June 17 DraftKings Analysis & Player Pool
Happy freaking Friday everybody! I typically don’t get as excited as the normal guy for the weekends because I actually have to work quite a bit harder when I can’t just retreat to the basement away from the kids to crunch numbers all day. But these Friday night baseball slates get me real hyped up. Let’s talk about the numbas!
First, you’ve gotta check out the new Batter vs. Similar Pitchers report! I detailed what it is here, and you can find the data (updated daily) here.
Here’s a look at the top SLG hitters:
Be careful not to get really excited about these guys with the red PA counts, there is still almost nothing to glean from a ten PA sample, so don’t go jumping on Matt Reynolds here. Even the 34 that Buxton shows there is much too small to take very seriously, but we know that he’s a great play against lefties (against everybody, really) already - so this just kind of drives home that point.
Anyways, if we look at the hitters here with 100+ PA and great numbers (looking for high SLG, high Brl, low K), we find:
Bryce Harper $6100
Rafael Devers $5900
Kyle Schwarber $4700
Brandon Belt $5000
Aaron Judge $6200
Jesse Winker $4300
Austin Riley $5200
Pitchers
The projections love Rodon against the Pirates, giving him the top spot. However, Rodon’s recent form has me quite worried.
First 8 GS: 3.92 DK/IP, 15.7 SwStr%, 34.1% K%
Last 4 GS: 3.13 DK/IP, 11.2% SwStr%, 23.6% K%
The Pirates are hitting just .227/.284/.372 with a 24.3% K% against lefties this year, so it’s a great matchup for him, but I don’t know - something about those last four starts has me not gung-ho to pay $9900 for him.
Frankie Montas vs. the Royals is appealing, but they’ve managed strikeouts against RHP with a rate of just 21% on the year, so a bit lower ceiling there.
Robbie Ray leads the league in SwStr% since May 1st with a 17.9% mark over his eight starts. Walks and hard contact have resulted in a few down games for him even during this stretch (his 3.02 DK/PA over that time frame is just 8th-best of pitchers pitching today!), but the strikeout upside is huge and the Angels aren’t all that great against lefties (.235/.306/.366, 24% K%).
Tarik Skubal has the best K-BB% of anybody on the slate, save Kershaw, with a 23.2% K-BB% mark (27.6% K%, 4.4% BB%), so that makes him interesting. The matchup with the Rangers is about league average.
Carlos Carrasco is also in slight consideration, but I think the price is a bit high for a guy with just a 24.8% K% on the year.
Probably the best per-dollar play on the board is, once again, Jon Gray - who has let us down in the past. His 31.7% CSW%, 13% SwStr%, 28% K%, and 10% BB% over his last six starts make him just far too cheap against the Tigers for $6900 - so he’s going in my main lineup FO SHO.
So to build my main lineup out, we’ll lock in Gray and then go with Skubal for now, and we’ll pivot to Ray or Montas if we need the few hundred in savings later on.
Best Offensive Spots
#1 Phillies vs. Paulo Espino
Harper $6100
Schwarber $4700
Hoskins $4700
This is kind of a “trust the model” spot. Espino hasn’t really been all that bad this year (3.4% BB%, .330 SLG, 6.5% Brl%) - but he’s thrown almost all of his innings out of the bullpen, and he’s being asked to start this game in a double header tonight. He’s definitely not a good pitcher, and the model is really wanting us to target the Phillies against him - probably based mostly on what Espino did against lefties from 2020-2021.
We also should make sure to check the Phillies lineup as I imagine they want to bench somebody of prominence in the second-half of this DH.
#2 Padres vs. Kyle Freeland
Freeland has limited the damage in Coors this year (1.80 DK/PA), but that shouldn’t have us hesitating on firing up the Padres here. Machado is a very appealing play against the lefty here, and you can play Ha-Seong Kim at SS for very cheap too, I think. He’s been pretty great against lefties this year so I like him quite a bit. Luke Voit is also cheap, but the strikeout rate and contact rate are so bad, and I don’t like to play those types of risks in cash games.
#3 Dodgers vs. Zach Plesac
We always want to have some Dodgers, and especially here against Plesac. Betts, Freeman, and Trea are the guys - but I also kinda like Gavin Lux down at the bottom of the lineup for very cheap ($3700). His 1.75 DK/PA is above the league average (1.64), but his 6.29 DK/GP is about exactly league average, thanks to the lesser total of PAs he gets down there. The price makes it worth it for me though, so let’s go with it.
Rockies vs. MacKenzie Gore
Coors changes everything, but Gore has been pretty tough on hitters this year with a .258 SLG, a 29% K%, and a .214 AVG. He is coming off a bad start, and he’s never pitched in Coors before. I would expect the Rockies to score here, but I don’t think I’ll go to them except for C.J. Cron $4800 who is just too cheap for this spot.
Hitter Player Pool
This is where I’m going to put the paywall, paid members can see my player pool and my cash lineup below!