Written by Ryan Humphries | @N1TRO on LineStar | @NitroDFS on Twitter

🔊 No "On Deck" Podcast on Thursdays

⚾️ 2019 MLB Preview & Strategy Guide

Who else is hyped for the NFL Draft tonight?! I certainly am. The draft is probably my favorite sporting event to watch (that isn’t an actual game). While some of the coverage can be a bit gaudy and excessive, especially the obsession over who goes No. 1 overall (it's Kyler Murray, c'mon now), it’s awesome to see lives change for a bunch of young men and their families all in one night. Real-time player and pick trades/acquisitions have always fascinated me as well -- I love all of the behind the scenes stuff and I can’t wait to see which players teams decide to stake their future in tonight.

While the NFL may own the widespread media spotlight this evening, we still have a nice little five game Thursday MLB slate to break down. Normally on a slate this small, there are only a couple of ‘safe’ routes to go, so ownership can be fairly condensed. However, tonight we have an inordinate amount of pitching talent to choose from which should result in ownership on different offensive stacks and one-off hitters to spread out a bit more than we’d usually expect. As of right now, with only three of these games outdoors, there are no glaring weather concerns, so let’s get straight into the nitty-gritty.

Here are tonight’s match-ups and Vegas lines/totals:

Stay up to date on all weather conditions and confirmed lineups as soon as they are released over on the Daily Dashboard!

Pitchers to Consider

Gerrit Cole (DK: $10.2k, FD: $10.6k) | RHP | HOU vs. CLE

Cole is coming off of an extremely rough start against the Rangers where he got tagged up early and often, leading to eight earned runs through 4.1 innings, but we just have to keep a short memory about that and quickly move on to the much better spot he’ll be in today. This is Cole’s sixth start of the season but only his second home start. In such a good pitching environment like Minute Maid Park, it’s no surprise that he averages 27% more fantasy points at home. This is also an Indians team that may deploy four or five lefties against Cole tonight. Cole absolutely dominates lefties in Houston -- last year he had a MASSIVE 48% kRate versus lefties at home and a 37.4% overall kRate (32% away). This year, through 29.1 innings, his strikeouts are actually up a tad from his 2018 average (34.5% kRate in 2018, 35.8% kRate this season). His 5.22 ERA this season doesn’t look great, but that’s why ERA isn’t always the best stat to judge a pitcher by. Cole’s 2.65 xFIP is the fourth best in baseball this year (20 IP min.) and indicates that he is getting really unlucky and is due for major positive regression. With legitimate 12 K upside tonight, I’ll take the slight discount we’re getting him at. The Astros are -150 favorites and the Indians have a 3.4 implied run total.

Aaron Nola (DK: $9.1k, FD: $8.7k) | RHP | PHI vs. MIA

Things have been pretty tumultuous through Nola’s opening five 2019 starts but a match-up with the Marlins would have any MLB pitcher licking their chops when they’re in search of a ‘get right’ spot. Though, Nola is coming off of what many would consider a successful outing for a pitcher at Coors Field. Despite giving up nine hits (two home runs) and three earned runs, Nola still accrued nine punch outs in just 5.2 innings in Colorado. He’s another guy whose 6.84 ERA doesn’t tell the true story, as his xFIP sits at 4.10 -- which isn’t great but an xFIP over two and a half runs lower than your ERA is very significant. The simple fact is, aside from having given up seven home runs already (2.52 HR/9), he’s letting too many guys on base. His 1.68 WHIP is way up from his 0.97 WHIP in 2018. But, as we know, the Marlins match-up should help him out tonight. Against RHPs this season, Miami has a .265 wOBA, .119 ISO, .277 OBP, 66 wRC+, and 29.8% kRate. In their eight road games this season they are only managing a pathetic 1.62 runs/game, so playing away from the pitcher friendly Marlins Park hasn’t benefited their batters in the least. Their offense just isn’t good and Nola should right the ship tonight. The Phillies are huge -200 favorites and the Marlins have a 3.3 implied run total.

Caleb Smith (DK: $7.3k, FD: $8.2k) | LHP | MIA @ PHI

Opposite of Nola, we have Smith, who has shown some really strong stuff up to this point in the season. In four starts across 23 innings, Smith has a 33.3% kRate, .173 AVG, 0.87 WHIP, and his 2.35 ERA has been pretty on par with his true skill, as his 2.94 xFIP is the 10th best in the MLB among starting pitchers with at least 20 innings pitched this season. He's also just making a ton of guys flat out miss with a 14.5% Swinging Strike Rate (9th among MLB SPs, 20 IP min.). The Phillies are a solid offense but have been pretty average against LHP. In 212 plate appearances against lefties they have a .317 wOBA, .203 ISO, .265 BABIP, and 94 wRC+. Far from bad but there’s definite room for Smith to reach some strong value, particularly with his DraftKings pricing which is where he’ll likely be a bit more popular tonight. Smith has faced a pretty tough gauntlet of teams already this season, including going against Philly two starts ago. He was able to shut PHI down in their April 13th match-up (6 IP, 0 ER, 1 H, 6 K, on 99 pitches). It's nice to see that he’s already shown success against this team but they’re also going to be a bit more familiar with his ‘stuff,’ playing against him just 12 days later. The Marlins will be the sizable +180 road underdog tonight but a 4.3 implied run total for the Phillies isn’t a huge number and he’ll certainly be in my player pool.

Team Stacks to Target

Quick Note: Keep in mind, there’s no rule saying you *have* to roll out four and five man stacks. Sometimes mixing and matching two and three man stacks with some one-off hitters is the better route to go in order to give yourself more exposure to different offenses.

