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Written by LineStar Fantasy Expert @GP_Landry on Twitter

Welcome to the weekend! Hope everyone’s Saturday is off to a good start. We have an eleven game main slate to talk about for tonight. In case you didn’t hear, Mike Moustakas was traded from Kansas City to the Milwaukee Brewers but he will not be available tonight. We have what could be a fun slate. I think the top tier of pitching options is pretty clear-cut. The value tier is much more cloudy, making SP2 selection on DraftKings a bit difficult. There is tons of offense on this slate including a game at Coors Field, the Red Sox powerful lineup at home, and the Astros facing a Double-A pitcher being called up to make a spot start. We’ll get to all that in a minute. The weather for today is looking rather quiet which is a good thing. I’m not seeing any threats of rain at the moment which has been a problem all week. We have hot weather in Baltimore, Boston, Atlanta, Colorado, and Los Angeles. Nothing worth mentioning in terms of wind. Let’s kick off this weekend right and win some cash today!

High Priced Pitchers

Justin Verlander, HOU (vs. TEX) (DK: $13.4K, FD: $12K)

I’m leaning Verlander over deGrom today but I’d be happy ending up on either one of them when the dust settles. The prices, strikeout rates, SIERA, and WHIP are all pretty similar between them. The matchup is what’s making me want to find the extra few hundred dollars for Verlander today. deGrom gets a Pittsburgh team that’s won twelve of its last fifteen games and also has a low 19.3% strikeout rate (lowest on today’s slate). Verlander gets a Texas team that’s almost the exact opposite. They’ve won just four of their last eleven games and they have the second highest strikeout rate on the slate at 25.8%. Plus, they’ve already thrown in the towel on this season after trading away Cole Hamels a few days ago. They will be sending a Double-A pitcher to the mound today (and not a good one) which has made Verlander a ridiculous -360 favorite. Need more convincing? He’s owned the Rangers this season. In four starts, he’s had nine, seven, eleven, and five strikeouts. He’s given up one earned or less in three of those four games (the other one he gave up three). He went at least six innings and recorded a quality start in each game. His 2.84 SIERA, 33% strikeout rate, 13.6% swinging strike rate, and 0.85 WHIP should be more than enough for him to cruise in this spot once again today. The only knock on him is the very high fly ball rate (53.9%) but he does a great job limiting hard contact (28.7%) and therefore doesn’t give up many home runs (8.9% HR/FB). The current Rangers lineup has a 133 at-bat sample size and they are hitting just .180 against him. Elvis Andrus and Robinson Chirinos are the only players with a wOBA over .250. Fire Verlander up with confidence today in both your cash game and tournament lineups. 

Patrick Corbin, ARI (@SD) (DK: $10.7K, FD: $9.6K)

If you want to save a little money and fit in some more expensive bats, Corbin gets a nice matchup today with the San Diego Padres who have a 24.8% strikeout rate to go along with only a .298 wOBA and 88 wRC+ against left-handed pitching. I believe Corbin has a similar ceiling to both Verlander and deGrom on this slate. Corbin has reverse splits, so his issue is against left-handed hitters, but the numbers indicate some serious positive regression is coming his way. He has a 6.00 ERA against them but the number we really care about is the 3.16 xFIP. They have a .375 BABIP which is well above average and not sustainable. The true red flags here are an 11.7% walk rate and 44.8% hard contact rate. But, he does have a very solid 27.9% strikeout rate and 51.5% groundball rate to make up for the high walks and hard contact. He’s excellent against right-handed batters with a 2.60 xFIP, 31.4% strikeout rate and only 5.4% walks. He’s still allowing over 40% hard contact but the .150 xISO and .282 xwOBA against right-handed hitters takes away my concerns. The bottom line here? The Padres have a little power with Villanueva and Myers but those are only two bats in a very weak lineup overall. With Corbin’s matchup today I think there is a real argument to play him over Verlander and deGrom and take the savings in tournaments. The SIERA, strikeout rates, swinging strike rates, and WHIP are all nearly identical. Corbin has the best matchup of the three and yet he’s over $1K cheaper on DraftKings and $2K cheaper on FanDuel. If I wind up with him as my SP1 today I won’t be upset about it.  

