Searching For the Free Square
In the game of Bingo, every card gets an empty spot in the middle called the “Free Square”. Since it’s the middle square, the free square is essentially the ideal spot from which to build lines around. In DFS we define the Free Square as the player to build your line-ups around. Generally, this player represents the closest we can find to a sure thing for the slate. This column is all about trying to identify the free square for a particular slate. We are going to be searching most often for one SP, one OF, and one IF. The type of player we are looking for that allows us to load up the rest of our lineup with high salary studs. Occasionally it will be a high priced stud in a great spot, The goal of this column is to use quantitative data to identify the free square for the days Daily Fantasy Baseball slate. Each slate we will take a deep look at three or four players which represent outsized value on the day’s slate of games and choose the one which best represents the top value and floor play to earn the title of the slates Free Square of the night.
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Recap
For our pitcher free square, we had Felix Hernandez who ended up with 28.75 DKFP which was good enough for 3.8x value! For our infielder free square, we had Mike Moustakas who ended up with 17 DKFP which was good enough for 5x value! For our outfielder free square, we had Adam Jones who ended up with 25.0 DKFP which was good enough for 6.8x value! A really solid night for the free squares!
Tonight
After a solid night last night we have a solid 14 game slate to attack tonight. On the pitching side of things we have one of the best pitching slates of the year as we have Chris Sale, Max Scherzer, Darvish, and Alex Wood. On the hitting side of things the teams with the three highest implied totals by Colorado, Houston, and Kasnas City. Let’s dive right into this Friday Slate:
Free Squares
- Aaron Nola SP PHI ($8,400)
- Aaron Nola and the Philadelphia Phillies will take on the Milwaukee Brewers tonight at Citizens Bank Park. The Phillies are currently -135 favorites and the Brewers have an implied run total sitting at right around 3.96 runs. Nola has been having a solid year and he has been especially hot in his last 5 starts. He has the following advanced numbers on the season: .328 wOBA against lefties, .250 wOBA against righties, 24.7 K%, 7.6 BB%, .294 BABIP, 32.1 Hard%, 3.84 SIERA, and a 3.62 xFIP. He will be facing the Milwaukee Brewers who have been averaging right around 4.87 runs per game. They have the following ranks against right handed pitchers on the season: 15th in BB%, 3rd in K%, 8th in OPS, 7th in ISO, 8th in wOBA, and 15th in wRC+. The Brewers are a solid hitting team but have been prone to striking out a bunch this year. This plays great for Nola who is a guy who can rack up some strikeouts. Outside of the top tier pitching options, Nola is my favorite SP2 on Draftkings tonight.
- Mike Moustakas 3B KC ($3,600)
- I am going to back to the well as we ride Mike Moustakas for another night tonight. He and the Royals will be taking on the Chicago White Sox and pitcher James Shields at Kaufman Field. The Royals have an implied run total sitting at right around 5.97 runs. Moustakas has been having a great year so far this year and has a great matchup against Shields tonight. He has the following numbers against right handed pitching: 5.0 BB%, 16.2 K%, .881 OPS, .279 ISO, .274 BABIP, .363 wOBA, 126 wRC+, and a 35.8 Hard%. He will get to take on James Shields tonight who has the following numbers against lefties: .426 wOBA, 3.86 HR/9, 11.7 K%, 12.8 BB%, .233 BABIP, 7.99 xFIP, and a 32.4 Hard%. Shields has some absolutely atrocious numbers against lefties on the season which is good news for the Moose tonight. He is still affordable for the upside he brings tonight in a fantastic matchup.
- Max Kepler OF MIN ($3,600)
- Max Kepler and the Minnesota Twins will take on the Detroit Tigers and pitcher Anibal Sanchez at Target Field tonight. The Twins have an implied run total sitting at right around 5.05 runs. Kepler has been having a solid year and always has a ton of power potential. He has the following numbers against right handed pitchers on the season: 9.3 BB%, 16.3 K%. .873 OPS, .216 ISO, .313 BABIP, .368 wOBA, 131 wRC+, and a 36.7 Hard%. He gets to take on Anibal Sanchez who has the following numbers against lefties on the season: .345 wOBA, 1.78 HR/9, 17.1 K%, 4.5 BB%, .296 BABIP, 5.23 xFIP, and a 33.7 Hard%. I think the Twins could be a bit of an underrated stack tonight and Kepler is right around the top of that stack for me. He is in a good matchup tonight and brings a ton of power potential to the matchup tonight.
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Free Square of the Night
This is quite the interesting slate tonight at there are a ton of different top tier pitching options on the board tonight. This is going to be great slate for GPP’s tonight. I hope we narrowed down a few places or players we can target tonight. We have tons of tools and content available at the DFS Army this year for MLB so don’t miss out on all of those opportunities to make some money. Click the link “DFS Army VIP Membership” and sign up and join the Army today! With my free square pick, I am going to go with Royals infielder Mike Moustakas tonight! Good luck Army!
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