Baseball on the weekends is glorious. As a family man, I don’t have the energy or the drive to have any fun of any kind by the time the weekend rolls around. I just want to be boring and lame and I am not ashamed to admit it. I am sure you have heard of the term “Weekend Warrior”. For me, it has a different meaning these days. Being able to juggle the demands of life throughout the week and still having the dedication to remain prosperous in MLB DFS is my battle. For my fellow dedicated DFS players, this article is for you.
- Main Slate Musings
There are a handful of very good mid-range options that we can key in on for the slate. There are also a few high-end options that could be worth paying up for particularly in cash games.
There are good enough pitchers littered up and down the 13 games to the extent where I don’t feel overly comfortable with many three or four man hitting stacks. There is only one team that stands out as a viable four man stack.
- Pitching
In five of his last nine starts, Alex Wood has allowed zero earned runs. In three of those other four games, he allowed just one earned run and in the outlier, he gave up three earned runs. He’s given up just two home runs on the entire season and hasn’t given up more than seven hits the entire season. He’s scored double digit Fanduel points in every single game this season and has 46 Fanduel points or more in eight of his last nine games. Over the course of the season, Wood has allowed opposing batters to have a 21% hard hit rate with an 89 MPH exit velocity and 181 foot batted ball distance.
Over the course of the season, Wood has allowed opposing batters to have a 21% hard hit rate with an 89 MPH exit velocity and 181 foot batted ball distance. Those are absolutely elite numbers and prove that he should be able to keep this up for the remainder of the season as long as his body doesn’t break down.
He’s not only my favorite pitcher on the entire slate he’s my favorite play considering he’s still a bargain compared to the players priced nearby when you take his floor and ceiling into consideration.
Max Scherzer is absolutely unfair. He has double digit strikeouts in 10 of his last 13 starts and has scored a billion points in basically every start this season. It’s pretty comical just how good he’s been. The strikeouts keep his floor extremely high while also raising his ceiling, it’s the best of both worlds.
Corey Kluber has been elite since returning from the disabled list. In his last five starts, he’s allowed one run or less in every single game. He has struck out double digit batters in five of his last six starts and allowed just one home run in the past eight games.
He gets to face off against the Athletics who have the second highest strikeout rate in the month of July when facing right-handed pitchers. Another double digit strikeout total is inbound.
These first three pitchers are in such good form I don’t find it overly beneficial to break down the opposing offense. They are simply just playing too well and not worth trying to get cute about fading them. They’re both solid for cash and GPP.
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- Stack
There is legitimately only one team I want to stack up with more than two hitters and that’s the Houston Astros. They have been so good for so long that it doesn’t even matter who the opposing pitcher is. That being said, they face Ervin Santana (R), who has given up multiple home runs in four of his last seven games. He pitches to contact and doesn’t strike out many batters. We could be on the brink of another explosion from the Astros considering that the Twins bullpen is one of the worst in all of baseball.
George Springer is the table setter for the Astros and he’s been on an absolute tear over the past month. For a closer look into his more recent production, and more specifically his production against righties, we will use his past ten games. Using those splits, he had a .553 wOBA, .423 ISO, 1.385 OPS and a .462 AVG.
Jose Altuve is another one of the Astors bats that are giving opposing pitchers nightmares. Using the same ten game sample against righties, Altuve had a .554 wOBA, .160 ISO, 1.333 OPS and a .560 AVG. He finished the first half of the season with three hits in the each of the final five games going into the break.
Carlos Correa always goes criminally under-owned and I never understand why but I am not complaining. I’ll continue to use him as he offers the highest upside at the short stop position. Using our previous splits, Correa had a .616 wOBA, .525 ISO, 1.533 OPS and a .475 AVG. He also belted six home runs in those final 10 games of the first half.
Our last Astro will be another under-owned player, Yulieski Gurriel. Using our splits, he went into the break with a .434 wOBA, .269 ISO, 1.038 OPS and a .385 AVG.
It’s mind boggling that there are four (and there were a few more including Reddick and Marwin) players on one team with such incredible stats using the same splits and sample size. Each and every one of them had the type of production that you look for across a 13 game slate and all four just happen to be in the same lineup. It’s no wonder why opposing pitchers of all skill levels have been getting demolished by this lineup.
Remember that there isn’t a wrong way or right way to construct a lineup until after the results are in. Whatever you do, just make sure you do it with sound research and analysis. Winning lineups may sometimes look like someone just threw darts at a board but nobody truly plays like that with money on the line. Game theory and research can be the best of friends for GPP’s.
Good luck to all of my fellow weekend warriors! You can find me on Twitter @DFSnDONUTS where I love to interact with my followers and enjoy the sweat of a big night with you.
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