Pitching: Nola (Optimal CPT), Kelly (GPP CPT), Alvarado, Dominguez, Kimbrel, Ginkel, Sewald, Mantiply
Hitting: Harper (GPP CPT), Carroll (GPP CPT), Marsh (Value CPT), Thomas (Value CPT), Longoria, Pham, Moreno (GPP), Walker (GPP), Marte (GPP), Schwarber, Gurriel
Tonight, we have a single playoff game to contend with as Game 2 of the NLCS takes center stage. The Phillies will be looking to take a commanding 2-0 series lead over the Diamondbacks prior to the series shifting back to Arizona while the Snakes will be hoping to wrest home field advantage away from the Phils.
Pitching:
Aaron Nola will be on the mound for the Phillies in this one. Nola has been electric in the postseason thus far, allowing just two runs on nine hits scattered across 12.2 innings of work while striking out 12. We have seen him throw 88 and 92 pitches in both games thus far so the Phillies clearly are inclined to let him work. With K rates of around 25% to hitters on both sides of the plate this season, he clearly has upside here as the optimal captain on this slate. However, he does carry some substantial risk this evening as well. Nola gave up 32 homers on the season and has seen his fastball get tattooed by hitters on both sides of the plate. Lefties have a .216 xISO off his fastball while righties have a .254 xISO themselves. The xwOBAs are held in check, which just tells us that it’s the long ball that could get him in trouble. With how great the Diamondbacks bats are at hitting the fastball, this could be a spot where Nola gets absolutely lit on fire, but we think his issues allowing the longball might be behind him. Many of those homers came before he changed which pitch clock he was looking at. That may sound like an insignificant change, but when the team was trying to diagnose why he was giving up so many homers this year, they found that to be the primary cause. When he looked at the clock, his shoulder alignment got messed up, and it was impacting his pitches that came late in the clock. He’s started looking at a different timer in the stadium, and it supposedly solved this issue. I believe that was discovered in September, and he’s given up just 1 HR in his last five starts. I think very few people are aware of this, so Nola may be better than the field believes. That being said, he has a lot of tough matchups in this DBacks lineup.
The Phillies pen should be loaded with solid options to consider. With only two true lefties projected to start for Arizona, the only reason we would see a lefty enter the game would be to contend with Corbin Carroll in all likelihood. The top option to have that responsibility is Jose Alvarado who went 1.1 innings of work last night while throwing just 15 pitches. The Phillies clearly trust him in big spots and we easily could see him again here. Although he is a lefty, he carries a massive 41% K rate against righties this season while holding them to a .102 xISO/.268 xwOBA which makes him an exceptional option. From the right side, it is instructive to look to last night to see how the Phillies followed Wheeler. Seranthony Dominguez came in prior to Alvarado and pitched well, allowing one hit over 0.2 innings of work before giving way to the lefty. He too threw 15 pitches in last night’s game but that should hardly limit him in this one. He has a 26% K rate against righties this season which bodes well against the heavy righty order for the Diamondbacks here. The final arm to love in this spot is their closer, Craig Kimbrel who certainly will see the mound in a close game looking for the save. With K rates of around 34% to hitters on both sides of the dish, he should be a popular bullpen arm for your lineups. Kimbrel threw 16 pitches himself last night but he should be available to close things down once again if it’s called for.
Meanwhile, on the other side, Merrill Kelly will be toeing the slab for the Snakes. He is priced slightly above Nola while projecting worse, which is causing him to project for roughly half of his ownership in this spot. This makes him a solid GPP pivot off of the chalkier Nola. He had a superb first start of the postseason against the Dodgers where he allowed no runs on three hits over 6.1 innings while striking out five. Kelly has been elite against righties this season, holding them to a .129 xISO/.297 xwOBA with a 27% K rate overall. Lefties have had more success off his heater with a .238 xISO/.367 xwOBA off of it which brings the big Phillies bats into focus for us. In this spot, Kelly does make a lot of sense in GPPs and can even be used as a contrarian captain option. Starting pitchers will never be extremely low owned in the captain spot, but with three hitters and Nola projected for more ownership than him currently, this is a spot where he easily could be lower owned than he should be. With only three scary lefties to contend with, he is a great GPP pitching option on this slate.
