Brian Tulloch 
Welcome to the Wednesday 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!
Congrats to our Win Daily Sports MLB Expert Rocker on a massive MLB DFS win on Saturday Night!
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 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!
MLB DFS Picks and Pivots: Main Slate Breakdown
Wake up early and start grinding because we have an 11 game HUMP DAY MLB DFS slate that kicks off at 1 PM EST and we have a TON of aces to choose from and one stack I plan on anchoring to.
Let’s work backwards shall we? We have a ton of viable elite K arms but there is really only one stack I am in love with so in those instances, we want to work backwards and see how we fill in the rest of our lineup.
The Toronto Blue Jays take on Kyle Gibson and if you were here for Opening Day, this was the same spot we went all-in on with the Royals in a game they scored 14 runs. Gibson is one of the worst arms in baseball and the worst arm on this slate – it is a 5 man Blue Jays stack kind of day.
This was straight from my Opening Day write up:
Gibson was arguably one of the worst arms in baseball in 2020 as he ranked in the bottom 5 in all of baseball in hard contact rate allowed (37.7%) and HR/9 allowed with 1.6 HR/9 in 2020.
In 12 starts last season, Gibson gave up 4 or more runs in half of them and surrendered multiple HR’s in 4 of his 12 starts. THOSE are the starts you are targeting – the multiple HR games with 5,6 and 7 ER’s – that is how you make noise in a MLB DFS GPP!
Gibson struggled with walks (10%) and had just a 9% swinging strike rate last year – meaning people were on base, batters put the ball in play and when they did – they did so at a top 5 hard contact rate.
Gibson promptly went out and gave up 8 hits and 5 ER and then turned it over to one of the league’s worst bullpens for 9 more runs. The Rangers bullpen ranked bottom five last season and so far this year ranks as the second worst with a 8.61 ERA while giving up the most runs (22) in all of baseball.
Gibson is essentially a two-pitch pitcher to right-handed batters, throwing a splitter/slider nearly 80% of the time and while all the Blue Jays are in play, I will say – Lourdes Gurriel is the one who profiles the best against both pitches. 6 of the 9 batters, including Gurriel, have .200+ ISO marks against the splitter which is why I say all of them are in play but Guriel’s marks against the slider from RHP is off the charts. Against the slider, he has a monster .420 ISO with a 91 MPH EV and an average distance traveled of 330 feet.
The Blue Jays are pricey but they are worth it and I think this is the first step in any and all builds today. Stack em all up – jam in 5 however you like – and let the runs flow in!
From a pitching perspective this slate is LOADED – and I would argue, it is not the slate to get cute. In fact, it becomes more about which two elite arms you can fit around a 5 man Toronto stack than anything else.
My man Adam Strangis, as usual, kills it in his pitching breakdown for this slate so I will not simply copy his breakdown – go read it here. However, there is one arm that he did not focus on, that I will and it is Kenta Maeda ($8.3K) against the Detroit Tigers.
Maeda’s 16.6% swinging strike rate last year ranks only behind Shane Bieber on this slate and he gets the “nut” match-up with a right-hander against the Detroit Tigers. If you are new to this game, this is the spot that we wore out last season and so far this season, it has been a goldmine for DFS production as our friends at Statmuse so easily show.
This was a match-up last season that Maeda just dominated over three starts with 8, 8 and 9 K’s in those outings and while the line-up is not exactly the same, it does have 7 high K% hitters and an overall team with a 24% K rate against RHP. Maeda averaged 23 DK points per start last season against the Tigers and I think at this price point he gives you SP1 production at an SP2 price tag.
MLB DFS Picks and Pivots – The Wrap Up
LOVE LOVE LOVE this MLB DFS slate today and I am pumped for the first “mid-week” all day MLB DFS slate as we can get our lineups locked in early and then sit back and enjoy.
To me there are two core philosophies on this Main Slate – 1) Stack 5 Blue Jays and 2) Lock in Kenta Maeda. After that, my other pitcher will likely be a salary decision based on the cheap secondary stacks that come available and let me tell you – we will have those.
If you are new to day time MLB DFS – this is where the random punt catchers at $2K get starts, we get the bench guys who randomly get a day game start and all of a sudden you will see some crazy minimum price value that makes a double ace and Blue Jays stack work with relative ease.
Enjoy this slate – let’s get in our FREE Discord today and chat it up while we dig through our cheat sheets and custom projections here at Win Daily to set up the start of this MLB DFS season with some big wins!
Make sure you follow me on Twitter at @2LockSports and be sure to sign up for an ALL ACCESS GOLD ACCOUNT account here at Win Daily Sports. Gain access to our Projection Models and jump into our Discord where we will have our experts talking plays across every sport and slate!
