Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

Tonight’s decision revolve less around stats and more along the lines of gameplan and how you strategize to attack it.

If you’re aggressive on the ownership game and believe that Carlos Rodón is a top-three pitcher rest of season, as THE BAT does, you’re of the mind that he’s matchup-proof. Or you’re indifferent to matchups give a skill set like this. Enough so that his median should be the highest projection. I say that the Dodgers cap his ceiling, but this could be of no concern on DK where the $10k price tag is kinda’ low and no one is gonna play him.

This is an extreme stance — taking a rising star against the Dodgers, but we shouldn’t cross him off if his projected ownership continues to be low.

Wind could be blowing in at Wrigley around 20 mph. If you believe that pitch counts are still so wildly unpredictable that they’re impossible to project, but see Rodon’s matchup as too risky, Michael Kopech has similar strikeout stuff baked in against a Cubs team that strikes out a ton by default. That Kopech went 94 pitches his last outing pumps volume into this per-inning master. If five innings is good to you because it’s so hard to get to six anyway, Kopech is your guy on DK where they don’t give points for the quality start.

If five innings isn’t fine and you want the more comfortable matchup, Joe Ryan has gone six-plus in three straight starts. The Orioles could be less likely to disrupt that streak. He isn’t a consistent strikeout monster, but the Orioles are as good a strikeout matchup as the Cubs, so this could be a ceiling spot for Ryan’s strikeouts. Of these three pitchers, he’s the only one with three outings of six-plus innings.

All of that said, there’s a guy with double-digit K/9, solid control, and elite power prevention since 2021 who’s thrown 89, 89, 95, and 95 pitches across his four starts this season. And he’s facing the lowly Reds for under $9k on DK. Brandon Woodruff is just too damn cheap. If ownership is of no difference to you at pitcher, Woodruff is a game piece that we jam in everywhere to price enforce.

We should be playing one of these four on FD and can mix any of these four into DK lineups. But maybe you wanna sprinkle these four around at SP1 and take a stand on an SP2 cheaper that Woodruff. Which is totally fine — but the options are all very risky.

Cristian Javier has a SIERA under 4.00 since 2021 because of his 11.46 K/9. The risk is that the Mariners aren’t bad anymore, he has 4.40 BB/9 over that stretch with an uncomfortable 1.33 HR/9 allowed on a 9.8% barrel rate. But those strikeouts are sexy. If you disregard walks, Javier is extremely underpriced.

Tyler Mahle is probably not getting the win tonight, but the Brewers are ho-hum offense that strikes out a lot. Mahle has 10.41 K/9 since 2021. The lack of win probability caps his ceiling. But he’s free, so who cares?

Germán Márquez is a great pitcher at Coors Field. We normally don’t give a crap about home-road splits, but when a Rockie pitches well at home, we should take notice, because Coors is its own animal. It’s tough to keep the ball in the park and movement is funky, so pitchers can struggle to generate strikeouts. Marquez’ career ERA is 4.73 at home, but his 9.3 K/9 there is higher than his road 8.6. He’s struggled a little to start the season, but his ERA was 3.67 at Coors last season. I don’t know if last year was a fluke, but if you’re of the mind that Marquez is a good Coors pitcher, hell, no one’s gonna play him.

I think this can be a fine pitching pool from which to choose for SE3 and MME. If you’re wondering why I disregarded some guys, let’s take a look:

Alek Manoah is too damn expensive to be facing the Yankees. If we’re disregarding matchup, we can do it with a far better pitcher in Rodon for a comparable price. If Rodon were catching ownership in the 20% range, we could consider Manoah.

Julio Urías is cheap and there’s an argument that if we’re throwing matchup caution to the wind, we should do at a cheaper price tag. I empathize with this, but Urias doesn’t have baked-in strikeout stuff near Rodon, so Rodon is a rare case

Noah Syndergaard should go without saying. The Red Sox are a pretty neutral-ish matchup, but Syndergaard is only striking out 5.8 per nine this season. The strikeouts could come back this season, given his time away from the game, this is a rare case where I wanna see it first.

This brings us back to Ryan and Kopech. These are $10k-worthy pitchers on whom the field has been saying, let me see it first. The result is them being underpriced and maybe overowned.

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

Pricing differs at the top of the pitching chain today across the sites. The gut reaction is to grab the cheaper options, but that isn’t always the correct option. The field likes to gravitate to the cheaper option. When we go along with the field on a pitching choice, we have to differentiate with our hitters. Don’t certain price points lock you into a chalky build.

