Jump into a new week, soldiers! If you are new to the Army, let me be one of the first to welcome you in. If you are just reading this from “the outside,” don’t worry. I’m not the type to pull a Donald Trump and fortify the walls so you can’t see what we are up to inside our community built to teach you how to become a better and better DFS player no matter your skill level. In fact, we’d love to have you, too, because there are only three things in life you can count on: Death, Taxes, and Continued Education. We can all learn from everyone, and I hope we foster that community in the DFS Army openly enough everyone feels they can take knowledge and give back so we all grow together.
If you are the brand newest player, take a peek here and join us.
**Editors Note** Fanduel is running a sweet promotion for new accounts right now! Here’s how it works:
Create a new account via this link: REGISTER FOR FANDUEL
Then enter a FanDuel league now and if you don’t win any prize in your first contest, they’ll refund your entry fee up to $120 back to your FanDuel account for additional play. Make sure to take FULL advantage of this by entering a contest with up to a $120 entry fee. Worst case you lose and they will put the $120 back in to your account.
However, if you are not new to DFS and are just new to The Army, take a look at what you gain access to as a VIP.
Chin Music (no link needed as you are already reading it) – Weekday article with slate skimming efficiency to point your research in the right direction.
Choppo’s Dinks and Dunks – 10 min video series using screen capture software to teach concepts you can immediately apply.
Chalkies and Cheapies – A quick hitting table of daily names that should be your “chalk” and the cheapest player in a good matchup for the day to use as your punt.
Boomer’s Bombers – Our cheatsheet of daily picks you use to upgrade off of your “cheapies.” Cheatsheet is backed by the analysis of our resident MLB professional Keith Hall. Keith also provides key statistics each day in spreadsheet form and advice about how to pivot off the chalk and construct your lineups to win the bigger tourneys on both FanDuel and DraftKings.
Exclusive Slack Channel Membership to all DFS Army members – Here you put your knowledge to the test and also solicit feedback from both our regulars and pros alike in an effort to maximize your ROI in all the games you play whether it be MLB, PGA, NBA, NFL, or eSports. If it’s offered, we have you covered. This community cannot be undersold. We have free leagues, bragging rights leagues, t-shirt giveaways, a lot of smack talk, and a lot of cheering for our members when the succeed.
As if that’s not enough, we have plans for the upcoming NFL season that will take our community to the next level in the industry. We have some tools coming and our own special brand of content from Kevin (@ffootballgeek) will be cranking back up with plenty of twists in how we deliver the content. Don’t think I’m exaggerating when I tell you we’ve been talking and planning NFL 2016 since about Christmas of 2015. NFL drives what we do, and we plan to deliver the best content to you if you become a VIP and join out community. We’ve already had many players mention how inexpensive we are compared to other sites and compared to what we deliver. And, it’s going getting better as we grow.
Decent slate of games today. I’ll break them down for you by looking at Vegas and where my mind naturally gravitates. You need only understand one thing about me. I love chalk. My natural tendency is to load up the picks everyone else also likes because they are so obvious. If you want to win a tournament, you need to use my tendencies to identify where the masses will be so you can go off the beaten path in a couple spots. Baseball is inherently random at times and the obvious picks fail….a lot. Position yourself for that to happen and you don’t need to be right very often to cash in. You literally use me to tell you how to win money. Not so much in my picks, but in my ability to tell you where everyone else is also heading.
I will also add that the newer guys need to head to the smaller slates of 3-6 games. These are easier to process information/research and help you get off on the right foot. Also, the luck factor gives you a MUCH better chance in these games. I would also stick to smaller tourneys like 500-1000 players or even less. One of my favorites is the $1 mini-Bunt. It has 295 players in it and pays just over 20% of the field. They are some of the easiest tourneys to cash frequently. And, you will beat 300 players more often than you will beat 10,000 players. That said, let’s hold our noses and jump in the deep waters of today’s MLB slate.
