MLB DFS Picks Today (7/7): deGrom-Wheeler Value Play

Tuesday's a weird pitching day, and I mean that as the whole read, not a throwaway line. It's a short, double-header-muddled board with no clean cheap value at pitcher, two aces towering over everything, and a top of the slate that's about to get so crowded it changes how you build. The two names everyone lands on are the easy part. The edge today is in the three arms and two stacks the field is going to be a beat late on, and that's the story our MLB Strategy show walked through this morning.

In Summary

• The Chalk Aces: Jacob deGrom (TEX) and Zack Wheeler (PHI) objectively grade out best and will be enormously owned. deGrom draws the single biggest outlier on the board.
• The Leverage Lean: Justin Wrobleski (LAD) versus the Rockies is the arm I keep coming back to. He's pricey and will be underowned precisely because deGrom and Wheeler soak up the room.
• The Mid-Tier Plays: Taj Bradley (MIN) and Payton Tolle (BOS) fill the $8K tier; José Soriano (LAA) is fine but third in line; Andrew Abbott (CIN) is a get-weird dart.
• Cheap Bats Win Today: Arizona and San Diego are the value stacks that let you afford both aces; the Dodgers and Phillies are elite but expensive. Trea Turner (PHI) is the individual I like most.
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Watch The Video

Watch the full MLB Strategy show on YouTube for the live Sims and DataHub walkthrough behind everything below.

First, The Double-Header Caveat

Before any of the projections mean anything, one housekeeping note the show flagged up top: there's a Brewers–Cardinals double-header, and the way the Sims pull data, the first-game starter (Jacob Misiorowski) was still populating the board this morning. He's been manually capped at zero exposure, but until that first game locks around 2:15 ET and the data reruns, top-pitcher probability and ownership will read a little off. So treat the exact percentages below as a morning snapshot, and refresh the tools closer to lock. That single quirk is why the ownership numbers look as extreme as they do, which matters in a second.

deGrom And Wheeler: The Two Aces The Field Will Pile Onto

Start with the outlier, because on a home-run-and-strikeout slate the outlier is the reason to build a certain way. The Angels carry a 3.2 team total, the lowest of any team on the entire day across every window, and they're doing it against deGrom in Arlington, where he's been outstanding this year. That's an ace with the softest opposing total on the board. It's the cleanest edge on the slate, full stop.

The most telling row isn't deGrom, it's the comparison hiding inside it. Wheeler is the other obvious ace, but he costs about $1,000 more, he's pitching at Great American, and the Reds sit a full run higher in team total (roughly 4.1) than the Angels do. Now, the Reds do lead the majors in strikeout rate against right-handed pitching at 24.9%, with the Angels right behind at 24.5%, so the whipping-out-of-bats case is real on both. But given the park, the price, and the run environment, deGrom looks better on paper than Wheeler even though you'll roster plenty of both. Hold onto that Reds-versus-Angels split; it comes back when we get to the bats.

Here's the forward promise from the intro, made concrete: on a zero-uniques run, the builds pour into deGrom and Wheeler at a rate the show said it hadn't seen once all season. When two arms get that owned, the leverage isn't in joining them, it's in the guys the room is about to skip.

The Leverage Arms: Where The Slate Actually Opens Up

Which brings me to the one I keep coming back to. Justin Wrobleski draws the Rockies away from Coors, and the Rockies against left-handed pitching are a strikeout buffet: the highest K rate in the league versus lefties, north of 25%, 29th in wRC+ against them, and below-average ISO on top of it. Look down their projected lineup and the numbers get silly, with multiple bats carrying 40%-plus strikeout rates versus lefties. Wrobleski is a touch expensive at $9,000 with only a 5.5 K prop, and I'd love to see that prop closer to 6.5. But he carries an 18-out prop and a great matchup, and because deGrom and Wheeler are eating all the ownership, there's a real chance he comes in underowned relative to how good the spot is. That's leverage you don't usually get on an arm this good.

After Wrobleski, the $8K tier is where the show spent its time:

• Taj Bradley (MIN) gets the Guardians, who are dead last in ISO against right-handed pitching and just aren't a power offense, especially without their bat-to-ball middle intact. He carries the highest strikeout prop of this group at 6.5 and is comfortably viable.
• Payton Tolle (BOS) stood out for a simple reason: he's $500 cheaper than Soriano, they project almost identically, and his 5.5 K prop is juiced to the over. On a pay-up-for-aces day, that $500 is the difference between affording a stack and not.
• José Soriano (LAA) is fine, but he's been wildly unpredictable and checks every box for a coin-flip. If I'm choosing in that price range, I'd rather have Tolle.
• Andrew Abbott (CIN) is the get-weird dart. Philadelphia runs four lefties through the meat of the order (Kyle Schwarber, Bryce Harper, Brandon Marsh, and Bryson Stott at seventh), and Abbott punches out 28% of the lefties he faces. His team total's ugly and the park is 86 degrees, so this isn't a hill to die on, but a 5.5 K prop against that many lefty bats can quietly work.