Read the rest of this entry »

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

This early main slate is a really difficult one to not play chalk pitching. There are five guys with double-digit per-nine strikeout stuff, but three have really samples and two of them are in bad strikeout parks. I’m nitpicking here because the two SP1s are just so obvious that excluding Joe Ryan in a bad strikeout matchup, Tyler Wells and his awful command, and Tanner Houck and his awful matchup feels pretty easy.

EDIT — The cheap Wells is rising on my list because no one is going to play him. I predicted he’d be in the 20-25% ownership range because of the strikeouts and the great matchup, but he could go single digits. He’s become a poor man’s Cease on this slate.

THE SP1s: Kevin Gausman and Dylan Cease

Kevin Gausman is the clear ace of the slate. His SIERA since 2021 is the lowest on the slate and his strikeout matchup is sneaky strong. The Red Sox active roster only has a 104 wRC+ against right-handed pitching since 2020 and their strikeout rate has gone up to 23.5%. Add in his 10.70 K/9, 2.22 BB/9, and 0.89 HR/9 with his ridiculously cheap salary on DK and we’re losing money by not going overweight on him. Sometimes chalk is underowned, too, and Gausman is one of those spots today.

Read the rest of this entry »

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

Speaking of lineups, we’re gonna approach this with Coors Field in mind, considering there’s a terribly high-contact pitcher on the mound for Colorado and an erratic pitcher on the mound for Philadelphia. We have to remember that we can’t play chalk pitching with Coors stacks. When stacking Coors teams, we have to find leverage elsewhere.

THE SP1s: Corbin Brunes, Robbie Ray, and Joe Musgrove

Walker Buehler and Framber Valez are strong pitchers, but both have bad matchups on top of weaker K/9, compared to the three we’ll discuss.

Corbin Burnes is at the top of the list. His SIERA is the only one on the slate under 3.00 with the only K/9 over 12.00 and the only HR/9 under 0.75 since 2021, with elite command. And the Pirates are atrocious. Burnes is probably underpriced on both sites.

Robbie Ray is about adequately priced. He’s shown some command issues thus far this season, but we shouldn’t put too much into a couple of outings. We should believe in the bust out we saw last season, where he dramatically lowered his BB/9 and HR/9, while still carrying a high K/9. He draws an unspectacular Rangers team, whose active roster has a 24.2% strikeout rate against left-handed pitching since 2021.

Joe Musgrove has seen his strikeouts, walks, and power prevention swing in the wrong direction since the late-June enhanced enforcement of banned substances. But his numbers since June 30 are still fine: 9.41 K/9, 2.89 BB/9, 1.16 HR/9 on a 3.94 SIERA. Add that the Reds are a no-hitter waiting to happen and fine is, well, fine.

Musgrove’s dramatically more expensive at FD, but the ownership is dramatically lower there. If we can jam in the Coors bats with his hefty price tag at FD, that’s our move. If Otherwise, he’s not really playable with Coors. Sure, the cheap price tag makes it easier to play him with Coors at DK, but everyone sees that same dynamic. Early ownership projections are showing that everyone is seeing Burnes and Ray as much stronger options than Buehler and Valdez, leading me the conclusion that we play Musgrove, Buehler, or Valdez at FD or Buehler and/or Valdez at DK with Coors.

Where we fade Coors, we should be playing Burnes, Ray, or Musgrove. The second we pull that trigger of not playing Coors is the second where we kinda’ don’t have to give a crap about ownership.

THE CHEAP SP2s: Cole Irvin and Chris Archer

Cole Irvin is projected better than Buehler and Valdez, according to THE BAT. The ballpark in Oakland is sexy for run prevention. It’s bad for strikeouts, but Irvin is so cheap that the strikeouts are cherries, not the sundae. Not to mention, the Orioles’ active roster has a 24.9% strikeout rate against left-handers since 2020.

Irvin’s 2.04 BB/9 displays great command and his 1.28 HR/9 is good enough power prevention facing an average bunch of hitters who strike out a ton.

With the field looking for paths toward jamming in two of Burnes, Ray, and Musgrove, Irvin is projecting to gather almost no ownership. But the day is early. He’s projecting so well in terms of performance that the ownership should follow. But, hey, there’s nothing sexy about playing Cole Irvin.

