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

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There’s not really anything sexy about four game main slates so on days like this I’ll mostly just play for fun and go light on the bankroll. Maybe just kick back, have a couple beers, watch some baseball, and if I don’t land in the green by the end of the night… ah well, at least I was kept entertained for a few hours. That’s how I like to look at it anyhow. Perhaps you prefer to go heavy on these sort of slates and try to land a GPP with 50+ lineups while many may just skip playing entirely -- to each their own! Tomorrow, in typical Friday fashion, we’ll have a monster 14 game main slate to dig into, so it’s nice to get a small slate to provide a break between the massive ones every once in a while. This will be a brief newsletter and there doesn’t appear to be any weather concerns at the time of this writing, so let’s jump right on in.

Match-ups with totals and moneylines:

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Pitchers to Consider

Stephen Strasburg (DK: $11.9k, FD: $10.4k) | RHP | WAS @ MIA

With just four games, it just seems too risky to get too far away from Strasburg today. It’ll be tough to afford him because you’ll probably want to get some Coors Field bats in as well, but it’s still doable. I sort of think about it this way -- what are the chances Strasburg is in the perfect lineup by the end of the night? It’s far more likely than not that he will turn out to be an optimal play. I won’t go through all the stats because you know the guy is good and in a prime match-up, but it’s worth noting that he has been better on the road where he’s posted a 2.92 ERA, 3.11 xFIP, 0.99 WHIP, and 30.1% kRate. His best game of the season came against Miami in Marlins Park on April 21st when he went eight shutout innings on 104 pitches while amassing 11 strikeouts and allowing just two hits, resulting in 41.6 DKFP/67 FDFP. Our expectations for a similar performance probably shouldn’t be quite that lofty, but anything below 25 DKFP/45 FDFP would be a significant surprise (and disappointment).

Alex Young (DK: $6.3k, FD: $5.5k) | LHP | ARI @ SF

This is primarily for DraftKings players because if you’re gonna roll out Stras while not completely punting every batter, you’ll obviously need some savings for your SP2. The D-Backs are sorely searching for starting pitching so they’ve called up Alex Young to make his first MLB start out in San Francisco tonight. Looking at Young’s minor league numbers, he’s gotten to a 4-3 record in eight games started at the AAA level across 54.2 innings -- which works out to about 6.2 innings pitched per start. His 6.09 ERA is worrisome but it seems he is getting a bit ‘unlucky’ considering he has a much lower 4.33 xFIP. The abnormally high .373 BABIP stands out as potentially a primary factor in his high ERA. He’s posting a strong 24.8% kRate which is nice to see and the match-up can’t get much better for a ‘young’ pitcher to garner in their debut start. Perhaps the MLB transition for Young won’t be too difficult because the Giants have honestly looked like a minor league team themselves at times this season and they’ve easily been the worst team in baseball against lefties. Against LHPs they have a .217 AVG, .266 wOBA, .112 ISO, and 64 wRC+. Dead last in every metric. They also strikeout 24.6% of the time. Young will likely give up some hits and a few runs but the Giants rarely blow anyone up completely. So if he can get in around six innings of work with a decent amount of strikeouts along the way, he’ll easily return value.

Team Stacks to Target

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 take in order to give yourself more exposure to different offenses.

Coors Field Notice: The Dodgers and Rockies are pretty clear teams to target when stacking and won’t be highlighted in this section. If you can afford them, load ‘em up. Especially the Dodgers power bats.

Los Angeles Angels vs. Tanner Anderson (RHP, Oakland Athletics)

Anderson only has 15 innings pitched in the Majors this year so there’s not much of a sample size to gauge there. However, this year he had 10 starts (54.2 innings) in AAA and I’m sort of surprised he managed to get called up due to the sort of numbers he was posting. In those ten AAA starts, he had a 6.26 ERA, 6.04 xFIP, and 14.5% kRate while allowing a .293 AVG and 2.30 HR/9. Ugly stuff. A low strikeout guy facing a team with the lowest kRate in the league (17%) could spell disaster (for Oakland). Aside from Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani, none of these Angels bats are overly expensive and I’d be fine rolling out most any of them -- but obviously focus on the one through six hitters.

Arizona Diamondbacks vs. Tyler Beede (RHP, San Francisco Giants)

This D-Backs team just faced Beede five days ago when they hung four runs on him in four innings. Beede’s ERA now sits at 6.96 with a 5.17 xFIP and 1.95 WHIP. Those numbers may continue to rise after tonight. He’s been particularly bad against lefties, allowing a .436 wOBA, .296 ISO, and 43.2% Hard Contact Rate. Arizona has some strong lefties to throw out at him which include Ketel Marte, David Peralta, Eduardo Escobar, and Jarrod Dyson. Reverse splits hitter Christian Walker could be considered as well.

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.

Cody Bellinger (DK: $5.9k, FD: $5k) | OF | vs. RHP Peter Lambert

If you can dish out the coin, there is no bat more tempting to roll out today than Cody Bellinger at Coors Field. He’s averaging 23.7 DKFP in his three games at Colorado this year and now that temperatures are set to be in the mid-80s today, he has legitimate multi-home run upside. In a limited sample size (36 batters faced), Lambert is giving up a dangerously high .344 ISO and 58.3% Hard Contact to lefty hitters. Bellinger did get pulled from yesterday's game with a minor left knee issue, so assuming he is good to go, he should smack one out of the park tonight.

Matt Beaty (DK: $4.2k, FD: $2.8k) | 1B/OF | vs. RHP Peter Lambert

Another Coors Field batter in a positive lefty on right match-up, but Beaty will not break the bank and could see a good spot in the order. Beaty is hitting .338 against righties this year with a solid .374 wOBA, .169 ISO, and 40.4% Hard Contact. He doesn’t strikeout much (14.5% kRate) and you don’t exactly need him to hit a dinger to return value. He should have a solid opportunity to hit in some RISP and to get batted in himself.

Brian Dozier (DK; $3.4k, FD: $2.6k) | 2B | vs. RHP Sandy Alcantara

Unless Dozier is facing a lefty, he’s pretty much a ‘home run or bust’ punt play. He only carries a .184 AVG and .271 wOBA against RHPs this season but he has hit seven home runs against them this year on 41.3% Hard Contact. He has a 94.6 mph average exit velocity against RHPs in the last two weeks so, despite the sub-optimal environment and his four game hitting slump, he just needs to see one good pitch and time it well to instantly provide some fireworks.

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