Pitchers: Wheeler (optimal), Castillo, Verlander, McKenzie, Heaney, Ragans
Batters: Coors (optimal), LAD (DK GPP), PHI (GPP), MIN (GPP)
Bad Chalk: Simeon Woods-Richardson
Weather:
TOR/KCR – heavy rain around gametime, very likely this one gets delayed and possibly postponed. Monitor closer to lock.
SDP/COL – scattered showers, but shouldn’t cause much of an issue if any.
Happy get away day! Like most Thursdays, we have most of our games being played in the daytime. As a result the main slate will be locking at 1:10 EDT on both sites. If you play on Fanduel you are looking at a 7 game slate with the last game scheduled to start at 3:10 EDT. If you play on Draftkings you are looking at an 8 game slate with the last game scheduled to start at 4:05 EDT. We have some interesting options and decisions on today’s slate so let’s get right into it.
Before breaking down specific pitchers and stacks, we wanted to provide a brief note about overall strategy on this slate. We have some options that seem to be obvious plays and therefore they are projecting to be chalk. That said, we know that baseball can provide more variance than just about any other DFS sport and if you are playing GPPs, you are likely looking for leverage off of the chalk. Our goal is to present some options where we think it makes sense to go against the grain and take some risks that could provide some big rewards.
On today’s slate we have a high powered Padres offense playing in Coors field. Their projected run total is 6.4 runs which is significantly higher than just about every other team on the slate. The Rockies are second with a projected total of 5.4, but after that we have a big group of teams that all fall in the 4.3-4.8 range. It is hard to ignore the upside the Padres have in this spot and we will go more in depth on that stack later in the write up. That said, the top options are pretty pricey on both sites. In addition, we are seeing Zach Wheeler pop up as a chalk pitching option and for good reason, but he is the most expensive pitcher on the slate. As a result, most of the field is flocking towards Simeon Woods-Richardson who is the bare minimum price on DraftKings and close to it on FanDuel. We anticipate that most lineups on Draftkings will start with Wheeler, Woods-Richardson, and then some variation of a Padres stack. If you are playing GPPs, we think a great way to get different today is to try and avoid the combo of Wheeler/Woods-Richardson. Woods-Richardson gets a great matchup against the lowly White Sox who have one of the worst lineups in baseball, however we are not sure Simeon Woods-Richardson is an MLB caliber starting pitcher and we think he can be hit around by even the worst MLB lineups. We know he looked good in his first start this year against the Tigers, but other than that all of his work has come in the minors and he has been smacked around quite a bit. Before his promotion to the big club, through 3 starts at AAA this season, he allowed 16 hits 5 walks and 9 ER through just 13.1 innings. In an even larger 22 game sample last year at AAA his results were pretty close to the same. Simply put, we think his start against the Tigers was an anomaly and feel like he could come crashing back down to earth today as he has not done enough outside of that one start to prove to us that he is capable of consistently going deep into big league games. We get that he does not need to do much to pay off his stone min price tag, but we think a negative score for Wood-Richardson is not out of the question today.
From there we can talk about the other projected chalk pitcher in Zack Wheeler. Wheeler faces the Reds and actually has a pretty manageable price at $10k on Draftkings and $10.6k on FD. He is our optimal #1 choice and feel a lot better about eating his chalk as opposed to Woods-Richardson’s. Wheeler has been very consistent this year and has pitched into the 6th inning in all but one of his starts. He has elite strikeout upside and is pretty much matchup proof. The Reds also have a good amount of swing and miss in their lineup and Wheeler should be able to rack up the strikeouts especially against the bottom half.
A group of pitchers we like on this slate is another way to get around playing the chalk pairing of Woods-Richardson/Wheeler. There are a handful of guys that are priced in the mid range that when played together can still give you enough salary to pay up for a Padres stack. Andrew Heaney, Triston McKenzie, Justin Verlander, Luis Castillo, and Cole Ragans are all priced below $9k on Draftkings and have decent point per dollar projections. Heaney and Mckenzie really stand out in this capacity and when combined are actually cheaper than a Woods-Richardson/Wheeler pairing. Triston Mckenzie gets a watered down Red Sox lineup who are still missing a lot of main players to injuries. Heaney gets a slightly tougher matchup against Seattle, but at 6k he is one the top point per dollar values and is not seeing a ton of ownership. Heaney has shown great strikeout upside in the past striking out hitters at 20%+ clip in 2023. Castillo has a tough matchup against the Rangers, but his deflated price point makes him a very intriguing option in GPPs as he has shown the ability to rack up big strike out numbers against just about any lineup in baseball.
Like we mentioned above the bats playing in Coors today are where you are going to want to go for your optimal stacks. The Padres grade out better than the Rockies, but the Rockies also look pretty solid and could make for some leverage off the Padres if you are forced to choose one or the other. The Padres face Rockies right handed pitcher Daktoa Hudson who does not strike a ton of guys out and is certainly susceptible to being hit around. Tatis stands out as the top option from this Padres lineup, but Bogaerts, Cronenworth, and Profar are all great options as well. Cronenworth in particular has hit righties hard this season and Profar has had great success against Hudson’s primary offering, his sinker. Jackson Merrill is also an intriguing option and his x stats show that he has had some bad luck against righties so far and should start to level out going forward.
In the other dugout, we look to the Colorado Rockies. The Rockies will be facing Randy Vazquez. Vazquez has a pretty even pitch mix but throws a lot of fastballs, cutters and sinkers. McMahon and Rodgers look like the two guys to start with when stacking the Rockies as they have great x numbers against right handed pitching. Blackmon also has great numbers against sinkers from right handed pitchers which Vasquez throws a majority of the time to lefties. After that, we are fine with mixing and matching the others in the Rockies lineup to complete your stack and let the light air in Coors do its thing.
Our top GPP stack on this slate is the Philadelphia Phillies. The Phillies will be facing off against Nick Martinez and have a projected run total of 4.5. Schwarber (.318 xISO), Harper (.240 xISO), Marsh (.259 xISO) and Turner (.222 xISO) all mash right handed pitching and that should continue today. Dating back to last season, all four of them also have great numbers against one of Martinez’s primary offerings, his changeup. We would start with those four, but obviously if you are looking to fully stack them, you can mix and match other options to work with what fits in your build.
Our next GPP stack of the day is the Minnesota Twins. They get to take on the hapless Chicago White Sox and Michael Soroka. Soroka has been absolutely torpedoed this season with lefties holding a .300 xISO/.537 xwOBA off the heater while righties have a .750 xISO/.581 xwOBA off the heater and a .321/.480 line off the fastball. That brings a ton of Twins into play including Kiriloff (.274/.397), Julien (.272/.345), Jeffers (.279/.379), Larnach (1.306/.986 – yes this is real this year!), and Kepler (.373/.464) are an elite top of the order stack to consider in this spot. We love all of them and they will have the added luxury of getting to face off with their awful bullpen once Soroka is battered around and knocked from the game.
The Dodgers are only on today’s Draftkings slate, but they are a great option off of the Coors chalk. They have a projected run total of 4.8 and will face Nationals lefty Mackenzie Gore. Betts (xISO .350), Ohtani (xISO .305), Hernandez (xISO .228), Muncy (xISO .214) and Freeman (xISO .255) all have solid x stats against left handed pitching dating back to last season. They all also do a lot of damage to lefty fastballs which Gore throws nearly 60% of the time. The guys mentioned are the top options, but as always feel free to build around them with any Dodgers if stacking.