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

🚨 2nd Episode of the PreSnap Podcast is up! Joe and Chris Preview the AFC/NFC North for the upcoming NFL DFS season! 🚨

🔊 8/26 On Deck Podcast with Joe Pisapia & Special Guest Greg Landry

• 8:30 Offense in Milwaukee

• 10:22 Sonny Gray @ Miami

• 14:45 Vargas vs. Pirates

• 17:28 Oakland @ KC

• 21:02 J.A. Happ @ Seattle

• 23:07 Dodgers @ Padres

• 25:05 Betting Lines & HR Calls

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I hope you guys had a great weekend! The MLB will kick off the workweek with a Coors Field matinee and a modest seven game main slate. Those seven games could quickly get reduced down to six due to some potential for poor weather out in Kansas City. More on that below. It’s a bit of a “ho-hum” day without much star-power on the mound and no super enticing high totals to speak of, but days like this exist to keep us sharp and on our toes (at least that’s what I’m telling myself)! Tomorrow’s monster 15-game slate will surely give us plenty to mull over so let’s kick back and break down this short set of games!

Side note: Be on the look out for the 2019 NFL Season Preview & Strategy Guide which is set to be emailed and posted later today! 🏈

Today's match-ups with implied totals and moneylines:

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!

Weather Outlook ⛅️

OAK @ KC: This is our only trouble spot today. A band of storms will be making their way over Kauffman Stadium around the scheduled first pitch and may not clear up until later in the night. A lengthy late start could be in order, resulting in this game playing fully and avoiding a postponement. But for now I’m considering this one risky enough to where I will exclude mentioning any players here for the purposes of this newsletter. Keep your eyes peeled on the forecast once we get closer to game time when we’ll have a better idea of how things could shake out here.

Update: The outlook appears to be a bit better than when I initially gave this forecast a look. I still wouldn’t consider this game ‘safe’ but certainly more playable than what it first seemed.

Pitchers to Consider

Sonny Gray (DK: $11.2k, FD: $11.3k) | RHP | @ Miami Marlins

This is one of those days where one pitcher just stands out so much more above the rest that he virtually demands to be discussed. Quite literally every other pitcher on the board carries moderate to severe risk. Not so much the case here with Sonny but the salaries clearly reflect that. Gray is in certified ace territory at this point and he has posted a 1.58 ERA (3.38 xFIP) across his last ten starts. In that time he also has a 32.6% kRate, 0.93 WHIP, and opponent .167 AVG/.238 wOBA. The Marlins have wrecked expensive, chalky pitchers many times this season but it’s been a back-and-forth battle between Miami and Detroit for the title of “worst offense in baseball.” It’s incredibly hard to see Gray failing in this spot. Lower exposure or even stack against him in tournaments if you’d like but he’ll be tough to get away from elsewhere… even if he ends up being 50+% owned.

Eric Lauer (DK: $6.7k, FD: $6.3k) | LHP | vs. Los Angeles Dodgers

It may be time to get risky with Eric “The Dodger Kryptonite” Lauer. In six career starts against the Dodgers (36.2 IP), Lauer boasts a 1.72 ERA (3.99 xFIP) with a 24% kRate, 0.93 WHIP, and the Dodgers are hitting for just a .190 AVG and .238 wOBA against him. Lauer’s 3.10 ERA at home is also nearly three runs lower than his 5.93 ERA on the road this season. The Dodgers, as dangerous as they may be, have been pretty average versus southpaw pitching lately. Over the last month versus LHPs (338 plate appearances), the Dodgers have a 101 wRC+ (ranks 22nd) with just a .226 AVG (25th). Their .236 ISO still ranks 7th, however. So even if Lauer continues his unusually strong trend versus the Dodgers, a couple bombs hit off of him would be the furthest thing from a surprise. Without a lot of safety to be had in the pitching department today, Lauer could be worth a risk in some spots.

Joe Musgrove (DK: $6k, FD: $7k) | RHP | @ Philadelphia Phillies

Oh boy, as if reading about Eric Lauer versus the Dodgers doesn’t give you enough heartburn, how about a dash of Joe Musgrove thrown into the mix? Musgrove, at the very least, has shown a strong ceiling recently -- something that is lacking among today’s pitchers as a whole. One of his more recent ceiling games came about five weeks ago against this same Phillies team in which, in a winning effort, Musgrove went for six shutout innings on 98 pitches while allowing just two hits and issuing two walks en route to fanning eight batters. The Phillies rank 21st with a 90 wRC+ versus RHPs over the last month alongside a .246 AVG (20th), .312 wOBA (20th), and .165 ISO (23rd). Very below average metrics. Musgrove has also actually pitched a bit better on the road this year (averages 21.4% more fantasy points away) where, notably, he has only allowed 0.55 HR/9. As far as cheap pitcher plays go today, Musgrove feels like a pretty strong upside choice and I’d expect him to have a somewhat decent floor. But, as previously mentioned, there’s really only one “safe” play on the board today.

