Well, the Bieber Fever experiment wasn’t a total disaster. He looked really solid there for a while until a disastrous sixth inning where he gave up back to back home runs and then another single before getting the hook. The Indians bullpen then had a meltdown, per usual, and your Twins stacks became relevant in just the last few innings of the game. I could have used the quality start and win from Bieber in my FanDuel tournaments where I had the most exposure due to his super cheap price, but what can you do. Kershaw was definitely on a pitch count, as expected, though it was way earlier than we thought it would be. I think something is still wrong there. He was pitching a solid game but his velocity was still down. We’ve got a very interesting 15 game Friday night slate ahead of us today. Pitching is....weird. We’ve got Chris Sale and Gerrit Cole on the mound tonight, but they are facing each other. That instantly takes them out of cash game consideration for me. The offenses they are playing dramatically lowers their floors. I think they are both excellent tournament plays as this will likely be the lowest ownership you get them at all season between the bad matchups and people looking to fit in Coors bats. After that, there is a solid group of pitchers in good spots that are very underpriced in my opinion (some sites worse than others). We are going to focus our attention on this group for the article today. After that, well, it's just a huge group of crap. I don’t know how else to say it. There is a very narrow pool of pitchers I want to roster tonight and a whole bunch of guys I want to stack against. Weather is also going to play a huge factor today. It’s going to be extremely hot in Baltimore (87), Atlanta (85 plus humidity), Kansas City (94), St. Louis (92), and Colorado (83). We also have big time winds in Detroit (14 mph blowing out – boost to the bats), Minnesota (12 mph blowing in – boost to the pitchers), and Chicago (16 mph blowing out- boost to the bats). At the moment there is little to no threats of rain but you’ll still want to watch the weather right up until lock. A shift in any of these winds or an unexpected pop up storm could still happen and ruin your night. Let’s start our weekend off right and make some money today.

Power Pitching Targets ⚾️

Carlos Carrasco, CLE (@MIN) (DK: $10.7K, FD: $9.4K)

I love Carrasco today as he’ll face a Twins team that is left-handed heavy, particularly at the bottom of the order, with a lot of strikeout potential. Carrasco has a slightly higher strikeout rate against lefties at 27.4% versus 27.2% against righties. He also has favorable splits on the road where he averages 36% more fantasy points versus pitching at home. These factors should work in his favor today. He has a 3.39 SIERA with a 13.3% swinging strike rate and only 5.7% walks. Against left-handed batters, he has a 3.40 xFIP and allows just a .299 wOBA. Against right-handed batters, he has a 3.22 xFIP while only allowing a .281 wOBA and a 29.4% hard contact rate. His BABIP is average to both sides of the plate so there are no signs of regression with these numbers and his swinging strike rate indicates that the strikeout upside is real. The Twins, meanwhile, have only a .157 ISO, .305 wOBA and 88 wRC+ against right-handed pitching this season. He checks a lot of boxes today for me today. In addition to everything we’ve already talked about, he’s a slight favorite, the wind will be blowing in pretty hard at the ballpark, and the Twins have a .230 average against him in 97 at-bats. He’s firmly in play for both cash games and tournaments on this slate.

Nick Pivetta, PHI (@SFG) (DK: $10K, FD: $8.2K)

Surprisingly, after all the great things we just said about him, Carrasco is not my favorite option on the board. Nick Pivetta is pitching at an elite level this season. He has a 3.26 ERA and an even better 3.16 SIERA with a 28.8% strikeout rate and 11.3% swinging strike rate. To left-handed batters, he has a 4.02 xFIP, with 24% strikeouts while only allowing a .300 wOBA and a 28.2% hard contact rate. Against right-handed batters, he has a 2.40 xFIP, with a 33.3% strikeout rate (only 4.3% walks) while allowing just a .249 wOBA and 26.4% hard contact. His hard to soft contact ratio is outstanding and that will really help him in a massive park like AT&T today. The Giants are striking out 24.9% of the time to right-handed pitching with only a .146 ISO, .316 wOBA, and 101 wRC+. Pivetta faced them already once this season and threw five innings of shutout baseball with seven strikeouts. That game was in Philadelphia so he has an even better setup today playing in San Francisco. I think he’s underpriced today, particularly on FanDuel, and he’s my top pitcher of the day.

