Written by Greg Landry | @glandry on LineStar | @GP_Landry on Twitter

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No, Seattle won't get no-hit three times in a season and twice in a row. The odds of that happening are basically zero but you have to admit if there was a ever a chance of it happening this would be the spot against Justin Verlander who is absolutely dialed in right now. In case you missed it, for the first time since the 2015 Dodgers, the Mariners were no-hit for the second time in a single season last night. What’s unique about Seattle is both times were combined no-hitters. Four Houston pitchers (Sanchez, Harris, Biagini, and Devenski) got the job done. Sanchez led the way with six innings of no-hit baseball, allowing two walks and striking out six. That’s one hell of a debut for your new team. We’ve got nine games on today’s main slate with not quite as many pitching options as we had yesterday but definitely still plenty to work with.   Here’s a look at the Vegas lines:

Weather Outlook

Weather looks relatively unexciting. Most games will be hanging out in the mid-80s. We don’t have to deal with 90 degree heat in Coors Field on the main slate today. The wind at Wrigley is forecast to be calm with little to no impact. The one game to watch is down in Atlanta again where we are looking at a 25-30% chance of rain right now. It doesn’t look to be a threat for a PPD or even a delay but as always it’s worth keeping an eye on as we get closer to lock.  

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

Justin Verlander, HOU | DK: $12K, FD: $12K | RHP | vs. Seattle

Admittedly, he’s expensive today but likely worth it. The American League starter for the All-Star game is pitching at his best right now. He’s won four straight starts and given up a total of four earned runs in those games. Even more impressive is the upside he’s shown with 7, 12, 11, and 13 strikeouts during those appearances. This has brought his season long strikeout rate all the way up to 33.7% with only 5.3% walks. His run prevention continues to be outstanding with a 2.73 ERA and 0.81 WHIP. Despite how good he’s been overall, he actually hasn’t had the best luck against Seattle this year. He’s 1-0 in three starts with a 4.32 ERA (3.64 xFIP). Still, it’s hard to ignore how high the ceiling is here against a strikeout happy Seattle lineup who goes down 24.9% of the time against right-handed pitching. Only Crawford and Court in the projected starting lineup have a strikeout rate less than 20% this season. Verlander should be able to cruise through this group multiple times and rack up some serious points. My hope is that people will shy away from him given the gap in price between compared to the next closest pitcher and also his lack of success against this Mariners team. There’s no Vegas data for today just yet while Seattle tries to figure out who is going to pitch for them this afternoon but once it comes out I expect Houston to be heavy, heavy favorites.

Sonny Gray, CIN | DK: $8.1K, FD: $9.1 | RHP | @Atlanta

Gray’s price has been all over the map on DraftKings recently. He started off July at $9.2K and hung around the high $8K to low $9K range for a couple weeks, then he spiked to $10.2K for a couple more weeks and started to slowly reset a little back into the low $9K range more recently. Suddenly today, we are getting him at a massive decrease of $1.3K compared to his last start. What I can’t figure out is why all the fluctuation and why the huge drop? He was outstanding in the month of July going 2-1 in five starts with a 2.23 ERA (3.17 SIERA), 0.87 WHIP, 32.2% strikeout rate and only 5.8% walks. He’s forcing 51.2% ground balls and his opponents have just a .186 batting average against him during this span. I suppose his most recent start against Pittsburgh might explain the drop in price to some degree where he went only 5.1 innings allowing four earned runs and only striking out three. But prior to that he had four starts (two against Milwaukee, one against the Cubs, and one in Coors Field) where he gave up a total of four earned runs and had 12, nine, eight, and seven strikeouts. After a streak like that, if all it takes is one mediocre start to get his price to drop this significantly, I’m happy to “buy low.” The match up isn’t ideal against a solid Atlanta lineup (likely playing a role in the price as well) but there’s a lot of room for Gray to provide an excellent ROI if he pitches anywhere close to the level he’s been at for most of this season. He has one start against the Braves this season, all the way back on April 23rd, where he gave up six hits and four earned runs in 5.1 innings while striking out nine. The floor is lower than usual here but his ceiling is rock solid the way he’s pitching lately and the price is too good to pass up. The Reds are underdogs here but there has been some reverse line movement slowly in favor of the Reds overnight. Keep an eye on this.

Drew Smyly, PHI | DK: $6.6K, FD: $7.3K | LHP | vs. Chicago White Sox

To say Drew Smyly has had a rough season would be the understatement of the century. He went through a historically bad stretch between 5/29 and 6/18 where he allowed five earned runs or more including two or more home runs in four of five appearances. During that span he made it past the third inning only once and scored negative fantasy points on DraftKings in four of five games. As a result, the Rangers released him. He signed a minor league contract with the Brewers a few days later and lasted two weeks before they also let him go. Shortly after that the Phillies, who are desperate for rotation help, signed him and in his first two appearances as a member of Philadelphia he’s seemingly found a rhythm. Against the Pirates, he went six innings allowing four hits, just one earned run, and struck out eight batters. He followed that up with seven innings of shutout ball against the red hot Giants with five strikeouts. The question is, what’s changed? Is it luck? The change of scenery perhaps? Maybe the extra rest between his original release from Texas and being picked up by the Phillies did him some good? There are no glaring red flags in either start suggesting luck. He has a 3.52 SIERA, 0.85 WHIP, and 28.3% strikeout rate while forcing 53.3% ground balls. To be absolutely clear this is VERY risky. I don’t believe that he’s suddenly magically fixed all his issues. But his confidence has to be the highest it’s been all season right now, he’s well rested after his long layoff between jobs, he has a great match up today against the White Sox who have struggled as an offense all season, and he's dirt cheap. At his salary today I definitely want to own some shares in tournaments and hope that he can keep this success going for another start. Buyer beware: I’m surprised this morning how much “love” he’s getting on LineStar. I was hoping this would be sneaky. I still like him but if you’re multi-entering make sure you hedge. If you’re doing single entry, and Smyly is popular, go the other way. Just my two cents on game theory here.  