Value Pitching

Jhoulys Chacin, MIL (@SF) (DK: $7.7K, FD: $7.6K)

Value pitching isn’t pretty so I’m going to stick to my guns and continue attacking the Giants. Chase Anderson came through last night with a solid outing and while Chacin isn’t nearly as cheap as Anderson was I think he can come through for us in this spot. The biggest concern with Chacin is his performance against lefties where he has an ugly 5.34 xFIP and only 14.6% strikeouts. But, despite all the left-handed hitters they can roll out, the Giants lineup is worse. Their best left-handed hitter is Brandon Belt but he’s currently on the disabled list. That leaves a huge hole against right-handed pitching for them. What’s really standing out to me is the pitch type profiles. Chacin is a big slider guy, he throws it 32.1% of the time to lefties and over 54% of the time to righties. There’s only a few players in this lineup with above average numbers against the slider and one of them is Belt who obviously won't be playing. The others are Gorkys Hernandez (.207 xISO, .364 xwOBA) and Pablo Sandoval (.224 xISO and .322 xwOBA). The ballpark also helps with Chacin’s issue with left-handed hitters as AT&T Park is essentially death to left-handed power. Against right-handed hitters, we have a completely different story. He has a 3.87 xFIP with 23.7% strikeouts and an elite 0.95 WHIP. He’s only allowing a .144 xISO and .300 xwOBA to righties this season. As a team, San Francisco continues to struggle. They have a high 23.8% strikeout rate to go with their very low .143 ISO and .309 wOBA. In the past month, Chacin has an excellent 52.6% groundball rate, with 21.1% soft contact, and an average distance of only 179.5 feet. He’s also coming off his best start of the season, against the Nationals who also have a ton of left-handed bats, where he allowed just two hits, one earned run and had nine strikeouts. The Giants currently have the fourth lowest implied run total on the board today at just 3.5 runs. Chacin makes for an intriguing SP2 option in tournaments and he’s firmly in consideration for cash games given the lack of value on this slate.  

Trevor Williams, PIT (vs. NYM) (DK: $7.4K, FD: $6.6K)

Hear me out on this one. I’ve officially placed the Mets in the “our season is over category” after they placed Cespedes on the disabled list this week for the rest of the season and then traded away Asdrubal Cabrera just minutes before first pitch last night. Just like the Orioles I will be attacking this lineup often with pitching and on a night like tonight, with limited options available to us, using Williams here makes sense.   He’s flashed a 30+ point DraftKings ceiling this season with a 31 fantasy point performance against the Brewers back on June 18th. He’s also coming off of two strong starts against tough competition. Against the Nationals he went five innings, allowing four hits and zero earned runs with three strikeouts and picked up the win. Against Cleveland he went six innings allowing four hits and zero earned runs again while picking up the win and the quality start. The downside here, and it’s a big downside, is the strikeouts. He only has a 16.4% strikeout rate and a 7.3% swinging strike rate which are both very bad. But, the Mets are striking out 21.7% of the time and they will likely be replacing Cabrera in the lineup with someone who strikes out at a higher rate, providing an additional boost. This is far from a sure thing and isn’t an exciting pick at all but with Cueto, Gonzalez, and Gausman all likely getting more attention in this price range I wanted to highlight someone who’s likely going to be under 5% owned that I think can produce similar results if everything falls in his favor. I believe he can eat up innings, keep the runs to a minimum, and hopefully get somewhere in the neighborhood of five or more strikeouts against this very weak lineup. Roster him at your own risk, but consider him my wildcard option of the day.              

