DFS Alerts
A High Upside Arm
Sale and Scherzer will undoubtedly get most of the attention on this opening day slate, but don’t forget about Chris Archer. He’s one of the only pitchers who can rival the strikeout upside of those other aces, and he might have the third highest ceiling on the slate. The difficult matchup against Boston and having Sale on the mound on the other side will likely serve to lower ownership a bit, and I love Archer’s potential to win someone a GPP here. He’s a great pick, especially if you are trying to leverage a Sale fade.
Other-Wordly Numbers Against Lefties
With Bryce Harper and friends getting postponed on Opening Day, Mike Trout and Giancarlo Stanton move to the top of the list of elite plays. JA Happ is not a bad pitcher, but Stanton has too much talent for him. Stanton took more walks than strikeouts leading to a .449 OBP, and when he saw a pitch he liked, he didn’t miss it. He posted a .480 wOBA, .441 ISO and 1.213 OPS in 2017. He’s set for a huge year with his new team.
Underpriced in an Exploitable Matchup
Clayton Richard has a high ground ball rate, but he has never fared well against right-handed hitters. In 2017, he allowed a .352 xwOBA and a 38% hard contact rate to righties. Even though Petco Park isn’t the most hitter-friendly venue around, the Brewers still have plenty of fantasy appeal. Their lineup is loaded with right-handed power, including Ryan Braun. Last season, Braun had a 47% hard contact rate against southpaws with a strikeout rate under 10%.
An Intriguing Cheap Pitcher Choice
Opening Day is generally not the day where we want to go cheap at pitcher, but you can certainly make a case for it in GPP formats. Garrett Richards missed the majority of last season with an injury, but he came back and got some action toward the end of the year. He struggled a bit toward the end of Spring Training, but he looks healthy and carries plenty of upside against an Oakland lineup that projects to be below average this season. Give Richards a look in GPP formats or on DraftKings where you need a SP #2.
One of my Favorite Stacks of the Slate
Jake Odorizzi is coming off of a disappointing 2017 campaign and he’ll have his hands full right from the start. He is making his Twins debut today and is facing the Orioles in the home run-friendly Camden Yards. Odorizzi is a fly-ball pitcher that gives up a lot of hard contact, especially to right-handed hitters. This plays right into the strengths of the Orioles, as the top five hitters in their lineup all bat from the right side and all have good power against right-handed pitching. Manny Machado is an elite play in all formats and you can pair him up with his teammates if you are looking for a full stack.
A Top Stack against an Aging Pitcher
If there is one concept that won me the most money in MLB last year, it was targeting left-handed power against James Shields. The Royals have a lot of left-handed bats, so they are definitely an intriguing opening day stack. Moustakas and Duda are your key power bats here, and perhaps this is a spot where Alex Gordon can break out after his underwhelming 2017 performance. Shields allowed a .388 wOBA and pitched to a nearly 6.00 xFIP against left-handed batters a year ago. Yikes. Fire up any and all of the Kansas City lefties here.
Other tagged players: Alex Gordon, Lucas Duda Power with Contact Against a Weak Pitcher
Moustakas is a core play at his salary on DK/FantasyDraft. James Shields allowed a ton of power to left-handed batters along with low strikeouts and high walks in 2017. Moustakas makes strong contact for a power hitter, striking out at just 16% while posting a .268 ISO and hitting a home run once every 13.8 AB vs RHP. A lot of upside at this salary.
Lefty Masher Too Cheap on FanDuel
A fine play on DK/FDRFT, but Braun is way underpriced on FanDuel against a low K lefty. Braun had more walks than strikeouts to go with a 47% hard hit rate against LHP in 2017. With Clayton Richard carrying just a 13.9% K rate to righties, Braun will have plenty of chances to put those hard hits to use.
The Sneaky Opening Day Stack
Finding that diamond in the rough GPP stack is always fun. It doesn’t take a lot of intestinal fortitude to stack against guys like Homer Bailey and James Shields. With that said, I am a little higher on the overall Angels offense this year than a lot of people are. I like the addition of Kinsler, and guys like Trout, Upton, and Pujols always bring power potential to the table. The Angels are my favorite sneaky stack on Opening Day against a hittable pitcher in Graveman. If they can knock him out early and get to the middle relief, a potential outburst could await.