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.

Baltimore Orioles vs. Sean Reid-Foley

I like this to be a contrarian stack as I think Reid-Foley might be a popular cheap pitcher option today. He hasn’t given up a run in either of his last two appearances and it’s a good match up against a weak Baltimore offense. The logic makes sense and it could lead to Foley getting some attention from the general public as an SP2 today. Personally, I think he’s due to get smashed and I don’t care who the offense is he’s facing. Foley has a 2.55 ERA which sounds amazing until you see it comes with a 5.32 SIERA, 1.42 WHIP, and a .255 BABIP. He’s allowing a massive 41.5% hard contact rate while striking out just an average 20% of batters and walking an ugly 12.5%. The SIERA being nearly three full runs higher than the ERA is what’s really standing out here. For being a team that struggles with right-handed pitching there are some interesting pieces here for stacking purposes on the Baltimore side. Mancini is my priority with his .913 OPS, .375 wOBA, and .279 ISO against right-handed pitching. Santander (.349 wOBA, .224 ISO), Villar (.332 wOBA), Nunez (.328 wOBA, .222 ISO), and Sisco (.340 wOBA and .245 ISO) all have solid numbers as well. Baltimore has a 5.1 implied run total today and this game has the highest over/under on the board. 

Toronto Blue Jays vs. Jimmy Yacabonis/Tom Eshelman, BAL

As I just said, this game has the highest over/under on the board at 11 runs so a game stack is absolutely in play. Yacabonis will serve as the opener which he actually did only a few days ago against this same Toronto lineup and he allowed four earned runs in just one inning of work. Eshelman will follow and handle the bulk of the innings. All of his stats point to the perfect pitcher to attack with bats. He has a low strikeout rate of only 16.5%, a 1.54 WHIP, allows 38.5% fly balls, a 23.2% HR/FB, and nearly 40% hard contact. Same as yesterday, the younger talent at the top of the Toronto order is intriguing including Biggio (.341 wOBA, .236 ISO), Guerrero (.359 wOBA, .211 ISO), Gurriel (.351 wOBA, .231 ISO), and Bichette who collected another two hits last night and has looked every bit the part since he was called up. The veterans of this line up are firmly in play as well, including Smoak (.362 wOBA, .267 ISO), Grichuk (.205 ISO), and Galvis (.195 ISO).  

Minnesota Twins vs. Brad Keller, TOR (RHP)

If you haven’t figured it out by now the Twins need to be on your stacking radar every single night regardless of the opposing pitcher. They are just such an incredibly dangerous offense with a solid floor/ceiling combination from top to bottom in this lineup. They put up another 11 runs last night, the second night in a row and the third time in their last six games. Nelson Cruz is giving the middle finger to father time right now with another three home run night last night – his second in the last ten days. Today’s opposing pitcher, Brad Keller, has a SIERA over five, only 16.6% strikeouts, and a walk rate nearing 10%. The whole Minnesota team hits right-handed pitching well. Seven of our projected starting nine have a wOBA over .340 and six of them have an ISO over .250. Kepler, Sano, and Garver all have an ISO over .300 and stand out in addition to Cruz who is just knocking the cover off the ball right now.  

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. 

Adam Hasley, PHI | DK: $3.6K, FD: $2.5K | OF | vs. Reynaldo Lopez

Lopez always presents a good opportunity to pick up a home run or two in your lineup. He’s allowing 44.1% fly balls, 35.5% hard contact, and 1.74 HR/9. He’s given up 24 home runs this season, good for seventh most in baseball among qualified pitchers. Haseley isn’t my favorite option in the Phillies lineup today but he’s very cheap and is swinging a good bat recently. In his last 59 plate appearances against right-handed pitchers he has a .358 wOBA, .232 ISO, and 1.95 FP/PA.  

Jeff McNeil, NYM | DK: $4.9K, FD: $3.3K | 2B/OF | vs. Joe Musgrove

Musgrove has trouble with left-handed hitters, putting McNeil in a perfect spot for us to exploit. Musgrove has a 4.58 xFIP with only a 16.1% strikeout rate and is giving up 40.2% hard contact to lefties this season. McNeil has three double-digit fantasy performances in the last eight games. In his last 52 plate appearances against right-handed pitching he has a .743 wOBA+ISO. Musgrove meanwhile is allowing a .572 wOBA+ISO to lefties in his last 20 starts.  

Mike Moustakas, MIL | DK: $4K, FD: $3.5K | 2B/3B | vs. Yu Darvish

Not quite to the extreme as how cheap Aaron Judge was last night, Moustakas is standing out as a big time value play tonight. As recently as July 21st, he was $5K on DraftKings and has dropped down $1000 in the past two weeks. Granted, he’s a bit cold, having scored over six fantasy points just once during that span but we all know baseball is a marathon not a sprint so when typically high producing players have significant drops in price because of a cold streak, we should buy them every day while we wait for them to heat up again. Yu Darvish has looked a little more like his old-self recently but he’s still been volatile at best and not someone I’m afraid to attack with bats. In his last 20 starts against left-handed hitters he’s giving up a .555 wOBA+ISO. Moustakas has a .604 wOBA+ISO against right-handed pitching in his last 20 games. Extremely small sample size but he has faced Darvish seven times in his career with a home run and a 1.027 wOBA+ISO. 

Best of luck today! Don't forget about the Weekend Edition On Deck Podcast with Joe and Chris. There's a link at the top of the newsletter!

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