The Daily Grind: DFS, Streaming, and More for June 25

Agenda

1. Personal Injuries, Also Reed
2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard
3. Daily DFS
4. SaberSim Observations
5. Tomorrow’s Targets
6. Factor Grid

1. Personal Injuries, Also Reed

According to an imprecise description from my doctor, I have thoracic outlet syndrome – a semi-common shoulder injury in baseball players. As he explained it, there are two kinds of TOS. I have the neurological kind which can almost always be cured with physical therapy. Phew. Said rehab begins on Tuesday. Time tables have yet to be announced to the media.

A.J. Reed is finally getting a chance in the majors, although I have serious doubts about his readiness. I’m anticipating about a 100 wRC+ with a slash line something like .230/.300/.430. Still, grab him in case he goes wild. I’m shopping him in a couple leagues.

2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard

Paul Goldschmidt, Willson Contreras, and Corey Dickerson were the heroes of the day for contest winner rpimble. Congrats! The leaderboard is updated.

We’ll do a FanDuel evening contest tonight.

3. Daily DFS 

Yesterday’s Grind

Early: Thanks to a doubleheader, there are eight games early and eight games late. The early crew lacks a true ace, although John Lackey gets enough run support to average ace-level production. It’s tempting to try Drew Pomeranz at Cincinnati, but that ballpark is terrifying. Carlos Carrasco is the most talented pitcher available, but he’s opposite the Tigers.

I’m interested to see if Michael Pineda pitches to his ERA or xFIP today. The Twins are a beatable, strikeout prone offense, giving Pineda one of the top ceilings of the day. Between Yankee Stadium and Pineda’s hit friendly ways, there’s also a chance for a meltdown. He makes for a savvy GPP pick.

Stack Targets: Jorge de la Rosa, Anibal Sanchez, Paul Clemens, Matt Garza, Ervin Santana, Miguel Gonzalez, Brandon Finnegan, R.A. Dickey, Shelby Miller

Late: The night crew has the big name – Madison Bumgarner. He’s opposite the Phillies in what should be an easy eight inning, 10 strikeout win. Unfortunately, he costs a fortune and the time slot may not have enough good bargains to create a unique lineup around him.

Jacob deGrom versus Julio Teheran promises to be an interesting pitcher’s duel. Teheran has recovered his past glory while deGrom’s Mets have degraded into a terrible offense. It’s a battle of the baddies.

Steven Wright is kind of weird. As a successful knuckleball pitcher, it’s easy to think of him as a high risk, high reward GPP target. However, his results have been steadily above average with few high score outliers. The narrative doesn’t quite add up. He’ll be challenged versus the Rangers at Globby Stadium.

Chris Tillman, Jake Odorizzi, and Kenta Maeda are also viable options tonight. I wouldn’t mess with the cheap guys.

Stack Targets: Chris Young, Dillon Overton, Jhoulys Chacin, Jeff Locke, Jeremy Hellickson, Mike Leake, A.J. Griffin

4. SaberSim Observations

Our resident projection system claims Bumgarner is top dog. No surprise there. Only Pineda is remotely close in the projections. Pomeranz, Nate Karns, and Gio Gonzalez round out the top five. Those aren’t my favorites.

The Coors game, Nationals, Blue Jays, Red Sox, and Cubs are the best stacks.

5. Tomorrow’s Targets 

Pitchers to Start: Anthony DeSclafani would be outright ownable if he pitched for the Giants. Instead, he’s at the other extreme. The Reds rarely win and their home park is homer friendly. Tomorrow’s matchup versus the Padres is a plus – they can’t hit righties. He should get run support opposite Perdomo.

Also consider: Nate Eovaldi, Bartolo Colon, Bud Norris

Pitchers to Exploit: The Pirates are activating Chad Kuhl just in time to face Clayton Kershaw. Lucky him. Kuhl is a command and control type with a future innings eater profile. As I noted several times with regards to Zach Eflin – a similar pitcher with better stuff – this profile tends to struggle at first. In the minors, pitchers like Kuhl can work in the strike zone without getting hammered. In the majors, they have to learn how to throw balls without falling behind in the count. It’s kind of hard…

Also consider: Tyler Duffey, Luis Perdomo, Tyler Wilson, Drew Smyly, Martin Perez, Pat Corbin, Chad Bettis

Hitters (power): Mark Reynolds has ridiculous reverse splits this season. All eight of his home runs have come against right-handed pitchers. Even so, there’s no cause to ignore years of lefty mashing. Go ahead and use him versus Corbin.

Also consider: Chase Utley, Ryan Raburn, Franklin Gutierrez, Dae-ho Lee, Danny Valencia, Nolan Reimold, Max Kepler

Hitters (speed): Emilio Bonifacio is back in the majors with the Braves. He’s a bottom of the order guy with the potential to post an empty average and high stolen base rate. He’ll face Colon tomorrow.

Also consider: Angel Pagan, Jace Peterson, Ender Inciarte

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 day games are going to be very homer friendly. They were already at homer parks, and they mostly have 10 grade weather.

The Link.

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