On one hand, there’s nothing on the Fangraphs page of Chris Archer that tells us to play him. But he is free and projected by THE BAT to throw in the 80-pitch range, along with the terrible Royals as his opponent. His 95-96-mph fastball now sits in the 93-94 range and he did go four innings without walking anyone in his first start. The Royals don’t strike out much, on one hand; but they could also be quick outs that get Archer in the direction of six innings. Not putting six innings on the table here; just saying that we could get into the fifth against a high-contact bunch.

Historically, Archer was a fireballer until he got hurt and, then, he got ever more hurt even worse. We don’t really know what he is. But we’re presuming he isn’t and and that’s enough for this price tag against this opponent.

On a personal note: recent months have been overwhelmingly trying for my family and I want to express my deepest gratitude for all of the well wishes and support.

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

There’s some talent on this slate with mixed matchups, so we have a lot of work cut out for us, tonight. Early on, my pool is:

Full slate, so I won’t go through every pitcher, as there are a lot of gas cans, too. If you think I’m leaving someone out, feel free to tweet me. I will confess Zack Greinke and José Berríos are close and might enter my pool. Marcus Stroman has a great matchup, but we can play Kyle Gibson for less in an even juicier matchup, so I left him out, but he’s fine, too.

Lucas Giolito off the IL is way too much of a pitch count concern; for his price, we need volume. He’s projecting very well, with a projected pitch count in the low-80s, so any word that he gets normal workload, and he’s high on my list. Just not aggressively foreseeing that at this moment of the day.

THE ACE — Gerrit Cole

Don’t be scared of Gerrit Cole without the sticky stuff. Since June 23, he has a:

2.89 SIERA
13.65 K/9
15.5% SwStr%
35.1% O-Swing%
2.76 BB/9
1.16 HR/9
11.4% Barrel%

Going into Camden Yards, there could be more concern for lesser control and his awful power prevention than Yu Darvish post-sticky stuff, but that 11.4% is on contact and Cole is inducing chases and not giving up contact.

The Orioles aren’t terrible, so we don’t have to play Cole, but Cole is the best pitcher on the slate and that isn’t close. The control and power concerns with the ballpark are valid reasons to bump him closer to the field, but he’s still way above the field.

THE PIVOTS — Nathan Eovaldi, Frankie Montas

Nathan Eovaldi is firmly the second-best pitcher on the slate and feels safer because he draws the terrible Mariners, who gift strikeouts to all pitchers. Eovaldi’s elite control gets him deep into games for innings, so the context raises his upside into ace territory. He just isn’t Cole.

Cole has that 13-15 strikeout upside every slate against all opponents in every ballpark, whereas Eovaldi is relatively capped. For the price, Eovaldi isn’t a huge step. Battling the megachalk possibility of Cole, his ownership is a huge discount, though. And ownership is a cost. Remember that.

If that’s still too much to spend under the condition of not playing Cole, Frankie Montas draws a tough strikeout matchup, but a great one for run prevention in a great ballpark for doing so. On DK, he’s more than Eovaldi, so the argument is tough; but, on FD, he gets cheaper — where we only play one pitcher. There are a lot of baked-in strikeouts, his control is just a bit worse than Cole’s, and his power prevention has been elite post-sticky: 0.56 HR/9 on a 7.3% barrel rate.

Where I’m not playing Cole, I’m loading up on these two at what could be single-digit ownership on FD. Eovaldi will catch some ownership on DK, but will still be at a huge discount. THE BAT like Eovaldi for more raw points than Cole on DK, so that could put his ownership on the rise, so keep a look out.

THE SP2s — Drew Rasmussen, Jesús Luzardo, Touki Toussaint, Kyle Gibson

Drew Rasmussen has the worse matchup we’re discussing. The Jays are packed with power and don’t strike out much. But Rasmussen has shown elite power prevention and strikeout stuff. Chances are, the Jays win this battle, but we don’t care about what will happen a vast majority of the time. We care about how often the Jays will wet the bed in relation to Rasmussen’s ownership. Rasmussen has the stuff to succeed and any group of hitters can fold any night. This is a solid low-exposure spot for leverage.

The Jesús is a solid pitcher who gives up too much power at times. The Nats really only have a couple of guys to supply it. If Jesús Luzardo can get through he heart of the order, his strikeouts should cruise through this lineup for free. He’s the top spend-down option on both sites, despite his control and power prevention issues, as his K/9 is enough for me. The play is volatile and we should watch ownership before we decide to hit the gas, though. Higher-owned, he becomes a bad play; low-owned, a fantastic play who allows us to do whatever we want for hitting.

Touki Toussaint is all over the place. He can’t find the strike zone, but it might not matter in a great spot for run prevention against the Quad-A Rockies. The Rockies aren’t a great strikeout matchup, but their active roster’s 32.8% O-Swing rate is among the worst in the league this season. This is a sneaky-great spot for Toussaint to rack up the strikeouts. The fear, of course, is whether or not he can command his pitch count to stay in the game long enough.

Everyone is gonna play Kyle Gibson — I think. He draws the Quad-A Cubs, who strike out a ton. Gibson himself doesn’t have the baked-in strikeouts to lock him in, but his lack of command could induce chasing that helps him compile the strikeouts. We’ve seen him go seven (and even eight) innings this season quite a bit, so his seven shutout innings with six strikeout ceiling is in full effect. The downside, of course, is that those potential strikeouts can easily become walks and he barely last four or five innings, which is why I’m more likely to be defensively underweight on the flocking field than aggressive overweight.

Stats cited are since 2020 unless otherwise noted. Park factors via EV Analytics.

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

This slate is loaded with pitching talent, but I have a narrow pool a lot faster than I normally would. Without ownership data, yet, we’ll focus more on deductive reasoning to see how I narrowed this pool to:

Instead of analyzing tiers of the pool, this week, we should go down the list of who I’m likely not playing and why.

Carlos Rodón might be the best pitcher on the slate. It isn’t the matchup with the Red Sox that throws me off so much as his pitch count. He only missed one start with a sore shoulder and I wish he missed more and stretched out again in rehab starts. As is, we have no clue how limited he’s going to be. We can gamble on these scenarios often, but there’s enough pitching on this slate that we don’t have to bother our brains thinking much about it.

Tanner Houck is one of the best per-inning pitchers on this slate, but he hasn’t gone more than 5.1 innings in any starts this season. Yet, he’s priced right around the point where we want shots at six innings.

Joe Musgrove is still a really good pitcher post-sticky stuff, but he isn’t elite. Facing the Dodgers on a full slate, I want elite.

Framber Valdez is fine, but there are a lot of baked-in strikeouts on this slate and he has very little. Besides, his FD price is stupid. On DK, he’s viable, but we’ll get to a far lower-owned play under $10k later.

Tylor Megill is a good pitcher, but has some power prevention issues that don’t seem like early-career bad luck. Against the Yankees, we don’t need to test the skill luck factor.

Trevor Rogers is yet another really good pitcher on this slate. He’s as playable as Rodon, Houck, and Megill. Maybe more playable because his power prevention can neutralize the Braves right-handed thump. If he gets lost in the ownership shuffle, he’s the most likely to enter my pool as the day goes on. But, boy, the Braves can really getcha’.

Shohei Ohtani falls in the Musgrove category of a really good pitcher in a crappy matchup. Ohtani’s command has been on since his beatdown in Yankee Stadium, but the K/9 has fallen to 9.00 in the process. The Astros just don’t strike out, so our ceiling looks more like seven innings with five strikeouts than six or seven strikeouts. And this matters because a shutout, let alone clean innings, are hard to come by in this matchup. On DK, though, we could put him in my pool in the case that we have money left over, but we can spend down further for similar production.

Julio Urías has been great this year. The matchup against the Padres isn’t quite Musgrove or Ohtani’s hands-off matchup, but it’s still a left-handed pitcher against a lot of right-handed thump. That said, 9.67 K/9, 1.84 BB/9, and 1.09 HR/9 on a 5.9% barrel rate is all superstrong and no one is gonna play him at this price, so we can spend up to him with the extra salary. But, again, this is similar to Rogers’ situation. Except Rogers is cheaper and in a better spot.

Then, there’s a bunch of overpriced gibberish like Michael Wacha, Marco Gonzales, Madison Bumgarner, and Jordan Montgomery. Volatile plays with little upside like Eli Morgan, Matthew Boyd, and Paul Blackburn. Then, the gas cans like Chris Ellis, Griffin Jax, Daniel Lynch, and Jon Lester. Blackburn has a notable matchup with the Rangers, but should be overowned for the lack of strikeout upside.

I didn’t forget about Adrian Houser. There’s just nothing to say about him.

I also didn’t forget about Glenn Otto. The kid has electric strikeout stuff that we’d love on DK in a lot of matchups. But the Athletics don’t strike out much and this ballpark depresses strikeouts. Without an innings ceiling, we should be out. But if ownership funnels way up to Germán Márquez and Ian Anderson, he’s certainly viable.

Leaving us with:

Robbie Ray

Robbie Ray is the best play on the slate at first glance. This season has been really great for him because he’s finally found his command. With it, his BB/9 has fallen to 2.28 and his HR/9 down to 1.36 this season — despite an 8.7% barrel rate. Sure, he still gets hit hard when he gets hit, but “when he gets hit” is the caveat, as he’s still compiling 11.49 K/9.

Post-sticky stuff (since June 23), Ray’s gone at least six innings in 13 of 14 starts with 11.33 K/9, 2.17 BB/9, allowing only 0.79 HR/9. I’m not a recency bias guy, but this is clearly an elite pitcher finding his stride.

The Orioles are an about-average matchup, Camden Yards sucks for power prevention, but I don’t care. Looking at what we’ve eliminated, there are so many pluses here that the minuses are blips on the radar.

Tyler Mahle

Ownership on Tyler Mahle is usually tough to gauge on full slates. It looks like Mahle will get overlooked, despite having a great season so far because: (a) people don’t realize how much of a strikeout machine he is and (b) people don’t realize how many the Cardinals are against right-handed pitching. In a pitchers’ park at single-digit ownership, yes, please.

Ian Anderson

This is the chalk on both sites. Ian Anderson is criminally cheap on both sites for the Marlins matchup. So many strikeouts in here that the walks will likely not matter. If we’re spending down on FD, we’re eating the chalk here, but there’s a similarly priced pitcher who’s very similar to whom we can pivot on DK.

Germán Márquez

No one’s gonna play Germán Márquez because of Anderson’s situation, despite Márquez having slightly more K/9 and less B/9. Sure, Márquez has to battle Citizens Bank Park, but he battles Coors just fine, so why the hell would Philly be a problem. They’re an average, so the ceiling of seven strikeout in seven largely clean innings is certainly in play.

Anderson is the better projection, but Márquez is the better DFS play at microscopic ownership over Anderson’s megachalk.

Stats cited are since 2020 unless otherwise noted. Park factors via EV Analytics.

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

Both sites are very different on this slate because of pricing, but the overall slate is such that there are no truly great aces. Without ownership data, we’ll focus more on matchups to narrow our pool:

TIER ONE: KINDA’ ACES — Peralta and Ohtani

Freddy Peralta is the best pitcher on the slate, but he’s projected at only 75 pitches coming off of the IL. This doesn’t take him out of play if there’s an ownership gap between him and Ohtani that supplies us leverage. If Peralta is rolling — translation: throwing strikes — then, 75 pitches can get us some game depth to compile Ks with his elite K/9. His ceiling is capped at under 30 points, but his median projection might be good enough if we can get 15-to-20 from our SP2, as well.

Read the rest of this entry »

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

We’ll look at the three aces, the primary pivot off of the aces, and some DK SP2 options. Here’s my preliminary pool:

Read the rest of this entry »

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

We’ll look at the current pool I’m using — the chalk and pivots — and then, cover some questionable plays I’m avoiding for the most part at this time. Right now, this is what I’m looking at:

TIER ONE: ACES — Burnes and Flaherty

Jack Flaherty sticks out like a sore thumb because he’s a legitimate ace and is facing a terrible Tigers team that strikes out a ton. They strike out more often than any other pitcher’s matchup on this slate. He’s also pitched six-plus innings in nine of his 13 starts, so he’s staying in if he’s rolling — and he should roll through Detroit tonight for a quality start, a win, and a shot at nine-plus strikeouts.

THE BAT has Flaherty projected for the most raw points and lower ownership on FD, but pretty high ownership on DK. Sucking the air out of the room is the 500-pound gorilla looming over this slate with another idiom that slips my mind.

Corbin Burnes is the best pitcher on this slate and it isn’t close at all. This season, he’s fine-tuned his control and been a friggin’ serial killer:

2.57 SIERA
12.40 K/9
1.63 BB/9
35.1% K-BB rate
0.35 HR/9
2.7% barrel rate

These are the only Cy Young digits on the slate. That said, we’re paying for it.

