at pitcher, following the 4-3-1 stack method that worked a few weeks back. Nolan Arenado was the final member of the team. Harper obviously led the squad with 19.75 FanDuel points, while Kennedy worked seven solid innings and picked up a win. Of course, given the high scoring nature of the slate, my 60 point effort was just barely good enough to hang on for a minimum cash. Not having any of Arizona’s 13 runs in this lineup was what prevented it from being near the top.

• FINISH: 60.75 PTS / 90 OF 541 FOR $25.

Team #2 – In one of my more impressive feats of the week, I was actually able to cash a team without Bryce Harper on this slate. Max Scherzer pitched well as the easy “ace” choice, though he ran into some trouble in the 8th inning. Justin Morneau, Cory Spangenberg, Yasmany Tomas, and AJ Pollock combined for 11 hits, and their performances were enough to make up for the lack of Harper on this squad… barely.

• FINISH: 60.50 PTS / 96 OF 541 FOR $25.

Team #3 – Chris Heston was the easy punt choice on this short slate, and he was over 30% owned in this tournament. He flopped with just four points, and for some reason I didn’t put Harper on this team. It should have had zero chance to cash, but all the hitters did very well. Ironically, the only negative bat was Paul Goldschmidt. Outside of him and Matt Kemp, all the hitters had 4.50 fantasy points or more. However, the pitching performance and lack of Harper exposure was a little too much to overcome.

• FINISH: 51.75 PTS / 196 OF 541 FOR $0.

THURDAY, MAY 7TH

Team #1 – My two favorite stacks of the night were San Diego and Arizona facing off against each other at Chase Field. Collin McHugh fit nicely as a GPP pitcher on this team. Half of the stack worked wonders, as Arizona scored 11 runs. Half of the stack did not work wonders, as San Diego scored zero runs. I can’t complain about the result, however, as an Arizona stack led me to victory in the Gold Glove and Perfect Game on DraftKings on this night. I will gladly take the tradeoff! The dominant performance from Arizona alone was even enough for this team to scratch and claw its way to a minimum cash.

• FINISH: 46.08 PTS / 97 OF 919 FOR $25.

Team #2 – This was a smallish slate for an evening set of games, and there weren’t really any glamorous pitching options. Chris Archer was the ace almost by default, and it showed in his 49.5% ownership clip. He didn’t even last four innings despite striking out eight batters, and his tough outing was part of the reason the cash line was a little bit lower tonight. Quite a few of my bats came through on this team, led by Alex Rodriguez, Mark Trumbo, and Kevin Kiermaier. They all hit home runs on the night, but there wasn’t quite enough thump for this team to overcome the dud from Archer.

• FINISH: 39.08 PTS / 229 OF 919 FOR $0.

Team #3 – A few guys were just a bit cheaper, but I couldn’t pass on A.J. Burnett’s upside at $7,100. He tossed seven solid innings and picked up a win against the Reds, and his 13 fantasy points were more than double what Archer put up. Five of the eight bats on this team scored 4.5 fantasy points or more, and they were led by Paul Goldschmidt and Marcell Ozuna. I am very encouraged by the fact that I’ve been able to hit on quite a few bats this week. This team was also solidly above the cash line, but I couldn’t fight my way to the top.

• FINISH: 47.00 PTS / 77 OF 919 FOR $30.

FRIDAY, MAY 8TH

FanDuel really increased the size of the Line Drive for tonight, so this would be a really nice night to finish well ($5,000 to first place).

Team #1 – I mini-stacked the Yankees (at home vs. Baltimore) and the Padres (at Arizona) as I loved the matchups for both teams against average pitchers in hitters’ parks. Gio Gonzalez was the pitcher for this squad, and he came through nicely with a solid 17 point outing. With the masses on Matt Harvey (discussed more below), Gio was a nice change of pace that worked quite well. The stacked teams scored a total of 11 runs, too, which was more than enough for this team to cash in the tournament.

• FINISH: 50.00 PTS / 284 OF 5655 FOR $30.

