The Daily Grind: DFS, Streaming, and More for August 29

Agenda

1. Real Baseball Notes
2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard
3. Daily DFS
4. SaberSim Observations
5. Tomorrow’s Targets
6. Factor Grid

1. Real Baseball Notes

When the Phillies installed interim manager Pete Mackanin last season, the team responded by playing their best baseball of the year. Granted, that didn’t amount to much winning, but at least they showed flashes of brilliance. The success carried over into April, making the Mackanin hire look brilliant.

Since then, the team has crumbled. From my outside perspective, the biggest issue is a lack of pitching depth. Most of the secondary options are running into innings caps right around now, so there never really was a plan in place for getting through August and September. Now the team has a demoralized feel to it, and Mackanin may be part of the problem.

Rebuilding squads require a different sort of manager than contenders. Or perhaps the right thing to say is that they require a better manager. The players need to feel like they can win on any given day, and a lot of that comes from the confidence exuded by the man who posts the lineups. Again, this is an outside perspective, but Mackanin doesn’t seem to have that confidence. What’s worse, he’s in a cold feud of sorts with the team’s only star-caliber player.

It may be time for Philadelphia to investigate a new manager. One guy who comes to mind, Rick Renteria, oversaw the Cubs transition from loser to winner. Perhaps he could do a better job than Mackanin as a bridge to the next Phillies contender.

2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard

The DraftKings streak continues. See you there.

3. Daily DFS 

We have some nice, juicy aces today – three to five of them depending on how lenient you are with the ‘ace’-word. The obvious ones are Jose Fernandez, Jake Arrieta, and Yu Darvish. Arrieta hasn’t quite been himself lately, but he can still turn in big outings like he did last week. A matchup against the Pirates isn’t worrisome, even if the game is at Wrigley.

Fernandez deserves to be popular versus the ghost of the ghost of the Mets’ ghost. There’s a certain schadenfreude to seeing the Mets flail their way into September. At least they can’t choke this time. You need a lead before you can squander it. The only downside to Fernandez is his unspoken seven inning cap.

Darvish is probably working under the same constraints as Fernandez, but there’s at least a chance he’ll be cut loose for more than seven frames. He’s opposed by that all or nothing Mariners crew at The Glob.

The secondary aces are Rick Porcello versus the Rays and Carlos Martinez opposite the Brewers. While the big three can dominate their way to big scores in short stints, you’re playing for a complete game, seven strikeout shutout if you pick Porcello. CMart is attractive because the Brewers strike out at a massive rate.

Digging deeper, Tanner Roark should find himself in the winner’s chair, drinking from the chalice of champions after tonight’s pairing with Jake Thompson and the Phillies. Philadelphia has run out of pitchers, and I get the sense the team is demoralized.

On the cheap end of the spectrum, both sides of Joe Musgrove versus Sean Manaea have potential. Musgrove has scuffled in his most recent outings. Pitchers of his type often need adjustment periods where they work on contact management against major league hitters. Think of Musgrove as an early career Kyle Hendricks. I don’t have  a pretty comp for Manaea – he’s also fine-tuning adjustments versus major leaguers.

Stack Targets: Steven Brault, Jake Thompson, Rafael Montero, James Shields, Dillon Gee, Hector Santiago, Wade Miley, Matt Andriese, Zach Davis, Kenta Maeda, Marco Estrada, Jon Gray

4. SaberSim Observations

Fernandez, Arrieta, Michael Pineda, CMart, and Darvish comprise the top five tonight. I consider the high contact Royals to be a very bad matchup for Pineda. His path to DFS primacy is a six inning, 10 strikeout performance. KC is unlikely to hand him such a start.

Stacks include the Nationals, Cubs, Rockies, Dodgers, Orioles, Astros, Red Sox, and Blue Jays. SaberSim reeeeally likes these guys relative to the other options.

5. Tomorrow’s Targets 

Pitchers to Start: Matt Wisler has pitched marginally better this yea, but he’s still a hittable, homer prone pitcher. No matchup is safe, not even the Padres. He does have an easy path to a win assuming the Braves offense can get up off their butts against Edwino Jacksonius the Third.

Also consider: Tom Koehler, Seth Lugo

Pitchers to Exploit: It’s my professional opinion that Josh Tomlin is fatigued. The 31-year-old hasn’t tossed this many innings since 2011, and he’s dealt with myriad injuries in the intervening years. Tomlin is homer prone at his best, and he’s definitely not at his best. The very left-handed Twins lineup should enjoy visiting Progressive Field.

Also consider: Ubaldo Jimenez, Andrew Albers, Anthony Ranaudo, Edwin Jackson, Wily Peralta, Collin McHugh, Tim Adleman, Jered Weaver

Hitters (power): “Detlef” Ryan Schimpf takes his big-time power game on the road to face Wisler. Generally, a fly ball hitter versus a fly ball pitcher is a bad matchup. For some unidentifiable reason, I still really want Schimpf against Wisler.

Also consider: Zack Cozart, Scott Schebler, C.J. Cron, Nick Buss, Carlos Ruiz, Franklin Gutierrez, Xavier Scruggs, Nick Markakis, Alex Dickerson, Ryan Schimpf, Brandon Guyer, Joe Mauer, Max Kepler, Trevor Plouffe, Robbie Grossman, Kurt Suzuki

Hitters (speed): After a recent Twitter argument, I took a closer look at Travis Jankowski. The argument revolved around power – specifically that Roman Quinn has more of it. My conclusion re: Jankowski is that there’s 10 home run power in his bat and potential for a dramatic slash to his strikeout rate. The swing reminds me of prime Shane Victorino, but Jankowski leaks out over his front foot too often. As his hitting coach puts it, he doesn’t stay tall. I take it they plan to work on the issue. There’s very little to lose – it’s not like his current approach is producing a lot of contact.

Also consider: Ender Inciarte, Jace Peterson, Cameron Maybin, Rajai Davis, Jorge Polanco

6. The Factor Grid

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.

The Link.

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