As Justin Bailey pointed out in his daily slate breakdown, Corey Kluber has not been his usual self this season. The two-time Cy Young winner has an ERA approaching 6 and an xFIP approaching 5. So not only is he not elite, he’s not even good or decent.
One of his big downfalls has been walks — he is allowing way more this season than he has throughout his career. In the previous two seasons, he’s had a BB/9 right around 1.5, which is exceptional. This year, that number has nearly tripled to 4.35.
A start against the Miami Marlins might be just what he needs to get back on the right track, though.
Using our Trends Tool, we’ll see that there are multiple signs pointing to a strong DFS performance tonight.
Salary Change
Given his struggles, Kluber’s salary has dipped quite a bit. Since the start of the season, it has fallen from $10,500 on DraftKings to $9,400. Like the stock market, you want to buy low in the DFS world. We can see that buying low on a pitcher whose salary has dropped at least $1,000 on the season has led to a bit of value.
Two pitchers fit the bill today — Kluber and David “The” Hess “Truck”. It’s a good sign for Kluber, but there’s more research to be done!
Strikeout Prediction
Kluber isn’t a huge strikeout guy, but is hovering around 10 K/9 this year and had a career-high of 11.71 during his 2017 Cy Young campaign. He faces a Marlins lineup that ranks among the top three in team strikeout rate, including a few guys (Curtis Granderson, Jorge Alfaro) who really love to strike out. With that said, we’re projecting 7.3 strikeouts for the Klubot.
Historically, pitchers with a strikeout prediction of at least 7 have posted a Plus/Minus of nearly +2, which is prettay, prettay, prettay good.
Recent Exit Velocity Down Compared to Past Year
Though Kluber’s had his struggles, batters have been hitting the ball a tick softer against him compared to the past calendar year. Though some folks don’t believe in exit velocity, our data for both hitters and pitchers should compel anyone to think otherwise. There’s quite a linear correlation between batted ball data and DFS performance, and as you can see here, we start getting in the green right at that negative/positive line.
Mix All The Ingredients Together
All of these trends are nice, but none are exceptional. However, add all of the little ingredients together into your cauldron and you get a lovely result.
Boom! A Plus/Minus north of 4 and very consistent results make Kluber look like a very sultry choice on tonight’s slate.
