TJ's Top Tournament Takes for MLB DFS on FanDuel - September 13th
TJ Zwarych is one of the top up-and-coming Daily Fantasy Sports players in the world, and recently qualified for FanDuel’s World Fantasy Baseball Championship Live Final in Chicago. Not only is he a long-time RotoGrinders member with multiple 6-figure DFS wins, but he is also the Editor-In-Chief of TV & Film media outlet the Agents of Fandom and host of their podcast. A few times per week, TJ will be giving his top tournament takes for FanDuel to help you take down tournaments.
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September 13th
We’re fresh off a successful weekend at the Fanduel World Fantasy Baseball Championship as I managed to squeak out a 16th-place finish behind a gem from Nick Lodolo and a 9th-inning home run from Eloy Jimenez. I want to give a huge congratulations to Rotogrinders’ own SquirrelPatrol for his second-place finish, in what was probably his 795th live final appearance. It was so awesome getting to meet John as well as RG’s Andy Means, Kristi Metzer, and Andre Alford.
Top Tournament Pitchers on FanDuel
We get Jacob Degrom chalk night on this fine Tuesday, and it’s tough to disagree with a heavily rostered player when his talent is arguably the greatest of all time at the pitching position. We’re likely to see just shy of 50% Degrom tonight, and potentially even higher in smaller field tournaments. His 12k price tag and the beautiful hitting weather in New York tonight provide a couple of potential reasons we can pivot, however, I could never tell you not to play a pitcher in this good of a matchup with this strong of a skill set. Degrom’s sub-2 XFIP this season and 41% strikeout rate is so far above the field tonight, that I’m seriously considering locking him into my 150 lineups I’ll be playing on Fanduel.
I’m not going to mess around with many of the other high-priced pitchers tonight, because although they provide discounts to Degrom, I can’t see them matching him. Cole and Kershaw both have matchups that I don’t feel comfortable attacking tonight, and the only other pricey ace I’ll look to tonight will be Yu Darvish (10.4K). Although the Mariners have a lot of power upside, they also strike out at a fairly high clip of 20.9% in tonight’s projected lineup. Outside of Darvish and Degrom, I may try and take a few shots in the mid-tier to try and get some expensive bats with the likes of Joe Ryan at 8.9K vs Royals or Jakob Junis at 7.2K against the Braves…but I don’t feel good about it. Tonight, you’ll find me with a bare minimum of 75% Jacob Degrom.
Top Tournament Stacks on FanDuel
Due to people wanting to pay up for Degrom, we’re going to see some condensed rostership flowing towards the likes of the Orioles, Yankees, and Twins due to the prices of their stacks. While I like these teams and will certainly be playing them in my MME builds, there are other sneakier options we can capitalize on to differentiate from the field tonight.
Oakland Athletics – The A’s are my favorite value stack on the board tonight, and I’m not really sure why more people aren’t getting there at the moment. They receive a park upgrade heading to Texas and face young Cole Ragans who has an abysmal .254 ISO and .364 wOBA to right-handed batters so far this season in a limited sample size. Laureano, Pinder, and Langeliers make up one of my preferred value stacks on the slate rounded out with my top catcher option for tournaments, Sean Murphy. To those of you who get to this article prior to Grinders Live tonight, you’re privy to some Spidey Bomb early access as Murphy is my first home run call of the night.
Chicago White Sox – After a season full of disappointment, the White Sox bats have finally been getting things back on track lately. Even outside of Coors, Chad Kuhl is a pitcher we always want to target, as he probably shouldn’t be throwing pitches in the major leagues right now. Eloy Jimenez makes for one of my most rostered one-offs on the slate, and I’m more than happy targeting players from both sides of the plate tonight, as Kuhl can’t strike anyone out and gives up more than a 40% hard-hit rate to both sides.
Los Angeles Dodgers – The Dodgers will be my primary target in lineups I’m pivoting off Degrom, with Betts, Turner and Freeman being my top options against the Diamondbacks. Merril Kelly has been getting hit harder as of late and has been tuned up for 5 home runs in his last 4 starts. However, what makes the Dodgers my top overall team on the slate is how they can be mixed and matched with various pitchers. While we can pay up for the top 3 spots in the lineup with our mid-tier pitchers, we can also mix in the back half of Smith, Muncy, and the rest of the lineup with Degrom. On a wide-open slate with many offenses in interesting spots tonight, the Los Angeles Dodgers will be my most rostered.