Gary Gustafson 
Welcome to the Thursday 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!
A Quick PSA
Before I jump into today’s MLB DFS Picks and Pivots, I wanted to note something based on how this week has gone so far because all in transparency – I am getting my teeth kicked in. However, I will be the first to tell you that it was a known risk because each and every night I am making a concerted effort to fade 50-60% chalk arms like Jordan Montgomery and Joe Ryan to try and gain a GPP edge and well, the last few nights the chalk machine has been pumping out winners.
Do you know what that means for GPP players like me who look to ownership to find leverage? Pain.
I am not going to change my process nor should you – it has worked all year long – stay positive and focused on the long game as a tournament player. This ends my Ted Talk.
Early Slate Breakdown
Welcome my friends to a split slate Thursday across Major League Baseball where we have 5 games on the Early MLB DFS Picks and Pivots slate to break down with all clear weather, a game in Coors and Mad Max on the mound!
What stands out to me at first glance is just how strong this pitching slate is for a five gamer, and it is strong (or at least viable) at all price points which makes it even more interesting in how we build.
Let’s start at the top – Max Scherzer ($10.2K) goes to Coors Field and I don’t care where he pitches, dude is a straight strikeout machine right now with a 38.7% K rate that is 3rd in baseball, an 18.7% SS rate which is tops in the league and a 32.7% CSW rate which is second in the Majors during the last 30 days. He has been at or above 30 DK points in each of his last 5 starts and on a short slate he gives you the kind of must-have ceiling we want from an SP1.
Logan Webb ($9.2K) and Yu Darvish ($8.7K) are the next tier down with strong strikeout metrics of their own and reasonable price tags considering their upside. Webb sports a league-leading 33.5% CSW rate the last 30 days with a 28% K rate of his own while Darvish has been far more volatile but has racked up 9 and 7 K outings in 2 of his last 3 trips to the mound with 27 and 31 DK points.
Charlie Morton ($7.5K) sits in a comfortable SP2 mid-range against a beatable Arizona team that we just watched Ian Anderson mow down last night with 8K’s over 7 one-run innings on his way to 32 DK points. The metrics for Morton the last 30 days – a 26% K rate and a 12.5% SS rate – really are not that far off from the Webb/Darvish tier and the price discount on Morton, if you have been using him lately – is staggering. Morton was $9.7K his last start, $8K, $8.9K and $9K the stars before that and was $10.2K back on August 1st. Now we are getting him at $7.5K? Insert Ryan Reynolds “But Why?”
Lastly, if you absolutely need to punt, Yusei Kikuchi ($5.5K) is another arm that is priced far too low against Oakland. Kikuchi has pitched really well against Oakland in his both prior starts this season going 6 innings in both, with 12 and 6 K’s and putting up 28 and 18 DK points back in July and May respectively. Now, I get that Kikuchi has been volatile but much like Morton, this feels like a pitcher who got a $2K price drop from his normal DK price point for no real reason that I can see at first glance.
Now, we move to the bats – and yes, I know the Dodgers are on the slate against Kyle Freeland, and they will be chalk and I still don’t really feel the need to go all-in here – the pitches the Rockies have thrown at LA this series are veteran arms that know how to limit the damage in Coors and I am not going to chase high IRT’s just because of where the game is played.
The Atlanta Braves meanwhile look like they are in a prime spot today on the road in Chase Field against LHP Madison Bumgarner. Over the last 30 days, MadBum is giving up a .282 ISO and 52% HC rate with a 48% fly-ball rate to right-handed batters and here come the right-handed heavy Braves with the road match-up, 9 innings of guaranteed at-bats and some seriously soft pricing.
The Braves as a whole just feel too cheap – with Jorge Soler ($3.6K), Travis d’Arnaud ($3.8K) and Dansby Swanson ($3.9K) all under $4K here. Even the pricey guys like Freeman, Albies, Duball and Riley become doable to stack if you balance them with a $2K punt like Guillermo Heredia.
This feels like the Yankees last night (yes, I know it didn’t work out) but the pricing never made sense and what you ended up seeing was that people took notice and they became super popular as a result. This feels like to logical pivot off Coors today and you may see people try to go Dodgers and Braves together to load up on bats!
Ugh – I cannot believe I am going here and somewhere our resident Giants Win Daily Fan “GravMatt” is smiling – but I like the Giants bats against Yu Darvish. Literally, this may be the first time I have written up the Giants hitters all year but this spot seems like an ideal GPP difference-maker.
