Dave Gloeckner 
Welcome to Taco Tuesday edition of The Sweet Spot here at WinDaily Sports. We had some big cashes yesterday in GPP as our #1 SP, Luis Castillo, paid huge dividends as the top arm on the board. So did our low end pitching suggestions in Paul Blackburn and Alec Marsh. The Mariners once again lit up the scoreboard and were a huge stack as long as you had Cal Raleigh. But the Pirates were an off-the-radar sneaky stack that helped propel people to the top of the leaderboards. As for today, we have some upper tier pitchers to strongly consider and several good stacks that we are full onboard with.
As a reminder, this article will focus on Pitchers, from aces to value, and Hitters, from team stacks to studs to value plays. Prop bets are provided in the Gophers and Gas article.
There are many tools available, but I hope you’re using the Win Daily Projection Model as that has been very helpful in rostering key players each night.
For DFS, the featured card today begins at 7:05 pm with 12 games on the slate. All DFS plays below will come from those 12 games and any later games will be captured in Discord.
PITCHERS – DRAFTKINGS
CLASSIC SLATE – 7:05 PM Start
BLAKE SNELL ($10,700 DK)
I get to recycle an arm that I did research on yesterday since DK initially thought Blake Snell would start Monday’s game. But being he’s tonight’s SP doesn’t change my initial projection and he is fully in my player pool tonight.
Blake Snell has been a revelation this season for the Padres. He has 16 consecutive starts with at least 5 innings pitched and 3 ER’s or less. Over that same span, he is 9-2 with a 1.28 ERA. The Padres LHP has been as good as any pitcher in the MLB for 2.5 months. In fact, because of that dominant stretch his 2.65 ERA is the best in the MLB this season.
Tonight, he faces Miami who over the past 10 games is 23rd in batting average, 24th in wOBA and 23rd in wRC+. They were neutralized last night by Michael Wacha and managed just 7 hits while striking out 12 times against Padres pitchers. With the big ballpark in SD, and Miami’s lack of power outside of Soler and Bell, this should be another situation where Snell excels and continues his pitching brilliance.
YUSEI KIKUCHI ($8900 DK)
The Jays must feel like they have struck gold with Kikuchi as he has shone this year, especially of late. Toronto has bestowed patience with the inconsistent SP and finally tapped into the potential they’ve seen over the years. While we shine light on Blake Snell’s accomplishments above, Kikuchi has been even better over the last month. In his six starts since the Mid Summer Classic, the Jays LHP has a 1.29 ERA and 26.1% K rate. He’s only allowed 5 ER’s in those 6 starts and hasn’t had a game with more than 1 ER.
His opponent tonight is the 1st place Baltimore Orioles and they do pose problems. But one of those games since the All Star Break was against the O’s where he went 6 innings and allowed just 1 ER. He’s faced Baltimore three times this season and has improved in each outing. I’m going with the old adage the good pitching beats good hitting and will ride the Kikuchi Express tonight.
GRAHAM ASHCRAFT ($8400 DK)
I had Graham Ashcraft dialed in on yesterday’s slate but the game was abruptly cancelled due to weather. However, yesterday’s analysis hasn’t changed as the combination of the Reds SP recent success and teh Angels poor performance with the bats still make this an attractive play. Ashcraft has been one of the better pitchers in the NL over the past 1.5 months. Over his last 9 starts, dating back to June 30th, he is 3-2 with a 2.17 ERA. The only pitcher in the NL with a better ERA in that span is Blake Snell. The problem is, the Reds have scored 3 runs or less in 6 of those starts often wasting his efforts. The other issue is Ashcraft has a 5.9 K/9 inning in that span which makes him value deflated for DFS purposes.
Tonight he gets the Angels who can bring the strikeouts up for any pitcher they are facing. They have a 26% K rate over their past 10 games and have struck out 10+ times in 5 of those games. The Angels are also batting 0.199 over that span which is good for last in the MLB. In short, they are a mess at the plate outside of Ohtani. Ashcraft should be able to continue his pitching prominence and even add some K’s to his stat line.