Boston Red Sox vs. Jordan Zimermann (RHP - Detroit Tigers)

On a five game slate, this first stack likely comes as no surprise, especially just a day after the BoSox offense came to life with a 12 hit, 11 run performance. Zimmermann is the least talented pitcher on the mound tonight, or at least the one most prone to getting blown up. He got a couple quality starts under his belt to begin the season but has since gone 0-3 and has allowed 14 earned runs on 18 hits (five HRs) in his last 13.2 innings. Across his 27.1 innings this season Zimm has just a 17% kRate, 5.17 xFIP, and a 13.5% HR/FB Rate. I’d look to start with Andrew Benintendi (.375 wOBA, .385 OBP vs. RHP since start of 2018) and Mitch Moreland (.342 wOBA, 17.2% HR/FB Rate) with my Red Sox stacks tonight. JD Martinez (.419 wOBA, .404 OBP, 26.9% HR/FB) has had a slow April, by his standards, with just two home runs. He’ll be my home run call on the night.

New York Yankees (LHB) vs. Trevor Cahill (RHP - Los Angeles Angels)

It might be tough to figure out exactly what hitters to string together from this makeshift Yankees team but they’ve scored at least six runs in five of their last six games, so the production has been there, although it’s coming from all over the lineup. I’ll take a stab at stacking some Yankee lefties against Trevor Cahill tonight. He’s shown virtually no ability to shut down left-handed batters this season. To that side of the plate, he has allowed a .508 wOBA, 7.01 xFIP, 2.33 WHIP, with just a 14% kRate. He’s also allowing 47.4% Hard Contact and mirrors that with a 47.4% FB Rate resulting in a 22.2% HR/FB Rate (four homers given up to lefties in nine innings). He has been shutting righties down so I don’t see a ton of success going for right-handed Yankees while Cahill is in the game. I have no clue where they’ll land in the lineup order tonight but I’ll give Brett Gardner (.379 wOBA, .278 ISO vs. RHP this season), Mike Tauchman (.365 wOBA, .333 ISO), and Mike Ford (.308 wOBA, .200 ISO) some consideration. Tyler Wade would be the back of the order deep salary-saving flyer to take a shot on if you’re feeling frisky.

Detroit Tigers vs. Rick Porcello (RHP - Boston Red Sox)

If Porcello is going to be even remotely popular tonight then I want to go the opposite direction with stacking the Tigers in some spots. Despite how bad the Tigers have been offensively this season, Porcello hasn’t shown anything to be afraid of either. His ERA sits at 8.47 and though his 5.71 xFIP is nearly three runs better, it’s still bad. He has a 2.41 WHIP, so he’s putting plenty of men on base, and he has a 23.5% HR/FB Rate, so there’s a big risk of multi-run scoring homers against him. Perfect recipe for any sort of stack. He’s been especially bad towards LHBs, so far this year, allowing a .447 AVG, .535 wOBA, .316 ISO, 3.38 WHIP, with a 19.6% Walk Rate. There’s obviously no way any MLB pitcher’s numbers will stay that awful for too long but it’s worth noting just how bad he’s been to that side of the plate. Unfortunately, the Tigers don’t have many lefties to deploy. However, I’d start my Tiger stacks with the two switch hitters Jeimer Candelario (.360 BABIP, .342 OBP vs. RHP this season) and Niko Goodrum (.376 wOBA, .224 ISO, .382 OBP), who will be batting lefty against Porcello tonight.

One-Off Hitters

Here I’ll highlight players at [roughly] different price points (high, mid, low) that could be used as a ‘one-off’ piece in lineups -- or perhaps part of a two man mini-stack. 

Joey Gallo (DK: $5.1k, FD: $4.4k) | OF | TEX @ SEA

There is a chance that Gallo isn’t in the lineup tonight, as the Rangers will sometimes sit him in lefty on lefty match-ups. However, Marco Gonzales isn’t a pitcher that shows overly favorable splits to either RHBs or LHBs. I suspect Gonzales may be a pretty popular pitching option tonight as well, so what better way to leapfrog up in a GPP than to take Gallo who can do so much damage with just one swing of the bat? Gallo also has a bit of the BvP narrative going in his favor, as he is 4 of 10 against Gonzales in his career with a couple of home runs and five RBIs.

Mitch Haniger (DK: $5.6k, FD: $4.3k) | OF | SEA vs. TEX

I don’t like making it a habit to select two highly priced bats in the “one-off hitters” section, and his DK price is kinda nutty, but Haniger has been a lefty killer this season and he gets to face a LHP, Taylor Hearn, who will be making his first MLB start tonight. Since the start of last season against lefties, Haniger has a .401 wOBA, .200 ISO,and .415 OBP. Also, all five of his fly ball hits off of lefties have gone for home runs this year -- pretty remarkable despite the small sample size. There’s no telling how long Hearn lasts on the mound tonight but if you’re not stacking the Mariners, I’d say you should at least take someone as a one-off hitter or throw them in a two man mini-stack. Haniger looks like a great Mariner to anchor lineups.

Tim Beckham (DK: $4.1k, FD: $3.4k) | SS | SEA vs. TEX

Another Mariner, but hey… what can ya do? Five games to sift through. Not an overt amount of options! But this Mariner checks in much cheaper than Haniger but has shown a similar ceiling. Beckham has three games this season scoring at least 28 DKP. It’s only 16 plate appearances to go off of, but against LHP this season, Beckham has already hit two home runs on his way to a .571 AVG, .683 wOBA, .500 ISO, and .625 OBP. You can only put so much stock into those numbers but he could certainly come up huge tonight from the four or five spot in the order and he's at an affordable price on both sites.

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