The MLB Breakdown offers data-driven analysis for each day’s daily fantasy slate, using the FantasyLabs Tools and metrics to highlight notable players.
Saturday has a split slate: There are seven games in the 1:05 pm ET early slate and eight games in the 7:10 pm ET main slate.
Pitchers
Studs
Of the 30 starting pitchers going today, only five of them have a salary of $9,000 or higher on FanDuel:
Stephen Strasburg has been excellent to begin his 2017 campaign, posting an average FanDuel Plus/Minus of +7.69 through his first four starts. He’s given up at least two earned runs in each of those outings, but he’s still easily hit value because of his ability to make batters whiff. That holds true today, too: His 11.305 SO/9 rate over the past year is the second-best mark in the slate, and his K Prediction of 7.6 is third. He faces the Mets, who are currently implied for just 3.4 runs but did put up seven yesterday on Max Scherzer. However, Strasburg and Scherzer are very different pitchers: The latter is definitely a power guy, and he lives with a regular very-high fly ball rate. Strasburg, on the other hand, has really limited contact and induced groundballs this season: Over his last two starts, he’s allowed an exit velocity of 87 miles per hour, and he’s induced groundballs at a 61 percent clip. He will likely be the most popular option in the early slates.
Michael Fulmer definitely doesn’t have the name recognition benefit like the other guys listed above, but he’s certainly in a good spot today against a White Sox team that ranks 24th this season with a .297 team wOBA. The matchup is a little less exciting with the White Sox on a current power surge — they’ve gone for 40 runs over their last five games — but that should further work to keep Fulmer’s ownership levels down in guaranteed prize pools (GPPs). The White Sox still boast a top-10 strikeout rate this season (22.7 percent), and Fulmer’s 6.5 K Prediction is a top-10 mark today. He’s been solid over his last two starts, allowing a batted ball distance of 200 feet, an exit velocity of 88 miles per hour, and a fly ball rate of 22 percent. He’s a better value on FanDuel, where his $9,200 salary comes with six Pro Trends and a 90 percent Bargain Rating.
Values
Dodgers righty Brandon McCarthy has dealt with a ton of injuries over the last couple of years, but he’s been in top form to begin 2017, averaging a +12.21 FanDuel Plus/Minus on perfect Consistency through four starts. He’s currently the highest-rated pitcher on both sites in the Bales Model, and it’s for many good reasons. First, he’s facing the Phillies, who are currently implied for a day-low 3.3 runs; McCarthy is easily the day’s biggest favorite at -212. Also, the Phillies own the seventh-highest K rate this season at 23.6 percent, and McCarthy as a result boasts the second-highest K Prediction at 7.9. And finally, his recent Statcast data is as elite as it gets: Over his last two games, he’s allowed a batted ball distance of 175 feet, an exit velocity of 84 miles per hour, a fly ball rate of 25 percent, and a hard hit rate of 16 percent. Per our Trends tool, there have been only 12 DraftKings pitchers in our database who have been even close to his Statcast data and K Prediction marks.
And of those 12, 10 of them were $9,000 or higher. He’s only $8,900 on DraftKings and $8,000 on FanDuel. There’s a reason he owns three more DraftKings Pro Trends than any other pitcher today.
You can think of Francisco Liriano as the riskier version of McCarthy today. He’s in a more boom-or-bust matchup situation — the Tampa Bay Rays rank seventh in ISO but second in strikeout rate this season — and will likely come with much lower ownership than McCarthy as a result. The Rays are currently implied for 3.9 runs, and Liriano is only a small favorite at -117. That said, Liriano is right with McCarthy in terms of his other data points. First, Liriano’s K Prediction of 8.6 isn’t just the highest mark in the slate — it’s the highest mark by 0.7 strikeouts. He’s gone for 10 strikeouts twice over his last five starts. Also, his Statcast data is almost identical to McCarthy’s over their last two games:
You might notice the difference in their Recent Batted Ball Luck numbers. Here’s the definition of that new stat, in case you aren’t familiar:
The difference between a player’s percentile rank in batted ball distance and fantasy scoring over the past 15 days
McCarthy has an +11.90 FanDuel Plus/Minus over his last two starts; Liriano has a -1.37 Plus/Minus over the same time frame. The former is a great cash-game play today, but the latter could be a great GPP pivot (if you’re playing the All Day slates).
