Max Fried Daily Fantasy News, Rankings, Projections

An 11 game Monday night slate to start the weak features a marginal pitching board with just two pitchers hitting the $10K mark, though both do so on both major sites tonight. In fact, both are exactly the same price on either site. While four more reach the $9K price point on FanDuel, none do so on DraftKings, leaving a $1.4K gap between the second and third most expensive pitchers. After walking as many Mets as he struck out two starts back (five each), Max Fried completed seven innings with three earned runs allowed against the Nationals without a walk last time out, but just four strikeouts. He’s struck out just 17 of 100 batters in July, dropping his season rate to 22.9%, but with everything else in his profile remaining nearly elite (4.6 BB%, 49.7 GB%, 86.6 mph EV, 3.8% Barrels/BBE, 33.9% 95+ mph EV). That start against the Mets was only the third time he’s failed to produce a Quality Start in his last 17 tries. A 2.64 ERA is more in line with his FIP (2.57) and xERA (2.95) than contact neutral estimators (6.1 HR/FB). Aside from the lackluster declining strikeout rate at the highest price on the board, additional problems facing Fried tonight are the Phillies’ 109 wRC+ and 21.8 K% vs LHP, some very hitter friendly weather in an already power friendly park in Philadelphia and a potential rain issue. Fried still projects as the top pitcher on the board, but that says more about the state of the board than his expected performance. His contact profile may help him battle the elements in Philadelphia tonight and he projects as a better FanDuel value (Quality Start potential) than DraftKings, despite the same $10.5K cost. While Monday night’s board does lack strikeout upside (only one pitcher above 25%), find out which high priced arms may be superior options to Fried in Monday’s PlateIQ Live Blog.

Two games appear on the docket on DraftKings, but not on FanDuel. That is because one is the second game of a double header at Wrigley and the other is the regularly scheduled game following the completion of a suspended game in San Diego. The second game of the double-header at Wrigley complicates the DraftKings slate because it’s a great hitting spot with the current forecast calling for 20 mph winds blowing out to left field. The easy part is that we can ignore Jack Flaherty returning from injury, but on the other side, Zach Davies will be facing a predominantly right-handed lineup. That Davies has no split (LHBs .360 wOBA, RHBs .361) actually hurts him quite a bit here. The downside, of course, is that in a seven inning game, you probably lose a plate appearance, which is kind of a big deal here, but perhaps the offensive production still gives us four to five trips though the St Louis order? Our best indicator is that the Cardinals still have a 4.92 run team total that’s seventh best on the board.

The game in San Diego may be even more complicated, but is more easily ignored. A press release by the Braves after the initially suspended game stated that the first game would resume and last seven innings, while the regularly scheduled one to follow will be a full nine. We know that Max Fried will be pitching for the Braves in the regularly scheduled game that appears on DraftKings. That’s about all we know. The Padres have not yet named a starter, who will likely be an opener and lineups will not be available before lock because the suspended game doesn’t even resume until an hour after lock. We won’t know who’s pitching. We won’t know who’s hitting. It could even go extra innings. Thankfully, it’s a game that wouldn’t normally be of much interest to daily fantasy players anyway.

It’s really not very pretty below the $9K mark on either site tonight. The middle and lower ends of the board are filled with pitchers who are either struggling, unproven, lack upside and/or are generally dealing with substantial workload limitations, such as Spencer Howard. You probably want to pay up on FanDuel and for at least one SP on DraftKings, where you’re still in need of a lower priced SP2. As far as any mid-range pitchers who may be able to stand on their own, we’re really down to two. Max Fried is striking out nearly a quarter of the batters he faces (24.3%) with good control (6.5 BB%) and lots of weak (86.9 mph EV) ground balls (49.9%). His 3.51 ERA matches his xFIP exactly, while being slightly lower than additional estimators no higher than a 3.78 SIERA. He’s only less than $9K on DraftKings though and the Washington lineup still looks fairly potent against LHP with only two in the projected lineup above a 20 K% vs LHP this season. Atlanta is a positive run environment as well.

