Chris Flexen Daily Fantasy News, Rankings, Projections

Most times it's nice when high strikeout pitchers match up with weak contact generators, but sometimes players may not want to use a pitcher (bad peripherals) in their daily fantasy lineup and don't want to attack him either (strong contact management). On the other end of the spectrum, there are pitchers who can be of benefit with a high strikeout rate, but are also worth hunting HRs against. There are cases of each on tonight's slate. Chris Flexen has an atrocious -1.9 K-BB% and batters from either side have a wOBA above .380 against him. However, his 83.3 mph aEV is the lowest on the slight with LHBs having just a 27.3 Hard% through five starts (22 IP). Similarly, Andrew Cashner has a pathetic 2.6 K-BB%, but his 3.4% Barrels/BBE is second lowest on the board and he has a 50% ground ball rate. Perhaps players might need to consider refraining from assaulting him with every left-handed batter in the lineup, a successful tactic in previous years. Jhoulys Chacin doesn't miss a lot of bats, but has the lowest percentage of contact above a 95 mph exit velocity on the board (27.8). However, players can still consider attacking him with LHBs (.344 wOBA, 34 Hard%), except that Matt Carpenter is out of the lineup tonight. Trevor Williams has just a 17.5 K% and 4.71 ERA that nearly matches his 4.60 SIERA, but his 28.7% 95+ mph EV is third lowest on the board. On the other side of the spectrum, Ian Kennedy's 89.5 mph aEV and 10.7% Barrels/BBE are highest on the slate, but he pitches in a big park against an offense that doesn't have a lot of success away from Coors. Jordan Zimmermann's 89 mph aEV is second highest. He's has allowed 26 HRs, but just four over his last seven starts despite allowing 14 runs over his last 8.2 innings. In those seven starts since the break, he has a 30.6 GB% with a hard hit rate above 40% in five of them. An example of a pitcher with the potential for strikeouts, who is also a high HR risk is Asher Wojciechowki, who has a 24.8 K%, but has allowed a HR every 17.8 batters faced this year. Andrew Heaney generated 12 swinging strikes in 82 pitches in his season debut. He also generated a bomb every 20.5 pitches. Mike Fiers has a 22.8 K% this season. He’s now allowed 30 HRs on the season, 12 over his last eight starts, and multiple bombs in four straight. James Shields has a 24.6 K% over the last month, but has allowed 19 HRs over 14 starts, in case there was any extra incentive needed to attack him. Ervin Santana costs more than $8.5K on either site, despite allowing 24 HRs over his last 20 starts, 14 of them to RHBs. Rich Hill's 84.2 mph aEV is the second lowest on the board. However, it's still a good thing for backers that he's pitching in a park that punishes RH power tonight because six of his 13 HRs this year over his last four starts over which he has a 42.9 Hard% and just a 35.2 GB% with his walk rate hitting 10%. His 28.4 K% has been unfazed by the rest of these shenanigans though.

Exactly half of the teams on a 12 game slate have an implied run line above 4.75 runs, where the Rockies once again top the board at 6.71 implied runs, a full run above their opponent, the Mets (5.79). While Chris Flexen had a difficult debut in San Diego (four walks), he did have a 24.0 K-BB% in seven AA starts before making the jump. Tyler Chatwood, though, has been lit up only even making two post-All-Star break appearances totaling five runs and five walks in 1.1 innings. He has a -4.4 K-BB% in 23 innings since June 18th, in which LHBs have a .462 wOBA against him. Michael Conforto (140 wRC+, .258 ISO vs RHP since last season) and Jay Bruce (127 wRC+, .279 ISO vs RHP since 2016) both have a wRC+ above 150 with a hard hit rate above 40% over the last week and should be a staple of daily fantasy lineups tonight. Considering the stat of pitching on this slate, perhaps high cost offense is the way to go. Pittsburgh is a place where players may look at more affordable bats though. Robert Stephenson walked seven in his last start. RHBs have a .389 wOBA and 36.2 Hard% in 71.1 career innings, but LHBs have been even better (.419 wOBA, 43.4 Hard%). Adam Frazier (260 wRC+ last seven days) costs $2.7K on FanDuel, Josh Bell (115 wRC+, .208 ISO vs RHP career) is less than $4K on either site and John Jaso (106 wRC+, .162 ISO vs RHP since 2016) costs $2.6K or less on either.

Chris Flexen was just an “other of note” among Mets prospects via Fangraphs this pre-season, but Baseball America has him 10th in the organization in their mid-season update after the 23 year-old has dominated in his first taste of AA. The Mets don’t normally aggressively promote guys like this, so even if it’s just a spot start, something must have caught their eye and maybe that’s a 24.0 K-BB% in seven starts since being promoted from high A ball with a fastball that sits low to mid-90s. He has all the secondaries (slider, curve, change) with a slider that has improved by bounds this year (according to a local publication). He debuts in one of the top spots on the board in San Diego (86 wRC+, 25.5 K%, 7.1 Hard-Soft% vs RHP) at a reasonable price. Considering that his cost is $500 less on FanDuel and he has been going deep into recent starts (at least six innings in all seven AA starts and at least seven in five), he doesn't have to be just an SP2 paired with a higher cost arm. Cheap Padre bats are usable if not considering Flexen though. Manuel Margot has a 225 wRC+ and 42.9 Hard% over the last week. Wil Myers and Hunter Renfroe both exceed a .200 ISO vs RHP this year and Carlos Asuaje leads the lineup with a 136 wRC+ against RHP this year.