The Diamondbacks used Kyle Nelson out of the pen last night with him throwing 20 pitches in relief of Gallen. He could certainly pitch again tonight, but the two best arms that we would expect to see in a close game tonight are Kevin Ginkel and Paul Sewald. Ginkel has been their set-up man and has K rates of roughly 28% to hitters on both sides of the plate this season. He did not throw last night and we would expect to see him in this spot tonight. Paul Sewald has been electric since coming over from Seattle at the trade deadline and has been shutting teams down throughout the postseason thus far. If the Diamondbacks do lead, he will be tasked with navigating the ninth for them. Lastly, Joe Mantiply is their lefty specialist. We do think it makes a ton of sense for him to navigate the top of the Phillies order with Harper and Schwarber. Lefties have a 22.4% K rate and a .079 xISO/.215 xwOBA off him this season. The only issue is that it’s hard to get excited about a pitcher likely facing just three batters at the top of the lineup.
Hitters:
On the offensive side of the ledger, we will start our focus on the Phillies bats against Kelly. As we mentioned above, Kelly has been absolutely elite against righties this season – but lefties have had tons of success off his heater. Because of that, we would focus our attention on the Phillies lefties. Bryce Harper has been on another planet this postseason and is projected for far too low of ownership currently. Harper has a .215 xISO/.432 xwOBA off righty fastballs on the season and this is easily a spot he could knock yet another ball out of the yard. He certainly is a viable flex option and can be used as a GPP captain as well. At his ownership level, he is one of our favorite plays on the slate. Kyle Schwarber is another bat from Philadelphia that needs to be considered here. He mauls righty fastballs as well with a .274 xISO/.334 xwOBA off the pitch. However, the issue with Schwarbs as always is that he is very boom or bust. He won’t do much for you if he doesn’t homer. His numbers are solid here so he is viable, but we would not prioritize him with so many other great options on this slate given his rock bottom floor and the fact he is projected to carry far more ownership than Harper. The last Phillies bat to strongly consider is Brandon Marsh. Marsh holds a .197 xISO/.355 xwOBA off righty heaters this season and lines up exceptionally well with Kelly in this spot as a result. He is the second cheapest starting hitter on the slate and is projected for the highest ownership of any pitcher. Because of this, he can be used as the optimal value captain on tonight’s slate in addition to being plugged into a flex spot. This isn’t chalk you want to fade.
Turning our attention to the Diamondbacks bats, we actually love their upside in this spot against Aaron Nola’s fastball. The Diamondbacks offense is phenomenal at smashing righty heaters which makes this a spot where they could damage Nola pretty significantly if things go right. Our favorite option here is Corbin Carroll who, like Harper, is projected for too low of ownership due to people paying up for the pitching on this slate. Carroll holds a .285 xISO/.421 xwOBA off righty heaters this season and has an elite blend of power and speed in this spot. As the most expensive bat on the slate, he will be tough to fit, but if you can find a way to play him, Harper, and one of the pitchers, you could be in phenomenal shape. After Carroll, we love Alek Thomas. Alek is projected to be the highest owned Diamondback hitter and is the cheapest starting bat on the slate. With a .202 xISO/.381 xwOBA, he should be in most, if not all, of your lineups in our opinion as he holds tons of upside. He can easily be used as a captain option as well if you want to jam in some higher priced pieces. We can’t go into insane detail on every hitting option here for the sake of the length of this article – but we do want to give you an idea for how tough this road will be for Nola to operate. Bats like Ketel Marte (.375 xwOBA), Tommy Pham (.276/.438), Christian Walker (.219 xISO), Gabriel Moreno (.192/.391), Lourdes Gurriel (.186/.351), and Evan Longoria (.316/.374) all smash the heater. Each of them is playable on this slate.
Conclusion: Nola is the clear optimal captain on this slate with how well he has pitched in the postseason so far. If the changes he’s made are the difference maker they seem to be so far, then the sky’s the limit for him. However, his penchant to give up the long ball combined with the Diamondbacks ability to pulverize heaters gives these bats a ton of upside as well. The top arms in the Phillies pen are the same three we saw last night in Alvarado, Dominguez, and Kimbrel. All three should still be available this evening. Our top bats from the Snakes are Corbin Carroll and Alek Thomas but any of Marte, Pham, Walker, Moreno, Gurriel, or Longoria are more than playable in this spot.
On the other side, Merrill Kelly is a great GPP target tonight with much lower ownership than Nola. He will have a tough matchup against Harper, Marsh, and Schwarber but should be able to navigate the righties just fine if he can hold these three in check. Harper in particular is one of our top bats on the slate as he is projected for far too low of ownership in this spot. Best of luck tonight!