Dave Gloeckner 
It’s our weekday edition of The Sweet Spot here at WinDaily Sports. I was able to place 3rd in a big single entry last night which was further validation that our processes and projections are working here at WDS. Big nights from both Dylan Cease and Reid Detmer (who we’ve selected here a few times) helped propel that nice 50x cash out. But onto tonight which brings a much deeper card. It’s actually the first time I recall all 15 games being on one slate. There are several good spots we’re looking at with both pitching and batting. So let’s keep this rolling and I want you to show us your winners after tonight’s contests.
This article will focus on Pitchers, from aces to value, and Hitters, from team stacks to studs to value plays. Prop bets for today will be 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 15 games on the slate. All DFS plays below will come from those 10 games and any later games will be captured in Discord.
PITCHERS – DRAFTKINGS
CLASSIC SLATE – 7:05 PM Start
SHOHEI OHTANI ($11,300 DK)
It’s hard to navigate in the upper tier of pitching tonight because there are so many good arms in the middle of the group. But it’s also hard to ignore Mr. Shohei Ohtani’s matchup tonight against the hapless Chicago White Sox. The Sox are batting 0.219 over the last 2 weeks and have a 25% K rate. They are coming off a game where they mustered only 1 run on 3 hits while striking out 12 times against Angels pitching.
Ohtani himself is coming off a very good start against the Dodgers where he racked up 33 DK points. He has a 32.6% K rate and strikes out 11.8 batters per 9 innings. His bat is the biggest reason the Halos are in a playoff position but his arm comes through often too and I expect a huge night from him on the rubber tonight.
CLAYTON KERSHAW ($9700 DK)
If you haven’t noticed, the Rockies are playing some awful baseball of late. It’s easy to highlight the 25-1 game against the Angels over the weekend. But even before that, they had an 8 game losing streak where they were outscored 64 to 28. And over the past week they are striking out at a significantly high rate of 31.3%. We have to go back to last year with the Angels since we’ve seen such consistently high K numbers from a team (28.2% for the entire month of June).
As for Kershaw, he’s 3-0 with a 1.33 ERA in the month of June. He has a 1.00 WHIP as well as 9.3 K/9 inning. He’s on a roll and should continue his monthly dominance versus a team that has totally hit a wall.
ANDREW ABBOTT ($8600 DK)
At this point, it’s hard to pass on Abbott especially priced below $9K. All he’s done is go 3-0 with a 1.14 ERA in his first four starts in the MLB. And while tonight’s opponent is arguably the best he’s faced, the Orioles are batting just 0.244 over the past week which is good for 19th in the league. And that number drops to 0.167 versus LHP’s which is 25th in the league over that span. I’m willing to see if this flame stay lit tonight as I see some spots in the O’s lineup that Abbott can attack.
YU DARVISH ($8100 DK)
This is my favorite spot on the card tonight as Yu Darvish has a great matchup against Pittsburgh. Yes, the Padres pitcher has struggled of late posting a 7.73 ERA over his past 3 starts. And that’s likely why we get him down below the median price range of pitchers tonight. But don’t fool yourself and overthink this one. All three of those starts were against teams in the top 13 in batting average in the MLB. The Pirates are batting just 0.154 over the past week and have a 26.3% K rate. They are coming off a 4-game series in Miami where they lost 3 games and scored a total of 10 runs.
The ship is sinking fast in Pittsburgh and we have every reason to believe it will stay on that path until they can get some needed relief. It’s why we liked Eury Perez so much on Sunday and are doubling down with Darvish tonight.
KOOL-AIDE MAN (SWEET SPOT VALUE PITCHER UNDER $7K)
GAVIN WILLIAMS ($5900 DK)
The Guardians starting pitcher made his MLB debut last week against Oakland and fared well. While he came up short of some expectations, he was able to navigate around 4 early runs and work into the 6th inning. There were surely some nerves in play which hopefully will be settled somewhat tonight in his 2nd start. He gets a quality matchup against the Royals who are 23rd in batting, 28th in wOBA and 7th in K rate on the season.
BONUS PICKS
I do like a lot of arms tonight and will also consider BRYCE ELDER ($9200 DK), JULIO TEHERAN ($7400 DK), RANGER SUAREZ ($7000 DK) and BRYAN WOO ($6900 DK).
HITTERS – DRAFTKINGS
CLASSIC SLATE – 7:05 PM
SWEET SPOT STACK ATTACK: While there are a ton of arms to like tonight, there are still several quality stack out there. The stacks I like today are the Dodgers (vs Seabold), the Angels (vs. Kopech), the Padres (vs. Hill), the Guardians (vs Singer) and the Blue Jays (vs. Wood).
CORE BATTERS
JOSE RAMIREZ ($5600 DK)
The Guardians 3B loves to hit against Brady Singer. In his career, he’s hitting 0.438 off Singer in 16 career at-bats including 2 home runs. And he’s on a nice roll of late batting 0.345 in his last 7 games.
For stacking, look at STEVEN KWAN, AMED ROSARIO, JOSH NAYLOR AND MYLES STRAW.
MANNY MACHADO ($5900 DK)
Machado is coming into tonight’s contest with hits in 8 of his last 9 games. The month of June has been his best all year as he’s batting 0.296 with 4 home runs and 14 RBI’s. More importantly, he’s batting 0.368 against LHP’s this year and guess what, Rich Hill is a left-handed pitcher.
For stacking, I also like FERNANDO TATIS, GARY SANCHEZ, TRENT GRISHAM AND NELSON CRUZ.
SLAP HITTER (SWEET SPOT VALUE BATTER) – LESS THAN $3K
TONY KEMP ($2400 DK)
The Yankees are making a long trip out west to Oakland. That’s always tough especially the first game of a series after a cross-country flight. I like Oakland to compete tonight and have my eyes on Tony Kemp. He’s been terrible for the better part of his return to action. But he has 11 hits in his last 10 games and is coming into this contest with a 3 game hit streak and an average of 10.5 DK points in those games.
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