Three MLB Stacks to Target: Friday, June 14th
Stacking has become a common strategy used in tournaments on FanDuel. The concept is simple – roster multiple players from teams with the best MLB odds to score the most runs.
Colorado Rockies (6.5 implied run total)
To nobody’s surprise, the Colorado Rockies own Friday’s highest implied run total as they are set to host the San Diego Padres and Cal Quantrill. Despite a 4.85 ERA, Quantrill has pitched better than expected for San Diego with a 23.4% strikeout rate and impressive 13.7% whiff-rate. Quantrill has never projected as a strong strikeout pitcher and is more likely to settle in with a below league average strikeout rate.
Perhaps the biggest concern heading into Friday’s start for Quantrill is his reliance on vertical movement to get opposing hitters out. So far this season Quantrill has thrown his Sinker 26.5% of the time and his Changeup 25.6% of the time. While his Sinker has rated positively this season, it’s unlikely to be as effective due to the altitude. Quantrill’s Changeup, which has been his worst pitch this season, is unlikely to find sudden success in this environment and is a cause for concern.
Nolan Arenado, Trevor Story, and Charlie Blackmon are Colorado’s top hitters to target.
Minnesota Twins (6.2 implied run total)
Minnesota’s offensive production has been one of the bigger surprises of the season. The Twins lead the league with a 122 wRC+ versus right-handed pitching and are running laps around the rest of the league with a ridiculous .251 ISO. Power is what we want to chase when stacking teams and the Twins have a ton of it with seven hitters in their projected lineup (Max Kepler, Jorge Polanco, Nelson Cruz, Eddie Rosario, C.J. Cron, Miguel Sano, and Jason Castro) owning ISO’s north of .200 against right-handed pitching over the last two seasons.
Notably, the hitting environment in Minnesota is expected to be extremely favorable on Friday night with temperatures over 80-degrees and winds blowing out to left-field at 10+ mph. While it’s a relatively small sample, Kevin Roth’s Weather Edge tool shows an 11.4% increase in HRs over 18 games with similar weather conditions.
San Diego Padres (6.1 implied run total)
The Padres round out Friday’s list with the third highest implied run total on the slate. San Diego gets the Coors boost as they’ll face off against Jeff Hoffman in Denver. While Hoffman has posted some gaudy strikeout numbers in five starts for the Rockies (10.17 K/9) he has really struggled with run prevention, allowing 23 earned runs and six HRs over that span. As a team, San Diego strikes out a lot but they also have a ton of power in their lineup which makes them an attractive power stack to target.
Manny Machado, Fernando Tatis, Franmil Reyes, and Wil Myers are San Diego’s top hitters to target.