Value Pitchers

Jaime Barria, LAA (vs. TEX) (DK: $9.3K, FD: $6.8K)

This is a FanDuel specific play that I had to mention. Barria is crazy underpriced over there tonight at only $6.8K. That’s $2.5K less than his price tag on DraftKings. He’s also the heaviest favorite on the board at -165 going up against Bartolo Colon. Remember, the win counts for a lot more on FanDuel which adds to his appeal. Now, with that said, there are still a LOT of red flags here but this is a matchup with a bunch of upside too. The Rangers are a left-handed heavy team. Barria has an outstanding 1.76 ERA with 20.3% strikeouts and only allows a .217 wOBA and 29.6% hard contact to lefties. But, the sample size is small and there are signs of massive regression coming his way with only a .209 BABIP against lefties and a 3.94 xFIP (which isn’t bad but it’s much higher than the ERA). Against right-handed bats, he’s pretty vulnerable. He has a 5.06 xFIP with only 18.5% strikeouts while allowing a .343 wOBA and 35.6% hard contact. Obviously, not ideal, but this is less of a concern against Texas today who should roll out at least five or more left-handed bats. There are positives and negatives for sure, and Barria does not come without risk, so this is absolutely a tournament only play. But there is definitely upside for the taking in this matchup against a Texas team that strikes out 25.8% of the time against right-handed pitching. This game is also in Anaheim instead of Texas which is much more pitcher-friendly. He’s too expensive on DraftKings but his price on FanDuel is awfully intriguing. He could have a massive ROI and leaves you plenty of room to fit in basically any bats you’d want.

Jameson Taillon, PIT (@STL) (DK: $6.8K, FD: $7.9K)

Speaking of being underpriced, Taillon is too cheap on both sites but especially DraftKings. This is an ideal matchup for him. He is borderline elite against right-handed batters and will face a very right-handed heavy team in the Cardinals today. His overall numbers don’t leap off the page at you. He has a 4.11 SIERA and 21.5% strikeout rate. But, he has a .324 BABIP which tells us he’s been a bit unlucky, and he forces 48% groundballs while only allowing 28.9% hard contact. Against left-handed batters, it’s a little rough, with a 4.8 xFIP, 15.8% strikeout rate, and a 10.6% walk rate. But he still forces 48.6% groundballs and only allows 28.2% hard contact. Plus, the only lefty we are really worried about in this lineup is Matt Carpenter. Against right-handed batters, it’s a whole new ballgame (see what I did there?) He has a 3.13 xFIP with a 26.6% strikeout rate and only 5% walks. He still forces 47.4% groundballs and only allows a .299 wOBA and 29.5% hard contact. Against a team that is likely to roll out seven right-handed bats against him this just really lines up as the perfect matchup for him to succeed. He’s an underdog in this game, but still my favorite value option available. He’s very much in the conversation for both cash games and tournaments, especially as an SP2 on DraftKings.

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Stacks on Stacks 🥞

• Los Angeles Dodgers (vs. Tyler Anderson): Anderson is a pretty average pitcher. He’s got a SIERA just above 4, with a 21.8% strikeout rate, 40% groundballs, 36.4% fly balls, and 32.5% hard contact allowed. Pretty flat across the board. Something that does stand out to me is you can pretty much attack him from either side of the plate despite the dreaded “lefty vs lefty” matchup. His HR/FB rate against left-handed batters is actually worse at a super high 24.2% to go with an above average .177 ISO. To right-handed batters, he allows a .198 ISO and 15.4% HR/FB rate. All the bats are in play here since it’s Coors Field but I’d place Turner, Bellinger, and Kemp in the priority category with Muncy, Hernandez, and Forsythe as secondary options. BE CAREFUL. Dave Roberts LOVES to play the platoon splits and pinch hit for his guys throughout the game. They have the highest implied total on the slate so you have to consider them but guys like Enrique Hernandez who are much better against lefties than righties will likely get pulled if Colorado goes to their bullpen for a right-handed arm.

