The Daily Grind: DFS, Streaming, and More for September 22

Agenda

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

1. Misreading the Signs

In the second half of this season, I’ve been trying a new DFS strategy – rostering good players when they’re overpriced. The concept is pretty simple. I want players who are likely to produce big scores, but I also don’t want to share those players with others. For the most part, it’s worked out relatively well when I’ve targeted overpriced, non-obvious stacks (i.e. not at Coors Field). I’ve had less success with pitchers.

Last night, I rostered $14,000 Chris Sale under the assumption that nobody else would do so. The break even point for a $14,000 pitcher on DraftKings is around 35 points. And while Sale hits that number about one-third of the time, there’s almost no upside for him to exceed 40 points. When you pay $8,000 for 17.5 points of implied production, you still have 15-20 points of upside. The bottom line, rostering Sale last night was a dumb move. So, applying my new strategy of overpaying, I went for it.

If you shared Sale with me last night, you know he flopped tremendously against the Phillies. Including me, four of 15 participants in last night’s TDG Invititational used Sale. It was like we kept $14,000 on reserve while also forgetting to pick a second pitcher. Ouchie.

2. The Daily Grind Invitational and Leaderboard

Congrats to godhood for 1. not picking Sale and 2. getting big games out of Corey Kluber, Chad Kuhl, Gary Sanchez, and Sean Rodriguez. The last time the Yankees faced Alex Cobb, Brian McCann delivered a double dong. This time it was Sanchez. The leaderboard is updated.

We’ll use the same parameters tonight – 15 users, $2, and top three paid on DraftKings.

3. Daily DFS 

Yesterday’s Grind

Early: The Tigers and Twins are playing the role of cheese today (i.e. standing alone). Actually, they’re playing a doubleheader. I don’t know what kind of cheese that is…roquefort? No Anibal Sanchez or Pat Dean for us. Oh shucks.

Late: We have 10 games in the main slate. Justin Verlander and David Price are the, ah, priciest pitchers. They’re also the best of the best of the best, sir! If you can afford him, Verlander is a savvy play with the Tigers in contention mode. They’ll want to ride him deep into the game. Price is riskier against a good Orioles offense. He dominated them about 10 days ago.

Jeff Samardzija is the next most expensive arm. He’s had a lot of trouble with left-handed hitters this season. The Padres have no lack of solid lefty sticks in the lineup. Shark’s last outing against the Padres was mediocre, but there’s still upside for a complete game shutout.

Cheap, high risk options include Seth Lugo versus Adam Morgan, Blake Snell hosting the Yankees, and Mike Clevinger hosting the Royals. Personally, I’m inclined to pick a side in the Lugo-Morgan debacle. Any self-respecting FanGraphs fan knows Lugo does special things with curve ball spin rate.

Meanwhile, Morgan has been quietly good since returning to the rotation in mid-August. I’ve always thought there was a major league pitcher hiding in there somewhere, it was just a matter of discovering the right weapons to pair with his command. To be clear, he’s still a fringy fantasy option. Lots of pitchers are bonafide major leaguers and also quite unusable.

Stack Targets: Jason Vargas, Ryan Vogelong, Josh Collmenter, Jose Urenda, Chris Tillman, Mike Fiers, Brett Anderson, Chase Anderson, Christian Friedrich, Tyler Chatwood, Ricky Nolasco

4. SaberSim Observations

Verlander, Snell, Price, Samardzija, and Lugo are the top picks for today per SaberSim. I really thought there’d be someone silly like Tillman (ranked second to last) or Anderson on the list. Oh, there’s Anderson ranked sixth. Expect four or fewer innings with a high meltdown risk.

Trouts, Red Sox, Brewers, Marlins, Pirates, Tigers, Astros, Braves!, and Indians are the top stacks.

5. Tomorrow’s Targets 

Pitchers to Start: Jon Gray has officially entered elite ceiling territory after a complete game, 16 strikeout skunking of the Padres last week. Of course, he has a much tougher assignment tomorrow versus the Dodgers. He held them run-less through six innings with eight strikeouts the last time he faced them – at Coors Field no less. There’s risk here, but there’s also a ton of reward. If you need everything, Gray is your pick.

Also consider: Francisco Liriano, Jameson Taillon, Jeremy Hellickson, Steven Matz, Zach Davies, James Paxton

Pitchers to Exploit: Drew Pomeranz is probably a little overmatched in the AL East. He’s also likely to be fatigued and perhaps a touch injured. Pomeranz hasn’t thrown over 100 innings since 2013. He’s at 164 frames now. He still can rack up the strikeouts, but he’s been homer prone in the AL (1.88 HR/9).

Also consider: Bryan Mitchell, Shelby Miller, Yovani Gallardo, Miguel Gonzalez, Andrew Cashner, Matt Wisler, Kyle Gibson, Alex Meyer, Kendall Graveman, Edwin Jackson, Albert Suarez

Hitters (power): Pedro Alvarez is slashing .251/.325/.519 versus right-handed pitching with 20 home runs in 320 plate appearances. That’s a 40 homer pace. Go ahead and grab a share opposite the broken shell of Miller.

Also consider: Jon Jay, Ryan Schimpf, Alex Dickerson, Stephen Cardullo, Chase Utley, Seth Smith, Adam Lind, Dan Vogelbach, Justin Bour, Hyun-soo Kim, Michael Saunders

Hitters (speed): Now is a good time to snag Phillies speedsters like Roman Quinn, Cesar Hernandez, Freddy Galvis, Odubel Herrera, and Aaron Altherr. Matz is slightly susceptible to stolen bases, and you can hang onto them for a Saturday matchup versus Noah Syndergaard.

Also consider: Angel Pagan, Denard Span, Travis Jankowski, Jose Peraza, Ender Inciarte, Jace Peterson, Jarrod Dyson, Terrance Gore, Socrates Brito

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.

This post is not brought to you by any DFS platform. The current author is quite pleased to present a DFS ad free environment.