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

🔊 7/17 On Deck Podcast with Joe Pisapia and Chris Meaney

• 6:45  Day Games

• 10:58  Nats On FD

• 12:50  Dodgers Bats

• 14:40  Paddack & The Padres

• 17:30  Robbie Ray @ Texas

• 20:43  Gerrit Cole @ Angels

• 23:50  Betting Lines & HR Calls

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Another split-slate Wednesday rolls around and here’s to hoping that all of you who threw down for the early slate are well on your way to cashing by the time you’re reading this. We’ll of course be targeting the nine game evening set of games here. While there may not be a pitcher on this slate with the talent level of the almighty Glenn Sparkman, we still have several viable options as well as plenty of offenses in strong spots. So, at first glance, it’s a fairly balanced looking slate… at least by 2019 standards. Weather could bring us some problems though -- more on that below.

Before we get into everything, I’d like to quickly throw out an invite to anyone looking to expand their DFS ventures. The Open Championship (aka British Open and final Major of the year) is set to begin late tonight and it should be a great event featuring the world’s best golfers. PGA DFS is a largely ‘unsaturated’ market and, if you get the hang of it, strong and consistent ROI is very achievable. For anyone interested, a full newsletter breakdown is posted over on the LineStar PGA landing page. Feel free to join in on the chat with any questions! Okay, onward to the baseball action!

This evening’s match-ups with implied run totals and moneylines:

Weather Outlook ⛅

Looks like we’ll have several situations to monitor heading into the main slate:

TOR @ BOS: Legitimate chance of a washout here. There's about a 50-80% chance of rain from the scheduled first pitch on well into the night. Playing the starting pitchers could be really risky. **Update** The outlook for this game has gotten bad enough that I will avoid mentioning any plays from this match-up for the purposes of this newsletter but I wouldn't fade it entirely just yet.

TB @ NYY: High chance of rain forecasted to move in right around the time this game should be ending. Possibility of rain mid-game as well. Any sort of late start or in-game delay could add to the risk of them not being able to complete this game. Sorta risky.

LAD @ PHI: Similar to New York, the worst of the rain comes in by the time the game should be over with, but this one looks like it’ll have a stronger chance of fully playing.

WAS @ BAL: Rain could force them into a delay out in Baltimore but it’s fairly likely they can get this one in. Arms are pretty risky, though.

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

Pitchers to Consider

Mike Clevinger (DK: $9.9k, FD: $9.4k) | RHP | CLE vs. DET

You have to imagine that Clevinger gets a ton of attention tonight since he profiles as perhaps the “safest” pitcher to spend up on. Like I mentioned yesterday, Detroit hasn’t exactly been a team I’ve been targeting with the same sort of confidence I had earlier in the season. Still, Clevinger is obviously talented enough to shut anyone down in this order. Injuries have sidelined him for a large portion of the year, so his sample sizes are much smaller than others, but in his 17 innings pitched at home this season, he has a stupidly high 45% kRate. Overall, he’s posted a 39.7% kRate while holding both righties and lefties to a sub-.300 wOBA and allowing just 29.3% Hard Contact. Detroit strikes out plenty against righties (24.2% kRate vs. RHPs last 30 days) and they don’t really have a platoon of hitters capable of busting a game wide open. Clevinger will need to start lowering his poor 10.3% Walk Rate but barring some random drawn out Detroit hit-and-run rally, he should thrive here. Cleveland is a massive -270 home favorite tonight and the Tigers have a lowly 3.8 implied run total.

Kenta Maeda (DK: $8.3k, FD: $7.4k) | RHP | LAD @ PHI

Truth be told, I don’t love targeting Maeda away from Dodger Stadium but he should have a sizable pathway to success in Philly today and the Dodger offense is capable of offering up plenty of run support against anyone (especially against a pitcher like Pivetta). Really, Maeda’s road struggles stem from his poor splits against lefties whom he allows a .300 AVG, .386 wOBA, 1.75 WHIP to with a modest 21.9% kRate. But the Phillies may be without one of their best lefty bats tonight, as Jay Bruce was forced to exit yesterday’s game with a right oblique strain. If Philadelphia ends up rolling out six or seven righties, Maeda’s road splits against them are perfectly solid: .172 AVG, .248 wOBA, 0.90 WHIP, 25.8% kRate. Among mid-level pricing, Maeda should be considered one of the better options on the board. But do remember to keep an eye on the weather conditions for this game. Assuming the rain holds off until late, Maeda should have ample time to get 6+ innings of work in.

Felix Pena (DK: $6.7k, FD: $6.9k) | RHP | LAA vs. HOU

Considering Pena now plays in the role of “long reliever,” this is more of a DraftKings SP2 punt play since he has no chance of earning the quality start bonus that FanDuel offers. On top of simply having to face a strong Houston offense, he also has an extremely tough counterpart in Gerrit Cole, so that will land the Angels as sizable +165 underdogs. Still, there’s a pathway to success here for Pena. Houston likely deploys six righties tonight and against RHBs at home, Pena is allowing just a .159 AVG, .198 wOBA , 0.84 WHIP while posting a healthy 27% kRate. Two appearances ago, despite only pitching four innings, Pena posted some decent fantasy numbers against this same Astros team resulting in 16 DKFP/27 FDFP. There’s not a ton of great value to be had among today’s group of pitchers so, if you want to roll out some lineups filled with big bats, Pena makes plenty of sense -- albeit fairly risky.

