Dave Gloeckner 
Yordan Alvarez hit the trifecta (home run, RBI, run) for us yesterday but Kevin Gausman’s poor performance held us back from a big day. In all, the pitching was down yesterday and a quality batting lineup was the key to success for most DFS players (stacking the Astros did help many who cashed).
There are so many tools available but I truly hope you’re using the WinDaily Projection Model as that has been very helpful in rostering key players each night.
It’s Monday at the Sweet Spot and the classic card for tonight starts a 6:40 pm with 6 games to choose from. My favorite plays for today, along with props and bets, are below.
NOTE: MLB 2022 Season Props/Bets are +16.4 units
PITCHERS – DRAFTKINGS
CLASSIC SLATE – 6:40 PM Start
CAROLS CARRASCO ($9300 DK) – Mets starting pitcher Carlos Carrasco is putting together a nice season as he is 6-1 with a 3.63 ERA. His advanced numbers show he is trending towards an even lower ERA as his FIP is 2.93. Some other numbers we like are his groundball rate (47.7%) and low barrel rate (5.3%). He’s been attacking earlier in counts as he has his highest first pitch strike percentage of his career this year at 67.7%.
Tonight, he faces the Paders who are fresh off a 7 game road trip where they went 3-4. In the past week they are 23rd in wOBA, 24th in wRC+ and 23rd in ISO. And conversely, this season they are a worse hitting team at home as they rank 27th in batting average hitting just 0.222. We may be able to take advantage of some jet lag too as the Padres are coming off an extra inning game yesterday. The Mets only had to travel south from LA so they got to San Diego much easier than their opponent.
CRISTIAN JAVIER ($9100 DK) – The Astros starter has been dealing lately as he’s allowed just 2 ER’s over his past 3 outings. And tonight he gets the Mariners who are a much different opponent away from home. In Seattle, the Mariners are 1st in wRC+, 1st in OBP and 5th in wOBA. But on the road, the numbers are much different as they drop to 20th, 22nd and 18th respectively.
And then there’s familiarity too as Javier faced the Mariners in Houston in early May and tossed 5.1 shutout innings of baseball. Lastly, Javier specializes in two pitches; fastball and slider. The Mariners are 29th against the slider and struggled against that pitch in their first outing against Javier as they swung and missed 30% of those offerings. He just needs to locate the fastball in good spots tonight because Seattle does mash that pitch. As long as he’s finding the zone and using the slider at a 30% or greater clip, we should have a good opportunity to gain solid points from the Astros starting pitcher.
KOOL-AIDE MAN (SWEET SPOT VALUE PITCHER UNDER $7K)
JON GRAY ($6600 DK): Which Jon Gray will we see tonight? The one who had a 5.55 ERA entering last week or the one that pitched a gem against the Rays in his last start? Well the one difference in his last start was that he pitched without a knee brace on his left leg for the first time since he returned from injury. He felt much “freer” as he admitted afterwards the brace was holding him back.
Onto tonight, Gray gets a Cleveland team that has slowed down offensively of late. In the past 2 weeks they are 23rd in wRC+, 24th in wOBA and 24th in OPS. Jose Ramirez is still as hot as ever but his other counterparts have been a primary reason for their struggles as batters like Steven Kwan (7 for his last 42) and Owen Miller (10 for his last 48) have been inconsistent of late. I’ll like Gray tonight as there is a high ceiling if he really is “freer” with his delivery.
BONUS PICK: I like MICHAEL WACHA ($7400 DK) today. I’m not sure how the Angels can feel anything but downtrodden as they have lost 11 in a row including yesterday’s gut wrenching loss to the Phillies. Wacha recently saw the Angels in Boston and went 5.2 innings with 0 ER’s.
HITTERS – DRAFTKINGS
CLASSIC SLATE – 6:40 PM
JOSE ALTUVE ($5300 DK) – Altuve is out of his early season funk as he has hits in 9 of his last 13 games. Just yesterday he went 2 for 5 and registered 10 DFS DK points. What’s even more important in rostering Altuve is knowing his home and away splits. At home, he hits 0.392 with 0.796 slugging percentage. On the road, he bats 0.208 with a 0.416 slugging percentage. Well today he is home and gets Robbie Ray who he is batting 0.429 against in his career. This looks like a Sweet Spot for sure.
JD MARTINEZ ($5500K) – The Red Sox OF had a day off yesterday which should play in our favor going into tonight. He’s one of the hottest hitters in baseball as he ended May with a 0.406 batting average. Tonight he gets Noah Syndergaard who he is 4 for 8 in his career off of. Hot hitter with a day of rest against a pitcher he has career success against. That is a recipe for success that I’ll ride tonight.
SWEET SPOT STACK ATTACK: I like the Red Sox in a stack today. Syndergaard has had two bad outings in his last 3 starts. And the Angels are playing so poorly lately that it adds extra pressure on the starting pitcher tonight. Unfortunately, against a quality lineup like Boston the extra pressure could worsen his performance.
SLAP HITTER (SWEET SPOT VALUE BATTER) – LESS THAN $3K
JARREN DURAN ($2600 DK) – We’re going back to Duran tonight as he has a favorable matchup and will likely bat at the top of the order. In two games against Oakland this weekend he managed to get a hit and provide positive results. So we’ll eye him up as part of our stack with Boston. Especially at this discounted price.
MLB PROP BETS
JOSE ALTUVE over 0.5 runs (-110 DK) and over 1.5 bases (+110 DK)
HUNTER GREENE under 6.5 K’s (-115 DK) – Arizona hits the slider and fastball well which are Greene’s best pitches.
BLAKE SNELL under 6.5 K’s (-140 DK) – NYM strike out only 17% of the time against lefties which is 24th in the MLB.
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