Darvish has been a total boom or bust arm recently, alternating elite starts with massive blow-ups including against this same Giants team two starts ago where he gave up 4 HRs and 8 ER’s in just 4 innings of work. Sheesh. If the pattern holds after his 31 DK point outing against the Cardinals last time out, we may see bad Yu again!
The number for Yu against LHB the last month have been – well, awful – a .476 ISO, 55% FB rate and 50% HC rate kinda awful and so that is where we want our focus with the Giants bats. Brandon Belt, Tommy LaStella, Lamonte Wade, Brandon Crawford and Mike Yastrzemski all have the splits advantage and every single one of them has a .200+ ISO mark and 40%+ HC rate against RHP the last month. The Giants also correlate incredibly well with the aforementioned Braves – making this my preferred stacking combination on the Early Slate.
Main Slate Breakdown
We turn our attention to the 5 game MLB DFS Picks and Pivots Main Slate which certainly looks like it could be a 4 gamer before we even get there with rain concerns in Philadelphia.
Honestly – let’s just get this out of the way – if that Philly game plays – why on Earth is Aaron Nola ($8.5K) against Pittsburgh? He has gone back-to-back games with 9 and 10 K’s with 23 and 30 DK points and his price dropped from $9.8K to $8.5K? What is the DK algorithm doing today?
In general, the pricing in this top range feels soft at the top end of the pitching pool today with only Lance McCullers ($10.1K) above the $10K price point. McCullers is at a nearly identical price point to the last time he took on the Angels, where he racked up 7 K’s and 26 DK points in 6 innings of 1 run ball and while he may not have the same “Scherzer ceiling” as we looked at on the early slate – he feels like a safe SP1 with a 25-30 DK point outcome.
If Nola is not an option for us – Luis Castillo ($8.9K) becomes a logical pivot point against the Nationals, coming off a dominant 10 K outing against the Dodgers his last time out. The Nationals have been a pesky offense with just a 15% K rate the last 30 days against RHP so the ceiling may not be the same but I think that’s been priced in here for Castillo who takes the ball in a must-win game for the Reds playoff chances.
And honestly – that is it – it is McCullers, Castillo, and Nola if he plays. The pitching pool is done.
The hitting options on this slate are far more balanced with 7 of the 10 teams sporting 4.5+ IRT’s so we are going to have a variety of strong hitting spots to attack.
The Toronto Blue Jays are the most talented offense on this slate in my opinion by a wide margin and we get them again on the road with 9 innings of guaranteed at-bats with RHP Michael Pineda on the mound. Pineda has been far worse against LHB this season with a .225 ISO mark and a 1.7 HR/9 rate but the right-handed metrics are not that materially worse with a similar HR rate and a higher HC rate just under 50%.
The left-handed bats on the Jays are few and far between however they do offer us a nice value path tonight with guys like Jake Lamb ($2K) and Corey Dickerson ($2.5K). Being able to use them to offset the big right-handed batters salary is a key to making the stack work and when we flip to the right side we want to find the bats that hit the slider well, since that is what Pineda throws 40% of the time to RHB.
Vladdy Jr. leads the team (shocker) with a .200 ISO, 44% HC rate, and 317 average distance traveled against the slider and guess what – last game when Pineda faced this same Jays team, guess what pitch he threw that Vladdy hit for a home run? Let’s do it again, shall we! BOOK IT!
My man Jared has been all over the hot bat of Lourdes Gurriel as a low-owned Jats pivot in stacks and he has delivered as one of the hottest bats in the lineup and he also profiles extremely well against the slider with a .331 ISO mark.
I feel like we have done this every day this week, but can we just keep using the Houston Astros free squares every day? Cool. Thanks
The Astros take on the Angles again, scoring 10, 10 and 9 runs in the first 3 games of this series and their bats continue to be free on DK. The Martin Maldonado/Jason Castro punt HR train has rocked for 3 straight nights and with Yordan Alvarez expected to sit tonight, we are going to get a whole lot of value with the Chas/Siri/Meyers trio all sitting in the low $2K range. Again – the correlation between Houston and Toronto is exceptional and allows you to really load up on these core stacks in various ways. Tonight with all the value they give us – it becomes easy to rock double aces alongside it!
MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – The Wrap-Up
What is better than a full day of MLB DFS Picks and Pivots? The correct answer is nothing.
These slates look incredibly appealing and the DK contest selection is STRONG – let’s crush these slates tonight and keep building that bankroll!
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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