Fastballs
Dan Straily: He threw an absolute gem last time out, going for 61.0 FanDuel points and striking out 14 batters in seven innings pitched; he owns the second-lowest recent exit velocity allowed mark, and he’s facing a Pirates offense that ranks 25th this season with a .135 team ISO
Yu Darvish: He faced these very Angels three starts ago and finished with 61.0 FanDuel points and 10 strikeouts; he has a lower K Prediction and opponent run total than Strasburg, who is only $300 more on FanDuel; Darvish is actually $300 more expensive on DraftKings; his ownership should reflect that pricing oddity
(Pro subscribers can review ownership trends across stakes in our DFS Ownership Dashboard.)
Notable Stacks
With our Lineup Builder, it’s easy to incorporate stacks into DFS rosters. Let’s do a five-man DraftKings stack for the early slate and then a four-man FanDuel stack for the main slate. We’ll generate stacks using player ratings from the Bales Model, as usual:
Yet again, it is a St. Louis Cardinals stack that rises to the top. They ended up with seven runs last night and are currently implied for 4.8 runs today — the fourth-highest mark in the early slate — against the Reds. They’ll go up against Bronson Arroyo, who turned into Cy Arroyo last game, going for 25.7 DraftKings points against the high-powered Chicago Cubs offense. Don’t fall into the recency bias trap, however: Arroyo likely got a little lucky, as he’s allowed a batted ball distance of 217 feet, an exit velocity of 93 miles per hour, and a hard hit rate of 45 percent over his past two games. He easily leads all early slate pitchers with a massive 2.571 HR/9 allowed rate over the past year.
Update: Reds-Cardinals postponed Saturday.
On FanDuel, the highest-rated four-man stack in the main slate belongs to the Dodgers:
There are four teams in the main slate currently implied for a slate-high 4.8 runs: The Dodgers, Diamondbacks, Astros, and Rangers. Of those, the Dodgers easily boast the highest Team Value Rating (TVR), which is defined below:
A 0 to 100 grade showing a team’s historical value based on their live implied runs and collective salaries on a given DFS site
What that shows is that, of all teams in the main slate, the Dodgers have the best combination of run implication and FanDuel salaries. Five of their eight projected batters (per our MLB Lineups page) are under $3,000, including Andrew Toles, who is projected to bat leadoff and is near min price at $2,300. They face Philly righty Zach Eflin, who has allowed an average batted ball distance of 236 feet over his last two starts.
Batters
On yesterday’s MLB live show, I talked about building a model solely to identify stacks that are crushing the ball of late. In an example model, I set the weights for exit velocity, batted ball distance, wOBA, and Recent Batted Ball Luck very high. The player ratings followed suit, and the players at the top of the model were ones that have been really hitting the ball well, with emphasis given to ones that have been a little unlucky of late. Using that model, I can generate stacks based on those specific player ratings. A team that stands out in this regard is the Houston Astros:
Carlos Correa is especially intriguing, as he’s done this . . .
. . . despite boasting incredible Statcast data. Over his last 10 games, he’s averaged a batted ball distance of 261 feet, an exit velocity of 94 miles per hour, a fly ball rate of 58 percent, and a hard hit rate of 44 percent. The fantasy production hasn’t been nearly as elite, but that could certainly come soon.
The Toronto Blue Jays stand out in this regard as well, although it is hard to get over just how bad they’ve been offensively this year, ranking 26th in the league with a miserable .124 team ISO. Things could be trending up, however: Russell Martin, Jose Bautista, and Justin Smoak all boast batted ball distances of 237 feet or more over the last two weeks, and they come with Recent Batted Ball Luck marks of 48, 80, and 50. They’ve been quite unlucky, but that could change today against Rays righty Matt Andriese, who owns the third-highest HR/9 allowed mark in the early slate. He allowed two home runs last game and has allowed a 95 mile per hour exit velocity and a 48 percent hard hit rate over his last two starts. Buying low on the Toronto offense, as scary as that may be, could pay off in GPPs.
Good luck, and be sure to do your own research with the Labs Tools!
News Updates
After this piece is published, FantasyLabs is likely to provide news updates on a number of players herein mentioned. Be sure to stay ahead of your competition with our industry-leading DFS-focused news blurbs:
