DFS Pitching Preview: August 24, 2022
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 smaller slate is pretty straightforward:
Shane McClanahan is the best pitcher on the slate and it isn’t remotely close. We’re just playing him on FanDuel. A lot of him to get overweight on the field.
Zac Gallen is the next-best play, but he’s a pretty expensive pivot on FanDuel, and we’re not exactly getting a discount on DraftKings, either.
Miles Mikolas is probably the spend-down SP2 pivot off of Gallen.
José Berríos is the other SP2 pivot to whom we can spend down, but he’s very risky.
Then, we have Framber Valdez, Andrew Heaney, and Lucas Giolito in high-risk spots we don’t wanna play, but should in MME for differentiation with a bunch of upside.
I’ve never done a post like this. And I might not do many like this again. I just wanna lay out the simplicity of this slate before we dig deeper.
SP1: McClanahan
His 2.53 SIERA has been outright dominant. Even with Mike Trout back in the lineup, the Angels’ active roster only has a 95 wRC+ against left-handed pitching since 2021. And there are some strikeouts in that lineup to amplify McClanahan’s 11.02 K/9.
McClanahan doesn’t beat himself, either. His 1.85 BB/9 and 0.96 HR/9 come in a great ballpark to pitch. Add the 6.3% barrel rate and we have what’s laid out to be a strong outing.
He projects the best because he’s the only dominant pitcher on the slate. We should be jamming him into single-entry and going overweight on the field in mass multi-entry (MME).
SP2: Gallen
Gallen is an inconsistent pitcher on a tear. Over his last eight starts, he has a 50.2 IP, 2.82 xFIP, 9.77 K/9, 2.13 BB/9, and 0.36 HR/9.
He gets to take this ride into the very pitcher-friendly Kauffman Stadium against a crappy Royals projected lineup that has a .295 wOBA, .145 ISO, and a 23.7% strikeout rate against right-handed pitching. Including five hitters with strikeout rates of at least 25.5%.
The problem with Gallen on FanDuel is that his price tag is too close to McClanahan’s. If McClanahan is too cumbersome for your build, Gallen’s will be closely so. And if Gallen makes for the perfect build, we don’t have to sacrifice much to spend up to McClanahan. And Gallen’s price tag doesn’t change our build; the Gallen lineups are gonna look a lot like McClanahan builds.
We can certainly play Gallen on FanDuel for MME differentiation, but he’s more of a DraftKings play, where we have to play two pitchers.
SPEND-DOWN SP2s: Mikolas and Berrios
Where we don’t spend up on Gallen at DraftKings, Mikolas gives us more salary flexibility. His strikeout stuff sucks because he lives on soft contact. But the Cubs projected lineup has a whopping 25.5% strikeout rate against righties with only a .311 wOBA. Mikolas leads the slate with 1.60 BB/9, so he’s not gonna shoot himself in the foot and the Cubs shouldn’t rise to the occasion.
Sure, Mikolas will still have a low K/9 for the outing, but he should get a lot of innings to compile more than enough strikeouts.
Mikolas has eight innings pitched in each of his last two starts; seven-plus in ten of his last 22 starts. This isn’t just a good real-life pitcher. This is a strong fantasy pitcher for volume.
Berrios is a bit cheaper and is worse in every way, but he can get a strikeout-per-inning through seven innings when he’s good. The problem is that his 1.82 HR/9 and 11.0% barrel rate carry a ton of risk. These Red Sox aren’t daunting, though, as their projected lineup comes in with a .310 wOBA and a .145 ISO. They don’t strike out, but this is where we’re looking for Berrios to bring the baked-in strikeouts, if he’s on.
But — again — if he’s off, he’ll be terrible.
RISKY PIVOTS: Valdez, Heaney, Giolito
Valdez projects really well, but 8.09 K/9 to 3.14 BB/9 is a bad ratio. What makes his 3.25 SIERA second-best on the slate, though, is his 0.42 HR/9 on a 4.6% barrel rate.
With no Byron Buxton, the Twins don’t strike out much at all, but their .302 wOBA and .122 ISO against lefties are atrocious. The worst we might think could happen is that Valdez gets BABIP’d around for a few runs.
But that’s not a worry to take lightly because he walks so many hitters and is facing a well-disciplined lineup.
Valdez projects really well, but he’s still far behind McClanahan. At this ownership, I don’t know if he’s worth the opportunity cost.
Heaney is in that same price range. I’m out on him because of his history of lacking power prevention to the point where I might stack the Brewers in single-entry, but he’s a strikeout machine. His 11.00 K/9 since 2021 leads the slate and the Brewers projected lineup has a 26.7% strikeout rate since 2021. This really could go either way, so we should be playing both sides of this matchup to strategic degrees in MME on a smaller slate.
If I’m gonna gamble on a guy who can see balls fly out of the yard a lot, I’m more likely spending down to Giolito. Giolito’s been bad and the Orioles have been good, but 10.21 K/9 is still double-digits against an Orioles projected lineup carrying a 23.4% strikeout rate against righties.
Back to the risk, we can’t not-enumerate Giolito’s 1.47 HR/9 against the Orioles’ .195 ISO. This is the fear we all have. But the collective all is greatly unified in this fear and Giolito’s strikeout upside is too much to completely ignore.
On FanDuel, he’s way in the back of my mind. On DraftKings, though, he’s more expensive than Mikolas — which should keep his ownership down there, as well, where we get to play two pitchers.
Alex Sonty is a professional DFS and poker player, while contributing to RotoGrinders and FanGraphs, as well as serving as a part-time political science professor in Chicago, IL. He’s been playing fantasy sports since 1996 and entered the DFS realm in 2014, currently playing high-stakes MLB and NFL cash games and GPPs. He is a Chicago Tribune and SB Nation alum, while holding a J.D./M.A. and L.L.M. from DePaul University.