The Daily Grind: Take Two

When the Phillies completely overhauled their offense, I imagine this is exactly how they scripted it. Intentionally walk Bryce Harper to load the bases followed by an immediate Rhys Hoskins grand slam. Baseball is fun.

AGENDA

  1. TDG Invitational
  2. Weather Reports
  3. Pitchers to Use and Abuse
  4. SaberSim Says…
  5. You Won’t See This Often

1.The Daily Grind Invitational

Day one goes to pyelsik. Eric Lauer, Max Scherzer, Luke Voit, and Javy Baez carried most of the weight. Congrats and leaderboard.

We’re off on FantasyDraft today. We’re still working out the Spring Training kinks.

If you have not signed up for FantasyDraft, please use this referral link for tracking purposes. If I understand properly, by using the referral, you will receive a 10 percent return on any rakes you pay.

2. Weather Reports

Five of today’s eight games are roofed which counteracts the chilly weather. There’s no rain in the forecast.

3. Pitchers to Use and Abuse

Gerrit Cole ($21,400) is quite clearly the top pitching target tonight. While the Rays get a lot of positive press, I look at that Opening Day lineup and wonder how they’ll ever compete with teams like the Yankees and Astros. Brandon Lowe cleanup? Ji-Man Choi and Austin Meadows with top roles. These are bottom-of-the-order, complementary pieces. There’s a lot of pressure on Tommy Pham to do everything. I guess a point in the Rays favor is it’s a deep lineup of complementary pieces. It’s the bargain version of the Phillies offense. Anyway, Cole is facing a very beatable opponent. The Rays answer with Charlie Morton ($17,200) in his first game against his former club.

Robbie Ray ($19,500) is listed as the next most expensive, but I happily prefer to pay $18,600 for Ross Stripling. I suspect my preference will be shared by touts, projection systems, and the like, i.e. Stripling will be very popular. In a sense, Ray could be a savvy contrarian pick. You never know when he’ll fire off 10 easy strikeouts. A matchup against the Dodgers obviously isn’t desirable whereas Stripling should be happy to face a depleted Diamondbacks unit.

German Marquez ($18,000) has elicited quite the debate in the baseball community. He was amazing in the second half of 2018, but it’s hard to completely dismiss his rough first half or the interactive effects of Coors Field. For today, a bet in continued success make a lot of sense. For one, the game is in Miami. The Marlins offense is a shambles. Daily Fantasy also happens to be the right format to bet on a fairly priced Marquez. Whereas a mistake in season-long fantasy hurts for half a year, a bad outcome for Marquez can be quickly dismissed. Trevor Richards ($14,000) is slightly overpriced – mostly because his path to a victory is full of pitfalls.

Freddy Peralta ($17,800) costs more than Jack Flaherty ($17,200). Uh huh. Well, we know the top contrarian play. Peralta is probably a $11,000 pitcher. He has a tough matchup against a strong Cardinals lineup. Flaherty’s pairing versus the Brewers is challenging too. The difference is he’s a beast with 10 strikeout upside.

Be wary using Yusei Kikuchi ($13,800) in DFS. Not only is the Red Sox lineup difficult to navigate, it also seems like he’ll be used in an unusual way. I can’t be more specific until we see more. I will note that long outings are unlikely. I like Nate Eovaldi’s ($15,900) chances to hand the Mariners a loss.

Matt Boyd ($13,000) reportedly made some gains over the offseason. I’d like him more for $11,500, but this isn’t an unreasonable price. I think he’s the most obvious bargain starter opposite the Blue Jays.

I’m sure some will like Joey Lucchesi ($15,500) this season. While I have a general aversion to pitchers of his skill set – i.e. two-pitch changeup specialists – I can’t deny the quality of his matchup today. The Giants lineup is so bad, their beat writers were joking about getting Bumgarner through the eighth inning so he could bat again.

Favorite Plays: Marquez, Eovaldi, Cole, Flaherty, Boyd

If your roster is trending expensive, a Boyd-Eovaldi duo looks pretty solid to me. Cole and Marquez are my picks for top pitchers of the day.

Stack Targets: Peralta, Matt Harvey, Marco Estrada, Matt Shoemaker

The jury is out on a Harvey rebound. The Athletics lineup is pretty difficult – they’re a better version of the Rays unit. Depending on the season, Estrada and Shoemaker tend to live in the replacement level to league average band. They could be ok. Or terrible. They might even pull something like a Jordan Zimmermann.

4. SaberSim Says…

Marquez, Cole, Peralta!, Ray, and Flaherty are the top rated pitchers today (where’s Stripling?). Ok, hold my breakfast beer while I check this out…

…Alright, I’m back. So projection systems think Peralta will post crazy strikeout rates because he’s always done so. However, his stuff really doesn’t support the 11.03 K/9 he posted last season. His command is 40 grade, his velocity is 91 mph, he allows copious volumes of hard, fly ball contact, and he shouldn’t be expected to throw over five innings. The best case scenario is “effectively wild.” It’s weird though, SaberSim agrees in one sense, projecting just 5.33 innings (but also 7.3 strikeouts).

The best pitcher values are Boyd, Marquez, Peralta (sigh), Richards, and Lucchesi. On the hitting side, Mike Trout, Mookie Betts, Alex Bregman, Jose Altuve, and Franmil Reyes comprise the list of possible future Hall of Famers and Franmil Reyes. Connor Joe, Austin Meadows, David Freese, Brandon Drury, and Ji-Man Choi are the value plays – in all cases due to projected lineup slot.

5. You Won’t See This Often

Or maybe you will. They’ll face another five times or so.





You can follow me on twitter @BaseballATeam

3 Comments
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Jackie T.
4 years ago

Looking forward to another year of the column Brad.

Side note: who do we talk to about making it so when you click the RotoGraphs banner at the top of the page it actually takes you to RotoGraphs and not the FanGraphs homepage? It’s very difficult to just get to the fantasy content page here,

Jackie T.
4 years ago
Reply to  Brad Johnson

Thanks Brad.