Update: Pena is set to start tonight without an opener. This makes him more viable on FanDuel but it also means his job is a bit more difficult since he’ll have to start off pitching against the dangerous group of Astros at the top of the order. All things considered, I’m still liking him from a GPP perspective on this slate.

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.

Los Angeles Dodgers vs. Nick Pivetta (RHP, Philadelphia Phillies)

The primary Dodger bats in this order are crushing, so why stop targeting them now? Nick Pivetta started off the season poorly, then he had two nice games in early June (one actually against the Dodgers), but now he’s back to getting tagged up pretty badly. He hasn’t been effective against either side of the plate and allows at least a .362 wOBA and .248 ISO to both lefties and righties on 40+% Hard Contact while surrendering 2.16 HR/9. In 43 innings at home this season, he’s allowing a 5.86 ERA, .313 AVG, .376 wOBA, 1.63 WHIP and is only striking out 16.8% of batters. Pivetta is struggling to pitch beyond five innings, so once he is retired from the mound the Dodgers will get a chance to tee off on a Phillies bullpen that has given up a league-worst 2.27 HR/9 over the last month. Your usual suspects to target, Cody Bellinger and Max Muncy, lead the way. Since he’d be facing a RHP, you also have to consider Joc Pederson and perhaps Alex Verdugo. AJ Pollock has been great as well in the few games he’s gotten in since returning from the IL. Plenty of ways to stack up this Dodger attack.

Kansas City Royals vs. Ivan Nova (RHP, Chicago White Sox)

Nova is sort of annoying to target because he’ll often do just enough to not get completely shelled but he still allows a ton of base runners with a slate-worst .316 opponent average and 1.54 WHIP, so I’ll give several Royal hitters some attention in this spot. Nova is also very prone to surrendering homers (1.87 HR/9) and has allowed seven dingers across his last four starts. On the year, the Royals offense has been fairly underwhelming, but they’re running pretty hot lately -- averaging 7.2 runs/game over their last five. Whit Merrifield, Jorge Soler, Hunter Dozier, and Alex Gordon are the best bets to produce. I may be getting a tad risky here but in a bid to go 3-for-3 in home run calls for the week (Muncy on Monday, Soto yesterday), I’ll plug in Jorge Soler as my bomb call for this evening. 💣

San Diego Padres vs. Trevor Richards (RHP, Miami Marlins)

Contrarian Padres stack? I don’t love it, but why not. San Diego always has the potential to blow a slate wide open. Despite the strong pitching environment that Marlins Park provides, Trevor Richards has actually been marginally worse at home this season. In 62.2 home innings, Richards has a 4.45 ERA and 5.80 xFIP while striking out only 16.8% of batters and allowing a high 42.8% Hard Contact Rate. Aside from phenom, Fernando Tatis Jr., I don’t have extreme confidence in any other Padre. But for upside purposes, Hunter Renfroe and Manny Machado are fully capable of hitting bombs anytime, anywhere.

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. 

Christian Walker (DK: $4.7k, FD: $3k) | 1B | vs. RHP Jesse Chavez

Here you have a reverse splits hitter in Walker going up against a reverse splits pitcher in Chavez at a very hitter-friendly park. Why not take a shot? Walker has a huge 50.6% Hard Contact Rate versus RHPs this season on 42.4% Fly Balls alongside a strong .263 ISO. He has five barreled balls against RHPs in the last two weeks (top 95%) along with an average exit velocity of 92.4 mph (top 80%). In 18.1 innings worth of pitches at home against righties, Chavez has surrendered five homers (2.45 HR/9) with a 25% HR/FB Rate. Walker should be batting clean-up tonight for a D-Backs team with a lofty 5.5 implied run total.

Yuli Gurriel (DK: $4.5k, FD: $3.9k) | 1B/3B | vs. RHP Felix Pena

Gurriel has been ridiculously productive as of late, hitting .380 over the last month with a .518 wOBA, .411 ISO, ELEVEN home runs and 23 RBI. Sure, some games at Coors Field and Globe Life Park have potentially aided in that production, but that doesn’t negate the fact that Gurriel is simply seeing the ball extremely well. He’s a reverse splits hitter who, over his last 20 games against RHPs (62 plate appearances), is batting .407 with a 1.038 wOBA+ISO and nine homers. I wrote up Pena above as a potential value pitcher to consider, and he is very strong against RHBs at home, but the case Yuli Gurriel makes for himself may be stronger.

Justin Upton (DK: $3.5k, FD: $3.5k) | OF | vs. RHP Gerrit Cole

I’m liking the price for Upton more on DraftKings, but on FanDuel, you can bet that his ownership will be sub-5% considering the Angels will be taking on the ace of the day, Gerrit Cole. However, Upton has actually found a fair amount of success against Cole. In 20 career plate appearances against him, Upton is hitting .316 with a .376 wOBA and .211 ISO with a home run to boot. Are those remarkable BvP numbers? No. But considering that’s against Gerrit Cole, I’d say it’s noteworthy BvP history. Upton has hit RHPs very well this year, batting .354 with a .452 wOBA and .271 ISO on 48.6% Hard Contact. The Angels will be relying on Upton to make things happen from the clean-up spot considering there’s a sizable chance that Mike Trout will be sidelined once again.

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Best of luck today! Don't forget to check out the "On Deck" podcast with Joe Pisapia & Chris Meaney. You can find it linked at the top of the page!

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