The Daily Grind: DFS, Streaming, and More for September 16

Agenda

1. Nickname Seeking Player
2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard
3. Daily DFS
4. SaberSim Observations
5. Tomorrow’s Targets
6. Factor Grid

1. Nickname Seeking Player

Without the permission of Carson Cistulli, I have re-resurrected the Nickname Seeking Player feature. Today we’re seeking to discover The Big Hoss. Any ideas? Hit me in the comments or on Twitter. We’ll vote someday soon.

2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard

EVHustler stomped all over the field with his Oakland Athletics stack. He cruised to victory with a near-50 point cushion. Congrats on perhaps the most dominating performance of the season. As an interesting aside, EV’s worst picks were Mike Trout and Mookie Betts. A Pirates stack could have done some damage too, but nobody rostered Pirates. The leaderboard is updated.

Here’s the link to today’s contest.

3. Daily DFS 

Yesterday’s Grind

Early: “Zoning laws!? I’ll show you a zone…with my fist,” exclaimed Theo Epstein in a famous closed door session of Chicago’s city council. Theo lost that particular battle when the councilmen and women unleashed a hoard of semi-tamed Pidgey. And so the Cubs have to play the Brewers during the day.

Late: That leaves us with 14 in the real contest. The aces have come to play with Max Scherzer, Corey Kluber, Chris Sale, Cole Hamels, and Chris Archer toeing the rubber. If this was 2015, we could include Felix Hernandez and Zack Greinke too. Scherzer has the best matchup of the bunch, and he also costs the most by a steep margin. I’ll probably avoid ponying up for Kluber. The Tigers are a consistently powerful offense.

If you aren’t going with a basket full deplorables aces, your choices are less savory. Matt Moore is always a wild card, especially with the help of AT&T Park. Moore’s last six starts include two gems, one above average outing, two duds, and one disasterpiece (at Coors). I won’t pretend that he’s even slightly predictable. I happen to like Luke Weaver more than Moore, although Weaver is much less likely to pitch beyond six innings. He has the necessary strikeouts and run prevention skills to turn in a strong start.

Boring Tom Koehler has the gimme matchup versus the Phillies. Much like a Ricky Nolasco or Collin McHugh, Koehler can occasionally turn in a complete game gem when you least expect it. Of course, we suspect it’s possible today so it almost certainly won’t happen. A Koehler complete game is like observing a particle of light. We can measure it after the fact, but it won’t happen if we try to watch.

Stack Targets: Luis Cessa, Ryan Vogelsong, Christian Friedrich, Kendall Graveman, Jose Berrios, John Gant, Clay Buccholz, Tyler Buchholz, Adam Morgan, Jered Weaver, Robert Stephenson, McHugh, Ubaldo Jimenez

4. SaberSim Observations

Scherzer, Kluber, Sale, Hernandez, and Maeda are SaberSim’s top picks. The simulator is backed by Steamer which can be a little slow adjusting to new fundamentals like the league wide coup against King Felix.

A Coors game, Cubs, Reds, Nationals, Padres Trout, Red Sox, and Pirates comprise the top stackables today.

5. Tomorrow’s Targets 

The Reds and Pirates have a doubleheader tomorrow. Plan accordingly.

Pitchers to Start: If you need seven-ish solid innings, Jeremy Hellickson is usually a solid play – especially if you can take quality starts instead of wins. Hellickson seemingly has the stuff to be better than he is, but he keeps leaning on that mediocre fastball. He’s a good bet for another quality start against the Marlins. Four of his five starts opposite Miami have met the requirements for a QS. In the other game, he allowed three runs in 5.1 innings.

Also consider: Seth Lugo, Ervin Santana, Miguel Gonzalez, Jon Gray, Francisco Liriano

Pitchers to Exploit: Jason Vargas returns! Ok, I’ll tone down the excitement. Vargas flashed impressive peripherals during his rehab stint to go with terrible ERAs. Expect the soft-tossing lefty to show some rust.

Also consider: Trevor Williams, Brandon Finnegan, Zach Davies, Matt Andriese, Jason Vargas, Raul Alcantara, Edwin Jackson, Bud Norris, Shelby Miller, Ricky Nolasco, Mike Leake, Mike Fiers

Hitters (power): The Phillies keep saying they’re going to play Tommy Joseph more frequently, yet they continue to start Ryan Howard versus right-handed pitching. That’s fine by me. Joseph is a second division starter at best, and Howard has out-hit him since early July (.263/.300/.570 with 10 home runs in 120 plate appearances). Howard is opposed by fastball thrower Jose Urena.

Also consider: Seth Smith, Dan Vogelbach, Yulieski Gurriel, C.J. Cron, Michael Saunders, Chase Utley, Andre Ethier, Ryan Schimpf, Alex Dickerson, Yangervis Solarte, Freddy Galvis, Ryan Howard, Pedro Alvarez, Hyun-soo Kim, Josh Bell

Hitters (speed): Coors Field is huge which means lots of space for Travis Jankowski to run wild. I smell some multi-steal games in his near future.

Also consider: Angel Pagan, Denard Span, Tim Anderson, Jarrod Dyson, Terrance Gore, Roman Quinn, Cesar Hernandez, Jose Peraza

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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