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.

Milwaukee Brewers vs. Adam Wainwright (RHP), St. Louis Cardinals

When it comes to home/road performance, you won’t find many pitchers with such stark splits as Wainwright. His 2.67 ERA at home rises nearly four runs to a 6.64 ERA when he takes the mound on the road this season where opposing hitters are also batting just under .300 against him with a .362 wOBA. The Brewers just saw Wainwright in his last start (where he happened to be at home) five days ago where Waino threw just two strikeouts and ultimately allowed five earned runs on eight hits (one HR) and four walks across five innings of work. Wainwright allows LHBs a .292 AVG on the season with a .393 wOBA, .226 ISO, and 44.2% Hard Contact so, if there were a preference to be had, the Brewers lefty bats would take slight priority. That will put Christian Yelich, Eric Thames, Mike Moustakas, and Yasmani Grandal in line for stack consideration.

New York Yankees vs. Tommy Milone (LHP), Seattle Mariners

The Yankees continue their west coast swing on into Seattle tonight. They have been crushing lefties so you can’t ignore them when they’ll see extended innings versus a pretty average southpaw who is prone to surrendering home runs in Tommy Milone. As a team, New York leads the MLB with a massive 179 wRC+ versus LHPs over the last month as well as a .345 AVG (.369 with RISP), .441 wOBA, and .332 ISO. Aaron Judge, DJ LeMahieu, and Gio Urshela make up three of my preferred pinstriped plays this evening.

St. Louis Cardinals vs. Gio Gonzalez (LHP), Milwaukee Brewers

Perhaps a game stack is in order here? Gio held the Cards to just one run on three hits and four walks in his last outing but a pitcher facing the same offense in back-to-back starts can often be a recipe for disaster (for the SP). The Cardinals are also heating up at the right time and have gone 13-3 over their last 16 games. The Brewers bullpen has also been very poor as of late which is good news for Cards bats as Gio has rarely pitched beyond the fifth inning this year. Dexter Fowler, Marcell Ozuna, and Paul Goldschmidt are some St. Louis bats to put on your radar.

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.

Ketel Marte (DK: $5.2k, FD: $4.1k) | 2B/OF | vs. Tyler Beede (RHP), SF

Marte’s a pricey bat but you know, more often than not, you’re getting a strong floor with him along with some legitimate upside. As a switch hitter, he’s batting well over .300 on both sides of the plate (.331 vs. RHPs, .317 vs. LHPs) so he’s not someone opposing managers can match-up well against with bullpen arms in the later innings. Tyler Beede’s form has also fallen off a cliff. In his last five starts (21.2 IP) he has an 8.72 ERA with a 2.03 WHIP, 3.30 HR/9, and is allowing an opponent .364 AVG/.455 wOBA on 51.9% Hard Contact. Oracle Park is not the most ideal hitting environment but in seven games there this year, Marte has gone 10-for-32 (.313) with three home runs and three additional extra base hits (two doubles and a triple). If you’ve got the coin, I don’t mind the spend up on Marte tonight.

Austin Nola (DK: $4.5k, FD: $2.8k) | 1B/2B | vs. JA Happ (LHP), NYY

Austin Nola the lefty masher versus J.A. Happ the homer-prone southpaw Yankee -- this should be a strong recipe for success. Nola has a 206 wRC+ versus lefties this season (so he is a little over twice as effective versus LHPs than the average hitter) with a .347 AVG, .487 wOBA, and .408 ISO on 48.8% Hard Contact and 56.1% Fly Balls. Nola was a mid-summer call up for the Mariners back in June but he has really only been receiving consistent playing time for just over a month. Across his season, five of his seven home runs have come at the expense of lefty pitchers in about half as many at-bats as he’s seen versus righties. This season, Happ has allowed 2.30 HR/9 to RHBs on 42.7% Hard Contact and 42% Fly Balls -- that’s the 40/40 HC/FB percentages that I like to see when I’m hunting for some four baggers. As such, I’ll be making Austin Nola my home run call for the night. 💣

Jacob Stallings (DK: $3k, FD: $2.3k) | C | vs. Jason Vargas (LHP), PHI

I know you aren’t required to roster a catcher on FanDuel but Stallings profiles as one of the better punts today regardless of position. In his last 20 games versus left-handed pitching (21 plate appearances), Stallings is batting .350 with a pair of homers and an .868 wOBA+ISO. On the year he is hitting lefties at a .290 clip with a .363 wOBA/.258 ISO. Vargas is an annoying pitcher to analyze because his numbers really aren’t that great but he often does just enough to not get completely blown up. Still, his 6.34 xFIP over the last month is easily the worst mark among starting pitchers today and he’s only striking out batters 13.1% of the time in that span. Stallings only has an 18.8% kRate against LHPs so the more chances he has to produce bat on ball contact, the more I like his chances of returning some easy value at these prices.

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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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