Stacking in MLB DFS has become an essential part of the game. We’ve covered the topic quite thoroughly in the past and due to its importance, we’re laying out situations that both behoove themselves to stacking and others that may warrant fading a potentially popular stack on a slate.
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So we’ve got a team averaging almost six runs per game this season, playing in a great hitter’s park and facing off against a below-average pitcher — in terms of WHIP at least. That will be a positive matchup for the majority of the lineup. Sounds like an ideal stacking spot to me.
Stack to Target
Baltimore Orioles – Projected Run Total: 3.9
Vegas doesn’t seem to be nearly as high on the Orioles as I am today, which is fine by me. This lineup will generally attract a decent amount of ownership due to its potential, but with a game at Coors and the popular Cubs in play I’m not expecting the Orioles to have an extreme ownership percentage tonight. And with the Red Sox projected to score a robust 5.1 runs in this matchup, we may see more players swayed to their side if they opt to utilize players in this game.
I touched on Hard Hit Differential — the difference between how hard a player has been hitting the ball recently as compared to his average over the previous year — in yesterday’s column and though it didn’t pay off in that matchup to the degree we wanted I’m going to utilize it again today. The Orioles as a team have been killing the ball thus far this season. In fact, only two teams have more players qualifying under this trend for 2016. Turning to the Trends tool, we can see that the Orioles trail only the Giants and Athletics in terms of their total count of occurrences this year. Unlike the Athletics (featured yesterday), the Orioles have been having success, with an average Plus/Minus among this group of players of +2.8:
What this tells us is that not only is Baltimore off to a hot start this season, but the lineup’s production has actually matched its play. While we’re not going to get any discounts on these players, for the most part they’re actually priced reasonably.
Despite facing a righty and featuring mostly right-handed bats, the matchup itself is favorable for them, as all but Mark Trumbo and Matt Wieters have positive ISO splits against right handed pitching. Those splits have paid off as well, with the projected starting lineup displaying greater Plus/Minus and Consistency against righties.
I mentioned above that Joe Kelly is a subpar pitcher in terms of his WHIP (1.44 last season). When this potent lineup has had the opportunity to tee off against players with a comparable profile — right-handed and poor WHIP — the results have been highly favorable:
Of particular note is how well Machado has fared against these pitchers. Not only does he have a ridiculous Plus/Minus of +3.3, but his Consistency rate of 44 percent over 25 games is impressive.
There are a lot of ways you could go with this stack, but including Machado in it seems advisable. Hitting second, he’ll fit nicely into a standard 1-5 stack and could also be utilized in a bit more contrarian wrap-around stack involving Hardy, Schoop and/or Flaherty.
