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Listening to Crunchtime, it sounds like both the Yankees and Phillies games are too risky to load up on. If we can’t play either Gary Sanchez or J.T. Realmuto, then I’d rather just save salary at catcher and go for a cheaper bat with power upside. Mike Zunino fits that bill, even from the bottom of the lineup.
Griffin Canning has the top SwStr rate (15.5%) on the slate
Aside from Chris Sale, today’s slate features several good or at least high upside pitchers in tough spots. Griffin Canning is no different, having to face a Dodger lineup (120 wRC+, 9.2 K-BB%, 16.6 HR/FB, 26.1 Hard-Soft% vs RHP) who will even add a DH tonight. However, Canning has struck out 26.9% of batters in his rookie season, while owning the top SwStr rate on the board (15.5%) with just a 6.4 BB% and while his .232 BABIP is unsustainable, he’s combined swings and misses with strong contact management (86.6 mph aEV). In no way is this an enviable spot, but there are at least five pitchers who are more costly on either site and the only pitcher below his price tag above a 24 K% is at Coors (where Yu Darvish may not be a terrible flyer to take at $6.2K on this slate either, by the way). Players who aren’t paying up for Chris Sale tonight and are looking for a pitcher with some upside may consider Canning if they can stomach the immense risk.
Attack Here With Lefties
This is not as much of a must play Coors Field game as usual with two upside pitchers on the mound. But the Cubs lefties have a favorable matchup with German Marquez showing big splits again this season. He does have some ground ball ability, but striking out just 18.2% of lefties is going to leave too many balls in play at this altitude. Kyle Schwarber is a patient batter who can hit the ball in the air from the top of the lineup at a fair price for both cash games and tournaments.
High Upside Lineup At A Discount
The Phillies bats look way too cheap on DK/FDRFT for a home game against Taylor Clarke and his 15.8% strikeout rate. We don’t have much sample size yet, but Clarke has managed just a 12.1% K rate in his young career against lefties while allowing a .229 ISO. Bryce Harper’s issue this season has been strikeouts, and those are not a concern against Clarke, allowing Harper’s hard hit ability to shine through at a discounted price.
Chris Sale is the highest upside pitcher tonight by a wide margin (Rangers 26.4 K% vs LHP)
Chris Sale’s 34.9 K% tops the slate by 4.5 points after a three-hit shutout in Kansas City where he struck out 12. He’s hit double digits in Ks in seven of his last nine starts, while his 2.97 ERA over the last month is actually well above his estimators (2.35 SIERA) and .221 xwOBA. The part that makes him nearly impossible to fade completely tonight is that the Rangers have just an 86 wRC+ and 26.4 K% vs LHP this year. That latter number is the second highest split on the board and the pitcher going against the highest L/R team strikeout split on the board is Jason Vargas (Yankees 27 K% vs LHP). While Vargas has been better recently, he still has a sub-20% strikeout rate. In addition, the only other pitcher above a 27 K% tonight (Charlie Morton) is facing an Oakland offense with just a 20.9 K% vs RHP this year. No other pitcher can come close to matching Sale’s upside tonight. While that may be true on a lot of boards he’s on, especially with fewer than 10 games, it would seem even truer tonight. Sale is the most expensive pitcher on the slate, but not incredibly so.
Too Much Righty Power
Jason Vargas has been on a remarkable run of real life results, but there is nothing in his underlying numbers to suggest that it will continue. He has struck out a below average 19% of right-handed batters, allowing 10% walks and 41% hard contact. Like teammate Gleyber Torres, Aaron Hicks has rough looking surface numbers against lefties this season, but a huge 61% hard hit rate says it’s small sample size noise. Going back to the bigger sample size of 2018-2019, Hicks has a .221 ISO on 47% hard hits against lefties.
Too Much Righty Power
Jason Vargas has been on a remarkable run of real life results, but there is nothing in his underlying numbers to suggest that it will continue. He has struck out a below average 19% of right-handed batters, allowing 10% walks and 41% hard contact. Gleyber Torres has struck out a lot this season and has ugly surface numbers against lefties, but that has brought his salary down too far for this matchup. He still has a solid hard hit rate this season and looking back over the longer term data, from 2018-2019, this is a guy with a .262 ISO against left-handed pitching.
Just Play The Best
There are a lot of good pitchers on the mound tonight, but there is no question which one is the best. We can quibble about matchups and salary, but Chris Sale has double digit strikeouts in seven of his last nine starts and easily the highest strikeout rate on this slate. He is facing a Rangers team that lacks right-handed power and there are enough value bats to make lineups work with an expensive pitcher tonight.
