Jared Levitt 
Welcome to the Monday, July 19th edition of MLB DFS Picks and Pivots where we dive into the top fantasy baseball plays and slate strategy to help you take down tournaments all season long at Win Daily Sports!
If you are new to MLB DFS Picks and Pivots, the goal of this article is not simply to list out the “best plays” but rather to walk through the context of the slate and help you identify the best arms and stacks to build around for MLB DFS tournament play. We will use DraftKings pricing as our anchor and help you get a head start on your winning builds!
Main Slate Breakdown
Welcome into an 11 game Monday MLB DFS Picks and Pivots where we kick-off the week with a solid slate that has some fascinating GPP appeal due to the fact that we really lack the “obvious plays.” Any time we get a slate where the top arms are not in ideal match-ups or we don’t have a gaudy 6+ Coors Field type total, it makes things far more interesting and likely far less chalky.
We have three elite strikeout arms on today’s slate with Kevin Gausman, Yu Darvish and Shohei Ohtani and I start here because we saw it yesterday, K’s are still king in MLB DFS as ceiling games from Carlos Rodon and Corbin Burnes were anchors to winning GPP line-ups. The one concern today is the weather in Atlanta with serious storms that could threaten this game and really change the landscape.
Now, I know – the last month and a half since the sticky stuff breakdown, many have been hesitant to pay up for pitching as admittedly, the returns are far less consistent, but I still argue that this is the best path for single entry type builds.
When you layer on the fact that the mid to low range of pitching on this slate is flat-out ugly, I tend to side with Adam Strangis in Starting Rotation where we anchor to the top K arms, even in match-ups we may not love.
One of the reasons, I think we take this path is that the stacks I love today are simply – not that expensive and I have the opportunity to go double ace with my favorite bats, so why get cute?
Let’s not overlook the obvious – it is Jon Lester day and my friends, this spot is absolutely gorgeous. Lester is giving up a .242 ISO to right-handed batters and this Marlins lineup is loaded with right-handed and affordable power with the projected line-up sporting a .210 ISO and 40% HC rate against LHP since the start of last season.
The one “issue” writing this early is that the projected line-up we see this morning may not look anything like what gets rolled out later on due to both Jazz Chisholm and Garrett Coopper leaving Sunday’s game with injuries that require X-rays and MRI’s.
What you can anchor to is the trio of big right-handed bats in Jesus Aguilar, Starling Marte and Adam Duvall and when you dig into pitch type you see some premium bats pop. We know Lester’s cutter has been the pitch to attack this year with an absurd .502 ISO mark and 43% hard contact rate against it. Both Marte and Aguilar stand out with .375 and .235 ISO marks respectively, and Duvall leads the team with a .247 ISO mark versus southpaws this season.
Where it could get interesting, and allow us a path to pay for the double aces with ease, is if Jazz/Cooper end up sitting and we get some added value in the Marlins lineup and it sure sounds like Chisholm is headed for an IL stint we need to watch this Miami starting lineup for value today!
The other spot that stands out to me today for value, well, may not normally be a spot I look for value but take a peek at San Diego for a second. The match-up versus LHP Kyle Muller is not one I set out to target but I also cannot overlook when we get a team with multiple punt projected starts as the Padres have with Webster Rivas and Ha-Seong Kim.
Now, these guys are not the reasons you start with the Padres – but their inclusion is what all of a sudden allows you to get Fernando Tatis and Manny Machado into a Marlins/Padres stacking combination.
I preach roster correlation all the time – and guess what the Marlins do not have – strong 3B and SS options – paving the way to load in arguably the two best bats on the slate into our line-ups today in an ultra Stars/Scrubs type build.
Now, Muller is an arm I have argued we should use early in the season due to his minor league K pedigree but flip the script here a second and this is the same arm that has had strong fly ball tendencies and HR issues at AAA, and has given up a 60% fly-ball rate to right-handed batters in his short big league time.
This is not an indictment of Muller’s talent, it is an opportunity to potentially get Tatis/Machado who have .330+ ISO marks against both of Muller’s primary pitch types in the slider and curveball.
In both of these cases, we get to anchor to one of my favorite strategies – stacking road teams with guaranteed 9 innings of at-bats. I know it may seem like a throw-away comment but when I know I can anchor to stacks that will get 11% more at bat’s, it becomes a slight edge for those who stack home teams and when every at-bat is a chance to make a difference in tournaments, I want any edge I can get.
MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – The Wrap-Up
Walking into this MLB DFS Picks and Pivots slate, I think the path for a “double-ace” approach with elite road stacks is really clear and becomes even more doable pending the Marlins line-up post-injury news.
Personally, I think you need to anchor to the top arms due to a combination of K upside and the opportunity cost of fading them. If guys like Gausman, Darvish and Ohtani have ceiling-type 30+ DK point games, the reality is they could lap the pitching field by double because there are far more floor arms today than those who have GPP ceiling. So anchoring to those builds and being able to do so with some punt value that still allows us the big bats, is a path I am all about today!
Good luck tonight all! Let’s keep that hot streak rolling! Come join the Win Daily Sports Team – grab a Gold Membership and take advantage of all the tools, articles, and expert coaching we can give you to make you a consistent winner in DFS.
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