First, let me apologize for the pink/purple highlighter in there. But, it’s important today. We like low Vegas totals for pitching. We like pitcher’s parks. This game has both, and it’s rare you see a total this low. It indicates Vegas thinks the game will be low scoring and has likely two solid pitchers rolling. Vegas is leaning Thor (Syndergaard) and the Mets in this one, but Carlos Martinez is no chump. Thor will likely be cash game safe according to most, but CMart is a fine GPP play. However, you might not see a win given to a starter in this one if it does indeed stay low scoring. That’s your risk. On FD, you need that win. So, you can look down at the HOU game because it has the only other total under 8. Keuchel at home was a sure thing last year. Not so much this year. The Yankees don’t scare me, but that park does. If Keuchel gets the ball up in the zone, major leaguers from any team can lose one for him. It’s a gamble best saved for GPPs again. So, now we need to look for other options in games with large money lines like TOR or Chicago. Aaron Sanchez vs SDP is intriguing and has Vegas’ support. I don’t mind it as much because when you see a moneyline this huge and a total this big, Vegas is trying to tell you TOR is going to go off and score the lion’s share of the runs in this one……meaning SDP should still suffer a bit. Sanchez is likely a decent pitcher for this slate. Jake Arrieta is our other pitcher. He’s pricey, but today may justify it. I don’t have any issues with running him out there either. But, these will be your popular pitchers because everyone can look at Vegas and make their calls.
If you want to take the weather into consideration, it adds risk to the NYM/STL game. That 50/50 shot of rain at first pitch tapers off as the game goes on but it takes a couple hours to do so. I’d keep a VERY close eye on this one since it’s where everyone wants to go. If the weather looks crappy, I will give you an insider tip from STL. The STL pitchers are actually well adapted to handle delays. If one happens during the game, it will wreck the best laid plans. But, if it only delays the start of the game, CMart will be fine. I can’t speak for Syndergaard and the Mets, though. As DFS players start to panic, you can hold the line on these top pitching options and watch the ownership fall off. If the rain looks bad, you can actually get a great advantage tonight in tourneys because these should-be-chalk pitchers will become lower owned than they should. Again, though, it’s a gamble if that scenario presents itself. The safest thing to do, and what I predict most will do, is pivot to Sanchez and Arrieta. If you are a true contrarian, you won’t look at any of those guys. Notice I haven’t mentioned the name Pomeranz yet? I wonder what his ownership will be after a couple of human starts in BOS. We know his talent. But, I haven’t dug into him deeply yet because I trust Vegas like most chalk players do, and Pomeranz just isn’t hitting my radar according to Vegas.
Bats are easy. This slate should come out balanced because there’s no Colorado game. Also, there are a lot of high-ish totals which will also tend to spread things out. I like looking for high totals, but I also like looking for ballooned ERAs. Give me a pitcher with a 6.50 ERA over 15 starts at this point in the year, and I’ll show you a bonafide DFS target for bats and stacks. These pitchers are better when they are in hitter’s parks (green park factors in graphic). de la Rosa, Gallardo, Rea, Cosart (small sample), Anderson, Mengden, Pineda, and Peavy immediately jump off the pages. They won’t all blow up, but pick the right bats against them and you set yourself up for success. I try and stick to the 2-6 hitters because that’s where most your power resides in lineups. ABs are important, but as Keith Hall reminds you, if a team is going to put up 8 runs, the 7 hole hitter is going to bat 5 or 6 times, too. When picking on bad pitchers, you can either stack a couple teams or just spread yourself out and hope you hit the pieces of the lineups that do damage. One thing I’ve found I like doing when spreading out is taking a cheaper pitcher when a good one opens up and taking 3-5 hitters from as many teams as I can. With a 7k pitcher, you can really do it about everywhere in your LU. Could today be that day?
Here are the teams I feel are most stackable today. ARI, HOU, TOR, and BAL. If you want to get a little off the beaten path, look to MIA and OAK. If you want to go contrarian, look directly at COL. Gallardo isn’t great, Camden favors hitters, and no one likes Rockies on the road. Just stay out of the STL/NYM game….lol.
Choppodong’s Dong of the Day
He may be a fish, but do you know which fish he is? No, it’s not Ichiro…….HOOAH!!