• Colorado Rockies (vs. Dennis Santana): The Rockies will face rookie Dennis Santana today who is expected to be called up to take the rotation spot of Kenta Maeda. Santana has been very good this season, posting a 2.54 ERA in 10 starts between Double-A and Triple-A. He has 65 strikeouts and 16 walks in 49 innings. He was promoted to Triple-A two weeks ago and he struck out 11 and walked none in six scoreless innings. We are working with VERY small samples here but he’s got an outstanding strikeout rate just over 31% (31.7% in Double-A and 31.1% in Triple-A), an xFIP right around 3 (3.20 in Double-A and 2.93 in Triple-A) and a groundball rate just under 50%. I’m not going to lie, there are quite a few similarities between him and Shane Bieber from last night. I can understand why Vegas has Santana favored. If this game were in Los Angeles tonight, I’d be all over him for tournaments. But, unfortunately, this is Coors Field which is a brutal spot for someone to make their major league debut. I will not be rostering Santana tonight and I will not be afraid to stack against him. Despite Santana’s numbers, all the Rockies are in play, but it will definitely be fun to watch him pitch and he could be somebody worth keeping an eye on. Sidenote, D.J. LeMahieu is expected back tonight and he's really cheap on FanDuel for a Coors game.

• Milwaukee Brewers (vs. Hector Santiago): I love the Brewers today. They get an extreme fly ball pitcher in a game where the winds will be blowing out at 14-16 mph. It’s not going to be as hot as it is in other areas today but still, you put a ball in the air (which is very likely against Santiago) and that wind will take it. The Brewers have enough power throughout this lineup that you can really stack them top to bottom. My least favorite player in this lineup is Yelich, who hits a ton of groundballs, but if you’re rolling out multiple stacks I wouldn’t leave him out because there’s always the chance he gets a line drive home run and there’s a very good chance he will be on base when someone else puts it in the seats.

• New York Yankees (vs. Andrew Cashner): We loved the Yankees last night. Everything is exactly the same today except it will be much hotter, which is even better for hitting. Cashner has a SIERA nearly two full runs above his ERA at 5.34, with only 14.5% strikeouts and a 1.41 WHIP. The Yankees have a .214 ISO, .347 wOBA, and 119 wRC+ against right-handed pitching. Camden Yards is an excellent ballpark for runs and is especially friendly to right-handed power. We know the Yankees have plenty of that. They have the third highest total on the slate today behind only the teams playing at Coors.

• Detroit Tigers (vs. Jaime Garcia): Garcia will see a bunch of right-handed bats today against the Tigers which will make his life very difficult. He has a 4.66 xFIP with only 18.3% strikeouts and very high walks (11.2%) and WHIP (1.52). He’s allowing a .341 wOBA and 33.2% hard contact to right-handed batters. The downside with stacking against Garcia is he loves to force groundballs at 51.2%. But, when one does get into the air he has an above average 14.5% HR/FB rate and this is another game with heavy winds that will be blowing out around 14 mph in a very hitter-friendly park. As if that wasn’t enough, Detroit has an extremely low 17.8% strikeout rate against left-handed pitching with a very high 38.3% hard-hit rate. This is a very bad spot for Garcia.

• Baltimore Orioles (vs. Sonny Gray): I’m going to give the sneaky stack award today to the Orioles. This is a spot we all liked last night against Sonny Gray. Today, we should be able to get this at considerably less ownership with it being a much larger slate and tons of other stacking options available including Coors Field. This game still has an O/U of 10 runs and was looking like it would have been fairly popular last night had it not been for the rain. I said it yesterday and I’ll say it again today. The Orioles are the ultimate boom or bust stack. They have the talent but you just never know what you’re going to get. Chris Davis will either hit four home runs or strikeout four times. There is a ton of power but also a lot of risks. They have five players with a .194 ISO or better against right-handed pitching. If they can put it together they certainly have the upside to win you a slate.

Tournaments will definitely be interesting today. Ownership should be pretty spread out because of so many good spots for some potential offense. Coors Field is still the top place to be but I can absolutely understand the argument for fading with so many other places for stacks available to us. As far as my strategy goes, I don't think you need Coors Field today. With the value pitching tiers lacking a bit (Taillon is likely to be popular) I'm considering using Carrasco and Pivetta together and then hunting for value bats. There's just so many good places for offense today. I don't think you need to stack either. One-offs or even pairs from your favorite teams is a viable strategy with so many games that should be high scoring. I'm going to pick and choose the pieces that will make my pitchers work. Good luck! As always, feel free to tag me in the LineStar chat rooms @glandry or you can find me on twitter @GP_Landry. Thanks for reading!

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