In this article, we cover four core plays for FanDuel & DraftKings daily fantasy baseball contests. These players are the ones we are going to have strong GPP exposure to for the main slate.
Let’s jump right into today’s article.
As a reminder, we focus primarily on lower-owned candidates for GPP tournament leverage. If you are looking for cash game plays, make sure to check out all the other great articles that we post on FantasyCruncher on a daily basis, like our Cheat Sheets, Daily Dinger & much more.
Top Pitcher
Lucas Giolito
Giolito is coming off a bad start against the Blue Jays in which he allowed six runs in just 4.2 innings of action. That along with the other pitchers in the same salary range as Giolito is likely to keep his ownership level down. While I understand why that would be the case I like Giolito a lot today. Giolito outside of the Blue Jays game had been excellent not allowing more than three runs in any other start this season. Giolito is also a high strikeout pitcher with at least seven strikeouts in six of his eight starts and a K rate of 33.3%. The strikeout ability is what really has me liking Giolito a lot as the Rays the team he faces today has the fifth-highest team K rate against right-handed pitching this season at 24.8%.
Stud Hitter
Manny Machado
Machado was in this article yesterday due to him facing a left-handed pitcher and while he didn’t have a huge game he was still solid with a double. After last night’s game, Machado is now slashing .367/.45/.776 with an ISO of .408 and a wOBA of .506 against left-handed pitching. While the pitcher he is facing Eric Lauer has been excellent this season he is also struggling a bit right now. In his past four starts, Lauer has a FIP of 5.10, an HR/9 rate of 1.71, and a WHIP of 1.29. Lauer’s Statcast numbers during those games are also pretty ugly with an average exit velocity of 90.9 miles per hour, an average launch angle of 17.3 degrees, and a barrel rate of 14.1%.
Value Hitter
Christian Walker
Walker has had a really down year this season but showed some major signs of life last week. In his five games, Walker reached base safely multiple times in three of the games with two multiple-hit games. In his two multi-hit games, Walker also went deep. Walker finished the week with a .333/.455/.722 slash line, three extra-base hits, and four RBIs. I am expecting Walker starts this week off right where he left last week off as Zach Thompson has really struggled against right-handed hitting. Thompson is allowing righties to slash .300/.357/.500 with a .375 wOBA this season.
Top Stack
San Francisco Giants
The Marlins have not officially announced a starter for today’s game but all signs point towards it being the newly called-up Braxton Garrett. If Garrett does get the start for Miami I am going to be all over the Giants as Garrett struggled in his previous stints in the majors. In his previous ten games with nine starts, Garrett has an ERA of 5.18, an HR/9 rate of 1.30, and a WHIP of 1.80. Garrett doesn’t miss many bats with a K rate of 20.7% and walks way too many hitters with a walk rate of 13.0%. Garrett has struggled against both left-handed and right-handed hitters and as a whole has allowed hitters to slash .311/.407/.478 with a .385 wOBA. Garrett has not only struggled in his previous time in the majors but the Giants also hit left-handed pitching extremely well. This season they have the tenth-highest team OPS and fifth-highest team ISO against lefties.
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