Team #2 – Matt Harvey was unquestionably the top pitcher of the night, so I had to put him on at least one of my three teams here. Somehow, the Phillies were able to hit him around a little bit, and his seven point performance was definitely on the short list of disappointing starts you will find out of the Mets’ ace. He was 30% owned in this contest, and it was hard for many of his owners to fight their way back into cash contention given Harvey’s high price tag. My team was no exception, and the bats here were average at best. Brett Gardner and David DeJesus gave this squad some life, but none of the other bats topped four points.

• FINISH: 32.50 PTS / 2465 OF 5655 FOR $0.

Team #3 – Jimmy Nelson got the call as the punt option of the night for a few reasons. First, he is a guy who has shown some significant strikeout upside at times this year. Second, he was going against a Cubs team that had been struggling at the plate and striking out a bunch in recent games. Nelson racked up 11 strikeouts in seven innings, but he gave up four runs and was unable to earn a victory. As it turned out, those four points were the difference between this squad cashing vs. not cashing. Some of the bats did very well (Wil Myers, Josh Donaldson), while others disappointed (Stephen Vogt, Ryan Zimmerman, Mookie Betts). A few more breaks the right way, and this team could have cashed nicely. It was right there.

• FINISH: 37.50 PTS / 1562 OF 5655 FOR $0.

SUNDAY, MAY 10TH

Team #1 – The New York Mets (vs. Chad Billingsley) and New York Yankees (vs. Bud Norris) were the stacks on Mother’s Day, so I was rooting for the Big Apple teams to come through for me. Garrett Richards was the pitcher choice on this squad, and I liked him as a tournament option against the strikeout-happy Astros. The stacks performed well as both teams scored 6+ runs, and Richards was great as he took a no-hitter into the seventh inning. Unfortunately, I picked the wrong hitters for each team and missed out on the two highest scoring Mets and the two highest scoring Yankees. This could have easily been at least a minimum cash, but instead I fell just short of the money.

• FINISH: 38.16 PTS / 667 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Team #2 – In retrospect, I wish I would have gotten Pineda on this team, but I went for the chalk ace pick in King Felix Hernandez. That’s not to say that he disappointed, as he put up a solid fifteen point game. The bats were relatively quiet, however, outside of a home run from Miguel Montero. This team still managed to finish in the top half of the tournament and close to Team #1, but it wasn’t enough to cash.

• FINISH: 37.25 PTS / 718 OF 1724 FOR $0.

Team #3 – This was another day where it was very hard to choose a cheap pitcher. I opted for Tyler Lyons because I liked his strikeout upside sometimes I have to be a homer. This didn’t exactly work, though he didn’t kill the team with eight points. Brian McCann and Jason Kipnis provided some thump with their bats, totaling 19 points between them. The problem is that the other six bats combined for -1.25 points, and that’s definitely not going to get the job done in a tournament game!

• FINISH: 25.75 PTS / 1385 OF 1724 FOR $0.

FINAL RESULTS – THROUGH WEEK FIVE

MY ANALYSIS

How quickly things can change. This week was the polar opposite of last week, as I was playing solid guys almost every day. In fact, the aggregate 15-roster-score for this week was the highest of any week I have logged since starting this series (granted, a lot of that was due to the one high-scoring slate on Wednesday). However, none of the entries finished right at the top of this top-heavy tournament, so I was only able to walk away with a $25 profit for the week ($175 of winnings off $150 of entry fees). That’s despite logging a cash rate of 40%, cashing with six of the fifteen rosters. It’s becoming more and more clear that I am going to need to log a top five finish at some point if I want to end the series in the green for the year, but such is life in some of these tournament games!

The other thought that came to me as I was writing this was that hot and cold streaks really have to be a “thing” in DFS. This has been debated numerous times, and the discussion is about as polarizing as BvP. I’ll admit that I probably won’t be able to be convinced that it’s not a thing in the same vein that you won’t be able to convince others that it is. Variance is the obvious answer that the detractors of streaks like to throw out, and that’s probably technically what all this boils down to… for the most part. I still think there’s something to be said for a hot streak that helps you think with a clear mind and grab the right guys. Whatever the case may be, I followed up my worst week of MLB DFS in 3 years with my second-best week of MLB DFS in three years. That was enough to wipe away the losses from the previous week, and I am really excited to see what next week brings.

As always, thanks for reading! See you next week!