Burnes is $1,200 more than Flaherty on FD and $1,000 more on DK. Instead of facing the bum-assed Tigers in a pitchers’ park like St. Louis, Burnes has to face a strong Reds lineup in a hitters’ park like Milwaukee. So, there is added risk.

I don’t — personally — think this risk is enough to sway me from the best pitcher on the slate. Flaherty is a really good pitcher. But it would take a great pitcher or maybe 150% of Flaherty’s ownership to take me away from Burnes on either site in single-entry.

In MME play, there’s a decision to be made. I expect the field to spread ownership around to a lot of good pitching that we have on this slate, I’m taking a strong stance by going overweight on both guys. The field wants to have enough lineups to spread exposure. I want to counter that by being potentially overexposed to the two cleat-cut aces.

TIER TWO: THE DK SP2 — Márquez

Germán Márquez isn’t cheap in a vacuum, but he’s way too cheap for the skillset and situation. This is a Coors Field pitcher with only 0.83 HR/9 on a 4.7% barrel rate and near 9.00 K/9. This is a really good pitcher. Add that he’s facing the Cubs and their high strikeout rate against right-handed pitching and I DGAF how the wind is blowing; he’s the best SP2 play on DK.

That said, everyone is seeing this terrible Cubs dynamic and will jam him in, which forces us to call back to savings on Flaherty from Burnes. More importantly, it raises the necessity for us to not play Flahety-Márquez or Burnes-Márquez lineups too freely, as those will be the two chalk combinations. We can play them; we just need to stack off the board when we do.

And we don’t have to play those pairings. There is a wealth of pivots on this slate.

TIER THREE: PIVOTS — Morton, Megill, Berrios, Morgan

Charlie Morton is still a really good pitcher. Where he ranks on this slate among qualified pitchers:

3rd in SIERA
4th in K/9
4th in K-BB%
2nd in HR/9
5th in barrel rate

Morton faces a tough power matchup in the Yankees, but he neutralizes power. The key to this play is that the Yankees have a few guys who strike out a bunch and Morton has baked-in strikeouts. No one’s gonna play him.

Tylor Megill is more than just a background Game of Thrones character. He’s a pretty good pitcher with baked-in strikeouts, decent control, and strong power prevention, who can go six innings, if he’s rolling. The Giants are a really tough matchup, but Citi Field is a great pitchers’ park. There aren’t any good SP plays under $7,000, so we have to consider sprinkling him around.

José Berríos is probably the pitcher after Morton in a bad matchup that I’m considering most. The White Sox are about as bad a matchup as the Yankees, but they strike out more often. This is a guy who can go seven innings against anyone any given night. Remember that more innings equals more strikeout opportunities and, hell, we get fantasy point for innings, too.

Last and certainly least, we have to discuss Eli Morgan. He isn’t any damn good. He walks too many guys and is a launching pad when contact is made. But this is a great run prevention situation. The Rangers are worse than the Tigers and Cubs and we’re considering passing over Burnes for Flaherty and Márquez. We can save a lot of money in some lineups and get the nut matchup. Sure, it can blow up in our faces, but this is baseball.

Baseball is a risky game on which to make wagers of any sort. The temptation on a slate where there is really good pitching is to eliminate all of the high-risk situations as unnecessary. This is incorrect.

Tournaments are won by calculating when to embrace variance. Doing so at SP2 with a guy who struggles to prevent power because he can strike out a man per inning is totally fine. Especially on a slate where the cheapest guy we want to play is $8,200.

Stats cited are since 2020 unless otherwise noted. Park factors via EV Analytics.

Our pitching in MLB DFS isn’t just a source of fantasy points. The price tags on pitchers make it so they shape they dictate the freedoms and restrictions of building our lineups. Before reading this article, it’s highly suggested that you read my article, “DFS Pitching Primer,” so the concepts discussed here make more sense.

That we’re not selecting the best players. We’re constructing the lineups which carry the most leverage without sacrificing many projected fantasy points.

Tonight, we have a full slate with a lot of options and at 6:00 a.m., I’m in favor of a robust pitching pool and a condensed pool of diversified stacks for hitters. Because, well, we can’t play everyone, and I rarely favor balance over taking a stand. Currently, this is my pitcher pool. We’ll go through the three tiers of these pitchers and briefly sum up why I eliminated others in the end.

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