Hello again everyone! nillyJay here – some of you may already know me; I’m a coach/contributor inside the DFS Army and my main focuses are NASCAR and MLB. If you’re not already, you can find and follow me on Twitter, or, for DFS Army members, in our coaching channels (@nillyJay or just swing by my channel #nillys-garage-nas-mlb).
As always, if you aren’t familiar with my content, be sure to check out these articles to get up to speed: carnage rating system and tiers & classic batter sheets.
My take on a consistent process – looking at pitchers
Because I created the carnage rating system, it only makes sense that I would start there when looking at a new slate. Let’s do just that:
It shouldn’t be too surprising to see Buehler and Nola near the top here, but there is another who takes the lead. That 604 KSCORE is pretty fantastic though, so be sure to have some exposure to Nola today. If you’re playing cash on this tiny slate, those two would be your guys.
Finding pitchers to attack
Just like it can help us find pitchers to use, the carnage rating system is great for helping us to find pitchers to attack. However, because we only have three games here, I’m going to have to keep today’s best targets for our VIP members only. Sorry!
Early slate
Los Angeles Angels at Chicago Cubs
We’ll kick off this massive 4-game breakdown with the Angels and Cubs, two teams that are no stranger to doing some damage on the basepaths. The Angels look to start Cam Bedrosian, though it looks like they’ll transition over to Trevor Cahill after the first inning or so. The Cubs will have Lester pitching for them, somebody that the Angels haven’t really had a whole lot of success against in the past. The same can mostly be said about Cahill as well, so this could be an interesting little pitcher showdown for a good 5 or 6 innings.
Angels 5 star plays – Trout
Angels 4 star plays – Fletcher, Pujols
GPP note – Not much success against Lester, so they could be limited for their first couple of at-bats
Cubs 5 star plays – Rizzo, Bryant
Cubs 4 star plays – Schwarber, Baez, Heyward
GPP note – Not much experience against Cahill either, but I do like their chances of success a bit more
Main slate
Los Angeles Dodgers at Arizona Diamondbacks
Two solid pitchers face off in our next game, though the Dodgers have seen Ray plenty, so I’d have to give them the upper hand in this one. The Dodgers will be deploying their anti-lefty lineup, so you know who to look at there. Well, if not, read below!
Dodgers 5 star plays – Bellinger
Dodgers 4 star plays – Turner, Hernandez, Freese, Taylor
GPP note – Lots of experience (and strikeouts) against Ray, so if he’s not on his game, some fireworks are bound to go off here
Diamondbacks 5 star plays – none
Diamondbacks 4 star plays – Escobar, Marte, Dyson
GPP note – Tough matchup against Buehler, who they’ve seen very little of, so full stacks may not be the answer here
Philadelphia Phillies at San Diego Padres
We have two more solid pitchers going at it for our next game, and like some of the others, there hasn’t been a whole lot of experience between these pitchers and the batters they’ll be facing today. I think that helps Nola more than it does Lauer since the Phillies have the stronger offense, but both pitchers are capable of putting up some big scores here, so definitely give them a look today.
Phillies 5 star plays – Harper
Phillies 4 star plays – Hoskins, Segura, McCutchen, Realmuto
GPP note – Lauer is no pushover, but neither is this offense. One-offs and/or big stacks are in play here
Padres 5 star plays – none
Padres 4 star plays – Hosmer, Machado, Garcia
GPP note – If you’re going to attack Nola, I’d do it with a heavier focus on the lefties
Houston Astros at Seattle Mariners
And finally (I know, this was such a long read today), our hammer game will feature two pitchers that we don’t really have a read on right now. Martin had an excellent debut in May but put up three duds since then. LeBlanc has been up and down (mostly down) all season, so we don’t really know what we’ll get out of him either. This puts both offenses squarely in play here, because there’s a pretty good chance that one of them goes off here.
Astros 5 star plays – Bregman
Astros 4 star plays – Gurriel, Brantley, Chirinos
GPP note – It’s been a while since he Astros have gone bonkers, but they’ll be in a prime spot to do it here
Mariners 5 star plays – none
Mariners 4 star plays – Vogelbach, Encarnacion, Narvaez, Seager, Haniger
GPP note – The lefties could be in a good spot to light up the scoreboard here, but it’ll depend on what we get out of Martin. It’s hard to know what to expect, so stack away and hope he duds again
Tiers!
Like I mentioned earlier, I provide a tiers breakdown for our members every day. I figured since I was running the show today that I would slide in a freebie. Let’s take a look at Tier 5:
Wait a second, something is different here! Yep, I decided to add another stat to the tiers sheet, so now we can quickly see Statcast’s barrel data for all of our matchups on top of everything else. This helps us narrow down our players even easier, and we can see that Marisnick, Freese, and Hosmer have the best matchups in this tier. Quick and easy!
Closing thoughts
Thank you for joining me here today! I hope you found this article helpful with your research for today’s slate. I have some more GPP thoughts for you guys in the DFS Army, so be sure to check my channel and #mlb-news-and-notes this afternoon for those.
If you like what you see here and want to experience everything we have to offer, I’d encourage you to consider joining up with us. As you saw, we cover (and win!) all sports, not just the common ones. Just remember to use promo code NILLY to save 20% off for the lifetime of your active membership, for the best deal in daily fantasy sports. Until then, I hope you all have a great day!