BRYAN WOO ($7600 DK)
Woo is returning from a 15-day stint on the IL due to forearm stiffness. And the downtime made sense as he had hit a wall over his prior four starts. In those outings he was 0-2 with a 6.65 ERA and a 7.52 K/9 inning clip. Prior to that proverbial wall, he had a 3.51 ERA and 11.4 K/9 inning. So the rest should do him well. And so should the landing spot he has for his return.
That landing is the Chicago White Sox who were humiliated last night by a score of 14-2. The White Sox have fully packed it in for the season as they have the 4th worst run differential in the MLB. Their numbers over the month of August are bad as they are 20th in batting, 28th in ISO and 27th in wOBA. And that includes a series in Colorado where they scored 16 runs in 3 games. But even more importantly, they are striking out at a 26.3% clip this month which is 4th highest in baseball. Here’s to Woo acting like Charlie Sheen after he got glasses in Major League and finding his stuff once again. And it’s even more likely because it’s the White Sox.
KOOL-AIDE MAN (SWEET SPOT VALUE PITCHER UNDER $7K)
JON GRAY ($6700 DK)
It’s rare that we get a pitcher that was $10K at one point earlier that falls below the Value line. But we have that in Jon Gray and I’m pouncing on the opportunity to play him tonight. He’s recently found his stuff again as he’s posted a 1.86 ERA over his past 3 outings. In that stretch he’s averaged 22 DK points per game which would put him well on his way to > 3x value tonight which is a number that we strive for (example $50K roster at 3x gets you 150 DK points which consistently profits).
As for the D’backs, they have recently got back in the Wild Card race but are still batting just 0.236 in the month of August which is 24th in the baseball. And their stars are struggling, as witnessed by Corbin Carroll getting a day off in the middle of a stretch run. This is a prime spot for what I see as a mis-priced SP tonight.
BONUS PICKS
I also like JUSTIN VERLANDER ($9500 DK) and BOBBY MILLER ($8600 DK) tonight.
HITTERS – DRAFTKINGS
CLASSIC SLATE – 7:05 PM
SWEET SPOT STACK ATTACK: The stacks I like in the MLB today are the DODGERS (vs. Cleveland), the BRAVES (vs. NYM), the PIRATES (vs. STL), the ROYALS (vs. Oakland), and the YANKEES (vs. Washington).
CORE BATTERS
FREDDIE FREEMAN ($6100 DK)
Freeman is arguably one of the hottest hitters right now sporting a 0.356 batting average for the month of August. But then he also gets to face ex-Dodger SP in Noah Syndergaard tonight who should effectively retire from baseball with his 6.57 ERA. Freeman is batting 0.417 in his career off of “Thor” in 25 at-bats. I expect that number to go up after tonight’s game.
For stacking, I like MOOKIE BETTS, WILL SMITH, MAX MUNCY, JD MARTINEZ, and CHRIS TAYLOR.
KE’BRYAN HAYES ($4400 DK)
We don’t have many opportunities left to hit off the tee. That’s because it looks like Adam Wainwright is winding down his storied career and will ultimately hang it up after this season. He waited one season too long as his 8.42 ERA is the worst for any starting SP in the MLB with over 70 innings of work. I’ll start this stack with Ke’Bryan Hayes who has 18 hits in his last 9 games.
For stacking, I like BRIAN REYNOLDS, ANDREW MCCUTCHEN, CONNOR JOE, JOSHUA PALACIOS, and LIOVER PEGUERO.
SLAP HITTER (SWEET SPOT VALUE BATTER) – LESS THAN $3K
TBD
Now that you finished reading the MLB Sweet Spot article make sure to check out MLB Lineup Optimizer and our YouTube Channel that keeps you in tune with all of our shows.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter (@dgloeck) and my other content that is part of the Win Daily Sports family.