One arm to be careful with: Kodai Senga (NYM) is drawing exposure because the Royals own the third-lowest total on the slate, but he threw just 44 pitches his last time out, his role isn't locked, and there's a real chance he's either limited or not the starter at all. That's a lot of uncertainty to eat this early. If his role clarifies and there are no limits, fine, but tread lightly.

The Bats: Cheap Stacks Win On A Pay-Up Day

Everything above forces the same question on the hitting side: if you're spending up for deGrom and Wheeler, how do you afford bats? The answer is the stacks that are cheap, not the ones that are best, and that's exactly where the Sims are pointing.

The row that jumps out is Arizona. The Diamondbacks almost never grade this high in value because Marte and Carroll have been priced up all year, but at $4,900 and $4,800 into a Padres bullpen game, the whole stack is suddenly affordable, and it lets you fit both aces without punting the offense. San Diego is the same idea from the other dugout: a cheap value stack against Zac Gallen, with Cronenworth the concentrated piece at 35%.

If you want the single bat I like most, it's Trea Turner. Remember Abbott's 28% strikeout rate against lefties from a minute ago? Flip it over. Against righties he punches out just 14%, gives up more than 1.5 home runs per nine, and carries a .333 wOBA allowed, all ugly numbers. Turner's been quietly rounding into form, he hits from the right side, and that's the exact profile that beats up an Abbott. The Dodgers are the highest total on the board at around six with Shohei Ohtani projected at a monster 53% against Lorenzen, and the Phillies sit second in top-stack probability, but both are expensive to get to. The value, again, is Arizona and San Diego.

How To Build It

Put the pieces together and the shape of the slate is clear. You're likely paying up for at least one, probably two, of deGrom and Wheeler, so your bats have to come cheap, which is why Arizona and San Diego keep surfacing at the top of the value board. If you want to be different from a field that's about to be 40%-plus on each ace, Wrobleski is the pivot that gets you off the crowd without giving up much, if any, projection. Run your exposures at a few different uniqueness settings before lock and watch how much the ace ownership flattens once the double-header data clears, because that shift is where a lot of the day's leverage is created or erased.

This is exactly why you build on Stokastic Sims rather than gut feel: the projected ownership, top-pitcher probability, and value scores in the DataHub are what tell you the aces are chalk and Arizona is a bargain before the field figures it out. Pair those numbers with the full MLB DFS projections board and the MLB DFS optimizer to build DraftKings and FanDuel lineups straight off the Sims, and update them as the picture sharpens through the afternoon.

Recent Sims Winners

Quick proof the process is landing: over Fourth of July weekend, Tyler Scandlin saw some overlay, fired lineups in, and booked a $50K win. The very next day, Cameron Hart took down $10K, back-to-back five-figure scores from Sims users. It's the run you're trying to join.

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FAQ

Who are the best MLB DFS pitchers today, 7/7? By the Stokastic Sims read, Jacob deGrom (TEX) and Zack Wheeler (PHI) grade out best and will be the two highest-owned arms. deGrom draws the lowest team total on the slate (Angels, 3.2). Justin Wrobleski (LAD) versus the Rockies is the top leverage arm off that chalk.

What are the best value stacks today? Arizona and San Diego. The Diamondbacks are cheap for once, with Ketel Marte at $4,900 and Corbin Carroll at $4,800 into a Padres bullpen game, and the Padres are a classic value stack against Zac Gallen. Both let you afford deGrom and Wheeler.

What are Stokastic Sims? Stokastic runs millions of simulations of each MLB slate to produce projections, projected ownership, leverage, and optimal-lineup rates, so you build on simulated outcomes instead of gut feel. The optimizer turns those numbers into DraftKings and FanDuel lineups in seconds.

More on this:

• MLB DFS Hub: Every Live Stokastic MLB Page
• MLB DFS Picks Today (8/18): Gausman Is Chalk On A 17-Point Pitching Slate
• MLB DFS Picks Today (8/18): DraftKings & FanDuel Lineups

The Bottom Line

A weird pitching day rewards patience, not force. The board hands you two aces it wants you to spend up for, then quietly makes the bats cheap enough to do it, and leaves one very good arm sitting underowned because the room can't look away from the top two. Get to deGrom, get to Wheeler, but keep Wrobleski and a cheap Arizona or San Diego stack in your pocket, then rerun the exposures once the double-header clears and let the numbers tell you where everyone else went. That's the version of today that wins while the field is still staring at the same two names.