Other tagged players: Justin Upton, Albert Pujols Elite Bat on a High Scoring Team
All of the top Houston righties are strong plays against Hamels and his below average strikeouts, combined with 38% hard hits allowed in 2017. Correa will be in the middle of one of the league’s best lineups after posting a .445 wOBA vs LHP in 2017 with just 11.4% K and a 43.2% hard hit rate.
Nice Power Upside
Mancini is under 3k on FanDuel for Opening Day, and presents some really solid upside for his price. Odorizzi is a reverse splits pitcher. He had a .326 wOBA with a 41.4% hard contact rate against right-handed hitters last season. Odorizzi threw his fastball 45% against righties last season. Mancini had a .503 wOBA against fastballs from right-handed pitchers last season, and a .543 wOBA against the average speed of Odorizzi’s fastball. Mancini had a .221 ISO with a 34.5% hard hit rate against right-handed pitching last season.
Cheaper Pitcher To Target
The Padres made a few offseason moves, but I don’t expect them to be much better than last season. Eric Hosmer is the only hitter on the roster that had a wOBA over .350 against right-handed pitching last season. Will Myers is the only projected starter that had an ISO over .200 against righties last season. All the projected starters except Hosmer had a strikeout rate over 18% against right-handed pitching last season. Anderson’s xFIP was 4.33 last season, but his WHIP was 1.09 in 2017 compared to his 1.37 WHIP in 2016. His 10.2% swinging strike rate was the best of his career, and he presents some solid upside in this matchup.
Low Floor With A High Ceiling
I’m always willing to take a chance on a guy like Dylan Bundy. He had an 11.4% swinging strike rate last season, and a 21.8% strikeout rate. He struggled with home runs, and finished the season with a 36.5% hard contact rate. He’s much better against righties, and even though the Twins only project three righties in the lineup, two of their best power hitters are right-handed. If he can work around Rosario, Morrison, and Kepler, he should exceed his value for his price tag.
Excellent Source Of Value
I was shocked when Nick Williams was hitting third, and Herrera was out of the lineup for the Phillies. It does present great value though. Teheran allowed a .338 wOBA with a 35.8% hard contact rate to left-handed hitters last season. He also had a 5.56 xFIP against lefties in 101 innings last season. Williams hit .293 with ten home runs in 229 ABs against right-handed pitching. He had an .205 ISO with a 38.3% hard contact rate against righties.
Chris Sale (36.2 K%) struck out 12 or more Rays (25.9 K% vs LHP) three times last year
Boston at Tampa Bay features two pitchers with enormous upside and injury concerns. Chris Archer had a 29.2 K% last season, but also an 89 mph aEV that’s highest on the board for the entire day. However, his .292 xwOBA and especially his .269 home xwOBA were still well under the league average mark. There are a couple of issues here though. First, the Red Sox don’t strike out a lot (19.7% vs RHP). That’s not a deal breaker by itself, but they also added a lot of power in J.D. Martinez (147 wRC+, .351 ISO vs RHP). Archer also experienced some forearm soreness last week. He’s since thrown a 30 pitch bullpen and been proclaimed fit, but this can be a concerning injury as it is sometimes a precursor to a UCL injury. That may not be the case here at all, but it’s something to think about. Chris Sale had his own injury scare, leaving his last spring start very early after being hit by a comebacker to the hip. He too has been pronounced fit after a bullpen on Monday. The hip is unlikely to be a concern unless the early exit affects his workload today. Sale has averaged nearly seven innings over the last two years and led all of baseball with a 36.2 K%. The Rays had a 25.9 K% against LHP last and could be even worse this year. Sale faced them five time last season, striking out at least eight in every outing and at least 12 in three of them. The top pitcher on the board in this spot, Chris Sale is also the most expensive one on the main slate.
Other tagged players: Chris Archer, JD Martinez