#HomeRunWatchList 💥

If you're new to the article this is the section where I pick an outfielder, corner infielder, and middle infielder to hit a long ball today. Make sure you are utilizing the LineStar Daily Matchup Tool when looking for hitters with a lot of home run potential. I'm excluding any players from Coors Field from this list but they are all on the watch list today.

Andrew Benintendi, OF (DK: $5.8, FD: $3.9K): Great spot for Benny against Jake Odorizzi who allows 15.2% HR/FB on 49.6% fly balls and 36.6% hard contact. Opposing lefties have a .249 xISO which has resulted in a 2.06 HR/9 rate. Yikes. Benintendi has a .221 ISO against right-handed pitching. He also profiles well against fastballs and split-fingered fastballs which Odorizzi throws most often. He’s got a .287 xISO against fastballs and a .290 xISO against split-fingered fastballs. 

CJ Cron, 1B (DK: $4.6K, FD: $3.4K): The Rays get a nice park upgrade going from the Trop to Camden Yards. Gausman has reverse splits so I’m favoring Cron here over Bauers though I have to admit I like them both. Gausman is allowing a .215 xISO and the highest HR/FB rate on the slate against right-handed hitters at 18.5%. This season, Cron has a .227 ISO and 36.7% hard-hits against righties this season. He also matches up well with Gausman’s pitch types (fastball and slider). Cron has a .382 xISO against fastballs and a .214 xISO against sliders.    

Ozzie Albies, 2B (DK: $5.1K, FD: $4K): The switch hitting Albies is my middle infielder home run call for today. He’s facing off with Alex Wood, who has been solid this season, but still allows a .190 xISO and 84.6 mph average exit velocity to right-handed hitters. Albies, meanwhile, has a .235 ISO and 43.6% hard-hit rate against lefties. Wood throws a two-seam fastball and a changeup most often to righties. Albies has a massive .437 xISO against the two-seam fastball and a .277 xISO against the changeup.  

Value Bats

Similar to the home run watch list in this section I'll provide an outfielder, corner infielder, and middle infielder that is priced in the value tier. If I can find someone under priced on both sites I'll highlight them but in some cases it could be site specific.

Yasiel Puig, OF (DK: $3.2K, FD: $3K): Puig is expected to be activated from the disabled list today and he’s ridiculously inexpensive on DraftKings facing a left-handed pitcher. He's been the subject of trade rumors recently so I would expect him to re-enter the lineup right away in hopes of driving up his value before the deadline passes. So far this season, he has a .228 ISO and .368 wOBA with 39.4% hard-hits against lefties. Fried is allowing 42.1% hard contact and he also walks 15% of right-handed hitters. Puig has a massive .511 xISO and .565 xwOBA against the curveball this season which Fried throws 31% of the time.  

Jeff McNeil, 2B/3B (DK: $3.2K, FD: $2.2K): For those of you who read the article yesterday I'm sorry to repeat a player, but with the trade of Asdrubal Cabrera to the Philadelphia Phillies, McNeil should be the permanent starter at second base moving forward. He gets another good matchup today against the right-handed Trevor Williams, who has a 5.48 xFIP, only 10.9% strikeouts, and a .348 xwOBA allowed to lefties. I know I highlighted Williams as a possible pitching option but that doesn't mean McNeil is any less of a value play. He has been incredibly impressive in both Double-A (57 games, 1.029 OPS, .299 ISO, .447 wOBA, 181 wRC+) and Triple-A (31 games, 1.027 OPS, .232 ISO, .438 wOBA, and 164 wRC+) I don’t think he stays this cheap for very long so keep rostering him while you still can at this value.  

Ji-Man Choi, 1B (DK: $4K, FD: $2.5K): Choi is getting regular playing time now as a member of the Rays but is still way too cheap on FanDuel at just $2.5K. Gausman has below average 19.8% strikeouts to right-handed hitters and allows a .182 xISO and .336 xwOBA. Choi has a .329 wOBA since joining this team back on July 11th and a .350 wOBA so far this season. Obviously, he’s not nearly the value on DraftKings but I had to bring him up here because of the price difference between the two sites.   