Mets have a team 129 wRC+ and 25 HR/FB over the last week
Masahiro Tanaka has his swinging strike rate up to 13.4% over the last month, though hasn’t improved on a 21.4 K% at all over that span. The good news is that his 14.7 HR/FB is league average this year (16.2 career). The estimators are all a bit above his 3.42 ERA due to disbelief in a career high 78.6 LOB% with a reduced strikeout rate. However, if the strikeouts regress closer back towards his career level, there may not be much issue with sustaining this performance. What might be interesting here are at least a couple of Mets bats with a significant park upgrade and Tanaka’s lack of a substantial platoon split. The first being Pete Alonso (131 wRC+, .298 ISO vs RHP) against a potentially HR prone pitcher in Yankee Stadium. Another is a fairly cheap Jeff McNeil (144 wRC+ vs RHP last calendar year), who costs just $3.6K on DK ($3K on FD). The Mets do have a board high 129 team wRC+ and 25 HR/FB over the last week.
Other tagged players: Jeff McNeil, Masahiro Tanaka LHBs have a .371 wOBA, .392 xwOBA against Taylor Clarke
Taylor Clarke is not missing bats (15.8 K%, 8.4 SwStr%. His 42.3 Z-O-Swing% is worst on the board, which has led to 10% of his batted balls being classified as Barrels and a .365 xwOBA that’s second worst on the board. It would then seem a bit fluky that he’s only allowed 8.3% of his fly balls to leave the yard, which puts his SIERA and xFIP more than a half run above his 4.43 ERA. With nearly half the teams on a nine game slate above five implied runs, no particular attention should be paid to what’s been an average Philadelphia offense at 5.11, especially with potential weather concerns, but LHBs have hammered Clarke in a small sample (.371 wOBA, .392 xwOBA, 40.5 Hard%). Bryce Harper (123 wRC+, .207 ISO vs RHP last calendar year) and Jay Bruce (109 wRC+, .281 ISO) are the obvious Philadelphia offerings from that side. The latter has been tearing the cover off the ball (266 wRC+, 55 Hard% last seven days). Also interesting though, is that Cesar Hernandez (103 wRC+, .139 ISO) has been working near the top of the lineup with McCutchen out and though he doesn’t have nearly as much power, he costs quite a bit less than those other guys ($3.6K DK, $2.8K FD), making him potentially one of the top values on the board. Also, while Clarke has just a .255 wOBA against same-handed batters, xwOBA drives that up 68 points, making Rhys Hoskins (143 wRC+, .287 ISO) a perfectly viable stacking compliment, especially at a reasonable $4.2K on DraftKings.
Other tagged players: Bryce Harper, Cesar Hernandez, Rhys Hoskins, Taylor Clarke Power + Speed
I have a confession to make: I pretty much always stack against Anibal Sanchez. Doing so has been more unsuccessful than not over the last two seasons but I’ve been tainted from the 2015-2018 seasons in which Sanchez owned a HR-to-fly ball ratio north of 15.5% each season. Chasing HRs is a worthy cause when stacking and this is undoubtedly a good power spot for White Sox hitters. If Kurt Suzuki draws the start behind home plate, it would also become an extremely good stolen base matchup for the Sox. The combination of power + speed matchup is good for the stack as a whole but also gives someone like Yoan Moncada, who excels in both areas, ridiculous upside.
Other tagged players: Yoan Moncada, Eloy Jimenez, Yonder Alonso, Tim Anderson
Plenty of Question Marks
Michael Wacha was sent to the bullpen after struggling to start the season but is expected to grab Monday’s start for the Cardinals against the Marlins. Wacha couldn’t ask for a much better matchup as the Marlins own the fourth highest strikeout rate in the league (25.1%) against right-handed pitching and the second worst wRC+ (77). Despite the elite context in pitcher friendly Marlins Park, there are plenty of question marks surrounding Wacha, including effectiveness and pitch count, which makes him a better tournament option than cash game play.
Sneaky Strikeout Prowess
On a slate with Chris Sale, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Charlie Morton, Mike Minor, Masahiro Tanaka, and German Marquez on it, it is Griffin Canning who leads the way with a massive 15.5% whiff rate. Canning has been a consistent fantasy producer for the Angels this season largely thanks to his 26.9% strikeout rate which has helped increase his floor on a game-to-game basis. Canning gets an extremely tough home matchup on Monday night against the Dodgers but I am still eyeing him up in tournaments because of the strikeout prowess he has shown through 38.1 innings pitched this season.
Hasn't Found It
Jason Vargas has been good through 45.1 innings pitched for the Mets but advanced metrics would confirm the notion that the southpaw hasn’t suddenly “found it” in his age 36 season. Vargas is the owner of a 5.05 SIERA and has certainly been over-performing his actual skill-set. This is a tough spot for Vargas who has struggled with the long ball during the latter part of his career which puts all Yankees right-handed power hitters in play in virtually all formats.
Other tagged players: Gary Sanchez, Aaron Hicks, Gleyber Torres, DJ LeMahieu, Clint Frazier If Lefty Mashers Exist, They Look Like This Guy
I’m all over the chalky Twins today, starting with Nelson Cruz against bad lefty Ryan Carpenter and this poor Tigers bullpen. Cruz should have high ownership as he’ll hold the platoon advantage and remains affordable across the industry, but I don’t care. He’s someone I’d seriously consider for cash games and I will be overweight on Twins stacks in GPPs.