Zac Gallen’s 26.3 K% is predicated on just a 9.3 SwStr%, while it’s hard to find many positives in an injury filled season. Perhaps that all of his non-FIP estimators are below his 4.34 is a source of optimism, though, again, they are all built on that questionable strikeout rate. He’s walked 10.3% of batters with a 16.3 HR/FB. However, he is facing the Rangers (78 wRC+ on the road, 87 wRC+ vs RHP) without a DH with three of eight projected batters above a 24 K% vs RHP this season and costs exactly $7.9K on either site.

As a pure SP2 option, well, that’s not easy either. The one guy who may have some upside is Jackson Kowar, who was shipped out in June, after striking out just two of 31 batters with five walks, allowing 10 runs over five innings. In 49 more innings at AAA after being sent down, he had a 5.14 ERA, but with a 34.1 K% (11.1 BB%). He struck out six of 24 Indians, walking three upon his return. He does have a 45 Future Value grade via Fangraphs and costs just $5.3K, while the Orioles have just an 88 wRC+ vs RHP and seven of nine projected starters exceed a 24 K% vs RHP this season. The biggest remaining obstacle is a difficult park.

It has been a pretty impressive season for 25 year old southpaw Max Fried. He’s posted a 4.25 ERA, 3.34 xFIP and 3.86 SIERA with a 24.8% K rate, 6.9% BB rate, 1.21 HR/9, 53.2% GB rate and 11.5% SwStr. He also has a miniscule 4.6% barrel rate and .302 xwOBA allowed. Fried has a 6.39 ERA over the past 30 days, but this number seems very fluky as he’s also posted a 2.58 xFIP, 3.06 SIERA, 25.5% K-BB and .313 xwOBA allowed in that same time frame. Fried gets a great matchup tonight versus a bad Giants offense that has a .302 xwOBA vs. LHP over the past 30 days. They also have just an 87 wRC+ and 23.3% K rate on the year vs. LHP. Fried has gone 5+ innings in 14 of his past 15 starts as the low barrel rate, HR/9 and walk rate all help to him to be a pretty consistent arm. He’s priced at just $8.5k on Draftkings and $8.6k on Fanduel, making him one of the better projected PTS/$ arms on the slate and. He’ll likely see decently high ownership across all contests. The Giants currently have just a 3.64 implied total vs. Fried and the Braves.

Max Fried has struck out 20 of his last 47 batters to drive his season strikeout rate up over 25% (25.1%). To this, he adds a board high 53.3 GB% among those with more than three starts. This has helped him to generate the lowest rate of Barrels/BBE on the board (3.5%), despite an 88.8 mph aEV. Of course, a lot of the hard contact is showing up in a 24.5 LD% and .337 BABIP, but Fried is down to a 3.17 SIERA and 2.49 FIP over the last month. For the season, he has a 3.86 ERA with all estimators below that (including a 2.99 DRA) due to the elevated BABIP. Fried is now one of just four pitchers in the league above both a 50% ground ball rate and 25% strikeout rate with more than 100 pitches. The other three are all fringe Cy Young candidates this year (Stephen Strasburg, Luis Castillo and Sonny Gray). This is a powerful combination that enables pitchers to shut down offenses in virtually any environment. While weather and umpire projects to favor offense more than pitching tonight, Fried should still have some value at a price point around $9K, especially on DraftKings ($8.9K). The Phillies have been perfectly league average vs LHP this year (99 wRC+, 22.2 K%, 15.0 HR/FB).

Without many standouts at the top of the board tonight, this is perhaps the kind of slate where players should look for the bets mid-range value and load up on offense. With a cost of $7.5K on DraftKings in a matchup with upside, Max Fried, very likely fits that description more than most tonight. Despite allowing 39.4% of his contact above a 95 mph EV, a 52.7 GB% has allowed Fried to limit Barrels to 3.7% of batted balls. He does this with above average peripherals (23.7 K%, 7.0 BB%) and while he doesn’t generally go that deep into games, he last failed to complete five innings 12 starts back. A 4.03 ERA is supported by a 3.98 SIERA, but his 3.40 DRA and a .299 xwOBA some 29 points below actual results show some remaining upside. As for the matchup, Fried is at home, which means the White Sox lose a DH. They may have a league average 99 wRC+ vs LHP, but the underlying numbers aren’t pretty and include a 17.9 K-BB% and 12.9 Hard-Soft%. Rostering Fried at a low price tonight leaves players with plenty of options, which include adding another high priced pitcher or several quality bats.