DFS Alerts
Good, Not Elite
Make no mistake, Luis Castillo is a good pitcher, but DraftKings priced these Cubs hitters as if Castillo was the top arm in the league. Lefties are my favorite Cubs hitters to target as Castillo has fared much worse against them this season. Left handed hitters own a .385 wOBA and 4.13 xFIP against Castillo this season while right handed hitters own a .260 wOBA and 3.18 xFIP. Cubs lefties aren’t priced as friendly on FanDuel but are still in play in all formats there.
Bat and Legs
Cleveland hitters are expensive and will be tough to squeeze into lineups if you’re running at Justin Verlander as SP1 but it needs to be highlighted how good of a matchup this is. The Indians have the second highest implied run total on the slate (5.5) and not only get a strong hitting matchup but an extremely favorable stolen base matchup as well against Francisco Liriano. If paying up for hitters from this Cleveland team I’m targeting guys like Jose Ramirez and Francisco Lindor who can get it done both with their bat and with their legs.
Lefty Masher
I listed Stanton as my favorite GPP option but reality is that you can play this fella in cash games too. Stanton draws an ideal matchup against a below average pitcher in Yankee Stadium that can’t miss bats (14.9 K%). As you know by now, Stanton’s splits against lefties are amazing – for his career he’s posted a 172 wRC+ and .338 ISO. Stanton is actually priced relatively inexpensive for this context as he’s under $5,000 on DK and just $4,300 on FD.
Cream of the Crop
Outside of Chris Sale who is expected to be limited to 3-4 IP on Sunday, Justin Verlander has the highest strikeout rate on the slate (33.6%), the lowest SIERA (2.76), and the second highest swinging strike-rate (14.1%). Justin Verlander is clearly the cream of the crop on Sunday with Sale out of the picture and Jacob deGrom taking on the Red Sox in Boston. JV’s price tag is expensive but it’s a Sunday in September – there should be plenty of value hitters available where fitting JV into your lineups takes negligible effort.
Great Bat for A Cheap Price
If you weren’t already aware, Murphy is a pretty darn good batter. He owns a .191 ISO and .369 wOBA in 2018 thus far vs. RHP and in all honesty when you look at his .416 CXwOBA and 9.4% k rate you know that those numbers are underselling him. He draws a matchup against Castillo who has been downright bad vs. lefties and owns a .367 wOBA and .258 ISO against lefties. The one thing we generally have to worry about against Castillo is his high k rate, but as mentioned earlier, Murphy doesn’t strike out often. This is a safe spot with some huge upside at a very low price. You should pretty much give Murphy the lock button in cash and probably have over the field in GPP’s
Huge Upside for The Price
It looks like DK is just pricing Dozier for how he’s been playing and not how he should be playing. On the year, Dozier owns a .418 CXwOBA and a .197 ISO vs. RHP, yet only owns a .296 wOBA. a lot of this has too do with his large k rate and low walk rate, but this guy has huge upside and is going against Gibson who gives up hard contact to righties at a near 40% rate. There’s a decent chance that Dozier has a ball leave the yard here and at just 3.1k over on DK this is way too cheap of a price tag. Throw him in as a cheap 1 off and make sure to include him in your Royals stacks.
Another Day, Another Free Square
There’s few things in life I hate doing more than writing up Forsythe, but I find myself doing it nearly every day. DK for some reason refuses to up his price to an even moderately reasonable level. I get that he hasn’t been great, but anytime you can get a guy hitting in the middle of a lineup going against a bad pitcher for under 3k, you don’t think too much and you just lock him in in cash. This is an easy call. Junis is a below average pitcher pitching in a decent pitchers park, but it’s gonna be warm enough to negate this. Now, stop reading this and just throw him in already.
A Clear Mispricing
There is no reason for a pitcher as good as Pivetta to be priced at 7.4k over on DK especially when he’s facing a trash team like the Marlins. Pivetta has outstanding numbers on the year with a 3.44 xFIP, 27.4% k rate, and a tiny 7.4% walk rate. He draws a matchup against the Marlins which may have the worst hitting lineup in all of baseball. They own a piss poor .144 Iso, .304 wOBA, and a 20.3% K rate. Don’t overthink this spot. You are getting a near ace pitcher with huge upside going against a team that has talent, but they’re way too young to put it all together. Enjoy the free square on DK.
