The Daily Grind: 4-22-14 – Presented by FanDuel

Agenda

1. A reminder about tomorrow
2. DFS Stacks
3. Wednesday Picks
4. Oh Table, My Table

1. A reminder for tomorrow

I won’t be here tomorrow, but I’ll be back on Thursday. Hopefully this isn’t like the time the BaseballPress site crashed on opening day. I permanently switched to Rotowire for daily lineups after I realized I liked their no frills layout more. Do come back on Thursday.

2. DFS Picks

Well well well. We have all late games today.

Danny Salazar is not the guy we saw late last season. His fastball velocity is way down, and there are other disturbing peripherals too. The Royals have a few lefties that can be stacked at Progressive Field, but a cold game time temperature might push you in another direction.

I’d try either side of the Miguel Gonzalez versus R.A. Dickey game, but I’d focus special attention on Dickey.

The White Sox have activated Charlie Leesman to spot for Chris Sale. The Tigers might pounce.

Brandon McCarthy versus Jason Hammel could result in an eight inning, 0-0 pitchers duel or a four inning, 10-10 mashing. There are better stacks today.

Speaking of those better stacks, try Giants righties against Franklin Morales. They let me down last night against Jorge de la Rosa, so they owe me a favor (that’s totally how DFS works).

Collin McHugh versus Erasmo Ramirez could result in some crooked number innings despite being played at a pitcher friendly park.

3. Standard Wednesday Stuff

Pitchers to Start: Nathan Eovaldi and Aaron Harang are both off to hot starts. They’re also both primed for multi-faceted regression. We’ll see if they can keep the good juju going for another start.

Wade Miley is a mediocre lefty facing a mediocre Cubs lineup. That has to add up to something.

The Indians are good at platooning against either handedness of pitcher. That’s a strike against Jason Vargas. Progressive Field is stingy to right-handed hitters. That’s a ball in Vargas’ favor. So he’s starting the game with a 1-1 count.

Despite his 0.86 ERA, Alfredo Simon is not the destroyer of worlds. He does pass the eye test. He won’t strike out a ton, but he can keep the ball on the ground and his stuff has been hard to square up all season. Speaking of someone who’s hard to square up, Simon is opposed by Roy Halladay dopplepitcher Charlie Morton. The infield grass is going to get some work tomorrow.

If you want more groundballers, Tyson Ross is opposed by Kyle Lohse.

Pitchers to Exploit: The Mariners are pretty left-handed. In his short career, Jarred Cosart is sporting some kind of crazy reverse platoon split (really, take a look). The saberist in me says that lefties should hit better than righties against Cosart. Small sample numbers say otherwise. You decide.

I don’t know what’s up with Justin Masterson. On the one hand, we see a 3.37 FIP and career best whiff rate. On the other hand, his fastball is down three mph and his ERA is two hairs under 5.00.

Keep betting against Dustin McGowan. We’re going to get a 12 run game one of these times.

Andre Rienzo pitched – oh not so good – in three minor league starts. Drew Smyly is going to have trouble getting deep into games for at least a few starts. His strikeout rate (22 percent) is not supported by his low low whiff rate (6.1 percent).

Mike Pelfrey has been sighted in Tampa Bay. It’s not exactly a launching pad, but it is exactly Mike Pelfrey.

Hitters (power): Matt Joyce and David DeJesus have the platoon advantage against Pelfrey. Sometimes I wish Pelfrey was actually Palfrey and also a horse. I would name him Sebastien – four syllables, not three.

It’s a Dayan Viciedo day. You could also try Juan Francisco against Chris Tillman.

Ryan~Raburn~duh~duh~duhduhduh.

Kelly Johnson is commonly owned for his superplatoonability (it’s a word). If he’s not, try rolling him against John Lackey. Just don’t hold out for lefty home runs in Fenway, it’s a deceptively stingy park.

Kyle Seager is going to stop sucking. Right? Right??

A Wade Miley start should mean a Justin Ruggiano sighting. He’s been scarcer than I expected.

Hitters (speed): Take a stab at Jonathan Schoop if you need MI depth.

4. Table

The table below indicates which stadiums have the best conditions for hitters today. The color coding is a classic stoplight where green equals go for hitters. The weather conditions are from SI Weather’s home run app. A 10/10 means great atmospheric conditions for home runs. A 1/10 means lousy atmospheric conditions.

Boston and New York might see rain, we’re going to have to wait until closer to game time to get a better judgment on the odds. There are some chilly games planned for tonight.

The Link. We have three green lights today. One is the omnipresent Denver game while the others are played in hitter friendly retractable roof stadiums.

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