At FantasyLabs, we believe that we have the best tools and data available for those who play daily fantasy sports. We also realize that these tools and data are only as beneficial as our ability to communicate their functionality and worth.
With this in mind, our Trend of the Day series features articles that each weekday walk subscribers through an important trend, created with our Trends tool. Also, shortly after you create a trend, you will be able to see it under the “My Trends” column in our Player Models.
The ability to strike out hitters reigns supreme in the DFS landscape. But what happens when pitchers with high strikeout rates exhibit deteriorating advanced stats over the past 15 days? As long as none of our other writers have used this as the basis for their trend, we’re about to find out.
Moments later . . .
After further investigation, Mitchell Block already tackled high-strikeout pitchers with a recent drop in velocity and Kelly McCann exposed Jake Arrieta’s subpar advanced stats in the latest Recent Form Report. I was taught as a kid to reduce, reuse, and recycle. Therefore, I’m going to fuse Kelly and Mitchell’s research and find pitchers to either fade or embrace.
MLB Trend of the Day: High-Strikeout Pitchers with a Velocity Dip and Receding Advanced Stats
This trend is applicable to FanDuel and DraftKings pitchers. For simplicity’s sake, I will construct it using DraftKings data.
Step 1: Stat Filters > SO Per 9 > 9 to 11
Two-thirds of Wednesday’s starters are wiped from contention under the current restrictions. It’s also a solid foundation for DFS success.
Step 2: Adv Stats – Recent > Pitch Velocity Diff (Beta) > -1.5 to -0.1
A decrease in velocity barely improves upon the Plus/Minus and marginally deflates Consistency for strikeout pitchers. Not much has changed in the month since Mitchell crafted his Trend of the Day.
Step 3: Adv Stats – Recent > Distance Diff (Beta) > 5 to 30
Perhaps expected, Plus/Minus begins to decline when pitchers have recently allowed batters to hit the ball farther than their yearly average. But even with the decrease, DraftKings pitchers still hold firm with a 56.5 percent Consistency. This perhaps shows the importance of strikeouts in DFS: Even with negative recent advanced stats, these pitchers have still been able to hit their salary-based expectations at an acceptable rate.
Current Matches
Lance McCullers, Jake Arrieta, and Chris Archer are our three matches for today, although only the latter is in the Main slate tonight.