Stacks on Stacks 🥞

I'm excluding Coors Field today. Both teams in that park are always in play as stacking options. 

Houston Astros (vs. Ariel Jurado): I'm assuming this will be popular so normally I would avoid it but this is chalk I'm likely going to eat tonight. Then again, with Coors Field on the slate, and this being in a very pitcher friendly environment, who knows. Regardless, it would appear the Rangers are officially scraping the bottom of the barrel for pitching arms. Today would have been Cole Hamels next start but he was traded to Chicago earlier this week. His replacement, Ariel Jurado, is being called up straight from Double-A. He did make another spot start earlier this year, so this isn’t his debut, and he gave up four runs in just four innings against the White Sox. His Double-A numbers are not good so I don’t understand how this is the guy that’s getting the call. He had 4.00 xFIP last season and has a 4.24 xFIP this season (again, this is against Double-A competition). He only has a 13.9% strikeout rate. The one plus is he gets over 50% groundballs but above average HR/FB at 12.4%. Typically, I try to avoid stacking in this ballpark. It’s a very negative run environment (though the Rangers put up 11 runs here last night so anything can happen). But, I’m willing to make an exception given this matchup. You can play anyone on this team that makes the lineup today with Springer, Altuve, Bregman being the obvious players to work around.

Toronto Blue Jays (vs. Lucas Giolito): Unfortunately, we won’t get away with quite as low ownership as we did last night. Giolito is worse than Lopez and after the Blue Jays put up ten runs yesterday more people will want to play them today. But, it will still be lower owned than it should be considering there’s a Coors Field game, the Red Sox, and the Astros who I just discussed. This is the same situation as yesterday. Toronto is significantly better against right-handed pitching. They get Granderson in the lineup. Both Morales and Smoak are better from the left-side of the plate. Grichuk hits right-handed hitters better than left-handed hitters. There is a ton of power in this lineup and it was on full display yesterday. Giolito has a 7.11 xFIP (you read that right) with only 9.8% strikeouts (yup, that’s right too), and 14.7% walks. He’s allowing a .268 xISO and a .423 xwOBA to left-handed bats. Against right-handed hitters he has a better but still awful 5.36 xFIP but at least this time he strikes out more people (17.9%) than he walks (11.4%) but those numbers are still poor. He also allows a .190 xISO and .335 xwOBA to right-handed hitters.  

Seattle Mariners (vs. Jaime Barria): Here is my sneakier stack of the slate. This is a nightmare spot for Barria against a team with a bunch of power right-handed batters. He allows a .306 xISO, .421 xwOBA, 86.5 mph average exit velocity, and 40.2% hard contact to right-handed hitters. His xFIP is an ugly 5.79 and he’s giving up 2.38 HR/9. Haniger is my favorite option from this team with a .233 ISO, and .362 wOBA. Healy, who I considered for the home run watch list, is next with a .232 ISO and .323 wOBA. Cruz, always preferred against lefties, still has a solid .223 ISO and .354 wOBA against right-handed pitching. Those three bats right there are a deadly combo for Barria to figure out how to pitch through. After them, you have secondary options like Jean Segura who doesn’t bring much power but has a .337 wOBA. Mike Zunino hit a bomb last night. The power is there with his .240 ISO (highest on the team) but he’s striking out 35.6% of the time to righties so he’s the definition of boom or bust. Barria is better against lefties (3.83 xFIP, 21.1% strikeouts, only 0.73 HR/9) so I wouldn’t prioritize them. But, if you wanted to use one to finish putting together a full stack I don’t see any issues with that.  

The Bullpen Report

Good luck today! Tag me in the LineStar Chat @glandry if you have any questions or feedback on the daily newsletters and hit me up on Twitter (@GP_Landry)