The Wild Ride Continues
If you’ve been on the wild ride that is playing the White Sox pitching staff lately then you know that there is no safety, but huge upside. Giolito has been a man to be reckoned with at times in the last month, but at other times has been the trash that smells so bad I have to take it to the cans in the front yard rather than throw it away in the kitchen. over the last 79 starts Giolito has 4 starts over 19 dk points and 2 negative dk point starts. He draws a matchup against the Orioles who only own a 151 ISO, .301 wOBA and a high 24% k rate vs. RHP. This is a more likely boom spot than bust and the price is right that you just throw him into your lineup and move on.
Jarlin Garcia will start for the Marlins on Saturday
The Miami Marlins originally had Elieser Hernandez slated as their most likely starter for Saturday’s matchup with the Philadelphia Phillies, but they’ve now opted to hand the ball to Jarlin Garcia, who has been working primarily out of the bullpen since late-July. This sets up tonight’s contest as a full-blown bullpen game for Miami, and Garcia should be treated as just an opener. There’s yet to be any confirmation on who, if anybody, will work a majority of the innings, but Garcia. like Hernandez, is a right-handed pitcher, so his presence on the bump shouldn’t alter the projections of the Phillies hitters in any significant fashion, if at all. That said, still be sure to double check out the Starting Lineups page and projections in LinuepHQ for any notable changes prior to submitting lineups for the main slate this evening.
As reported by: Clark Spencer via Twitter
A Clear Mispricing
I really don’t understand how Williams is only priced at 3.7k over on DK today. On the season vs. RHP he owns a .194 ISO, .340 wOBA, and a .449 CXwOBA. The guy is crushing the ball this year and is batting in the middle of a potent lineup with the Phil’s. He draws a matchup against Hernandez in a decent ballpark. On the year vs. lefties, Hernandez owns a terrible .394 wOBA and .205 ISO. He is getting crushed by lefties and is walking lefties at the same clip as righties. This an easy lock in spot for Williams here if you need the money and don’t forget to throw him in your Phi stacks
A Cheap Power Bat
Look, Chris Davis is a trash player right now. There’s no way around it, but he is due for some positive regression and he doesn’t have a terrible matchup. On the vs. RHP, Davis owns a .425 CXwOBA compared to an abysmal .259 wOBA meaning that he’s due for a lot of positive regression. One of the biggest issues with Davis is his 35% k rate vs. RHP, but on the season Lopez is only K’ing lefties at a 16.9% clip. There is a decent chance that Davis puts up a big fat 0 here, but there is also a decent chance he ends the day with a bomb. Take the upside at this price and move on.
Still Way Too Darn Cheap
I pretty much have to keep playing Forsythe and write him up every week, because DK just seems to hate raising his price. His numbers on the season are by no means fantastic, but the guy is still a pretty decent hitter and is batting in the middle of the lineup. He gets a matchup today against Kennedy who is not a great pitcher, doesn’t K a ton of guys, gives up a huge amount of fly ball’s and hard contact, and it’s pretty decent hitting conditions over in KC today. This is simply a don’t overthink it cash game spot here that allows you to get in some high priced bats and pitching.
A Pitcher Who's Been Hot Lately
Over the last 3 starts, Lopez has showed the kind of upside we were always looking for earlier in the year. On DK, he has 30, 22, and 25 points in the last 3 (2 of which were against the Yankee’s and Angels who are two of the better hitting teams in the league). Lopez draws a matchup against the Orioles who have really under preformed this year.The current projected lineup has a 22.7% k rate for the Orioles and only a 7% walk rate which should drastically limit the amount of base-runners for Lopez. In addition, the projected lineup only owns a .135 ISO, so Lopez’s HR tendency’s should be mostly negated. Overall, this is a big plus matchup for Lopez, and if he can continue to pitch the way he has been, he could end up as one of the top scoring arms on the slate.
Boom or Bust Cheapie
There’s a whole lot of ways that this could end badly, but conversely there are a whole lot of ways where this could end with Ramirez as the top scoring PT/$ play of the night. On the year, Ramirez has not been a great pitcher from a real life perspective. He’s walking a ton of guys, getting average K’s, and owns a sky high 5.59 xFIP, but his matchup leaves him with a ton of upside. In the Sox projected lineup, there is a projected 25.8% k rate and realistically, that number should probably be higher. There are only 3 bats in the lineup with under a 25% k rate and only 1 bat with over an 8% walk rate which should drastically add to Ramirez’s safety. Yes, he has huge FB numbers, but as long as he can land on the right side of HR/FB variance he can cruz through this lineup.