KBO DFS: Spotlight Hitters DraftKings, FanDuel

I overslept KBO lock by such a hilariously long time this morning that I couldn’t even be mad. Between that and the rain-outs the other day it wasn’t a great week for KBO DFS results so far for me. We’ve had some dynamite hits again this week among the folks in the Awesemo MLB Slack channel though, so hopefully we can keep that going.

We had some favorable outcomes in some of the more likely spots last night, with the Tigers in particular going off for eight against the Dinos. The Twins came through as expected, but they weren’t the highest scoring team of the day. The Lions had that honor with a 9-run performance, exceeding expectations and delivering as a major value play at their salaries. The Wyverns had a big game as well, coming through for the few that made them their KBO DFS picks last night.

KBO DFS Picks: DraftKings + FanDuel Hitters

Everything looks clean on the weather map for tonight and the alarm clock is set already so no excuses tomorrow. Looking at the slate, totals are up somewhat from the last few days as some teams are cycling into the back-end of their rotations. There is one standout spot tonight based on the implied team totals, but it’s not going to be a secret. The broad spread of totals in the mid-five run range offers some appeal and should give us some great options to work with on Fourth of July, or as they’ll be calling it in South Korea, “Toyoil” (“Saturday”).

The bulk of this analysis comes directly from reviewing Awesemo’s KBO DFS projections and the top stacks tool. Check out the rest of our KBO content, Awesemo’s projections, rankings, and ownership on the site for all your KBO DFS needs.

As usual, I’m going to look game by game, calling out a hitter or two from each team, and giving some top stacking options as we go. Pricing and popularity will be considered, more so as KBO DFS trends begin to emerge over the coming weeks. The numbers included with Suggested Stack are the projected lineup positions I would target for stacking that team, but do not restrict yourself exclusively to those spots. For example, if it says Wyverns 3-6 it means 3,4,5,6 in the projected lineup. If it says 1-2-3-5 it means those guys. If it means a two-man it will say so. I’m also going to start trying to include positions more, hopefully it helps speed up the process of finding guys as you build lineups.

With lock still hours away (5:30 A.M. EST), official lineups have not been released, so be sure to double-check status before you plug players into your lineup.

Hanwha Eagles @ Doosan Bears – 9.5 run total (3.29/6.52) – Suggested Stack(s): Bears pick ‘em

These two teams played a game that ended up as irrelevant for KBO DFS success on the hitting side of things. Both starters performed well in an eventual 2-1 that required late runs in the eight and ninth to secure. Eagles starter Bum-soo Kim surprised going six strong matching Raul Alcantara most of the way. Alcantara dazzled over seven, striking out nine and allowing a lone run on three hits.

The Eagles are in trouble against starter Chris Flexen here and have one of the lowest implied totals of the season. Flexen has been mowing down weaker KBO hitters and ranks 11^th among qualified starters with a 22.9% strikeout rate. The Eagles rank last in the stack tool and it would be inadvisable to play them to any large degree of exposure. If you’re playing these guys there’s nothing wrong with picking a spot in the top three to start from and building in a straight line down the batting order, although projected three-hitter Sun-jin Oh ($6/$3,600) is pulling a weaker projection than most of his teammates, making him a bit of a speed-bump here. Starting with Eun-won Jung ($8/$4,000) hitting second and skipping over Oh in favor of working down to Sung-yeol Lee ($9/$3,300) later in the order makes sense to me as a stack construction. If you’re playing this team you should work one of their better bats into your construction regardless of where he’s hitting in the lineup, if you can connect him to your stack in a logical manner.

The Bears disappointed in style last night. That looked like one of the better spots in recent weeks on paper, but we know how baseball rolls. Tonight’s Eagles starter, Min-woo Kim, is one of the better strikeout options in the league at a sharp 23.9%. His 5.36 FIP leaves a lot to be desired if you’re looking at him as a pitching option, but you never know. The Bears are massive favorites here, one of the bigger lines I remember seeing this season. The implied team total of 6.5 is nearly a full run above the next-highest games. The Bears rank second in the stack tool and Awesemo’s projections love the first seven hitters in this lineup and through the right eyes even the last two hitters have some appeal. This is a spot where I think it makes sense to try to get ahead of the public, the projected exposure isn’t too bad and a lot of key hitters are still under-owned. As long as Jose Miguel Fernandez ($17/$6,000) and Jae-il Oh ($15/$4,200) keep landing in the middle of bottom half of this team’s exposures I’m going to keep starting my lineups with them, regardless of pricing. Getting those two bats in the middle of your stack is a great start and you can connect them to basically anything in constructions. Catcher Se-hyuk Park ($7/$3,700) got into one for a home run last night from the bottom of this batting order. He’s not someone to focus on, but you can include him for some differentiation or to work with this stack as a lower-owned catcher where that matters. Soo-bin Jung ($9/$2,400) has shown more productivity throughout his KBO career than he’s had so far this season. His career on-base percentage of .351 tells me there’s we should eventually see more from a guy who is currently only pulling a .316 in that department. This is a low-owned option that works in a wrap-around. He’s not going to hit you home runs, but he makes a good alternate table-setter for the big bats atop this lineup. Jung has five seasons of more than 25 stolen bases on his resume but has only gone twice this season, if he’s on he could score KBO DFS owners some sneaky points with his legs.

Kia Tigers @ NC Dinos – 9.0 run total (4.08/5.13) – Suggested Stack(s): Dinos 2-6

Well the Tigers got there for us last night, which hurt a bit when I saw the score in the morning after running placeholder lineups. The top of the lineup mostly came through, although Preston Tucker was mostly a dead spot with an 0-4 one run performance. The Dinos were mostly kept in check by Drew Gagnon over 6.1 innings in the 8-2 Tigers victory.

Tonight’s implied total comes way down for the Tigers, with Drew Rucinski taking the hill for the Dinos. The Tigers rank near the bottom of stacks on both sites and, while the popularity is well below their chances of success, it’s still a shaky spot at best. There is appeal in getting to the quality hitters in this lineup when no one else is, and it should be easy enough to get over the field if you choose to. The easy move is once again to look to the obvious names like Hyung-woo Choi ($13/$4,500) who homered last night, as well as Ji-wan Na ($9/$3,400) as a starting point. If you want to play the three-man version Min-sang Yoo ($7/$3,100) is cheap and right there, while Preston Tucker ($17/$5,600) is still a quality option even if you mistrust him. If you’re going to this team in a bad spot you don’t want to do it with the lesser hitters in the lineup, but Ho-ryung Kim ($10/$3,600) has shown a bit of quality this season from later in the lineup. If you want to mix him in at minimal exposures, it’s reasonable. Nine hitter Chan-ho Park ($9/$3,300) is probably overpriced considering that he’s the Billy Hamilton of the KBO. Park stole 39 bases in his first full season in 2019, while getting on base at just a .301 clip. This season he’s off-pace with only six steals and a .281 OBP. Buyer beware, but as a limited wraparound guy he does potentially offer some peripheral scoring if he manages to get on.

Tonight, is a bit better for the Dinos by comparison to last night’s game against Drew Gagnon, but Tigers starter Hyun-jong Yang is no slouch. This is one of the better non-import starters in the KBO, and the 32-year-old has done it over a 13-year career since being the first overall selection in the 2007 draft. The Dinos rank in the middle of stacks tonight. They offer a very slight ownership edge, but I don’t love the play against quality pitching. I’ll make sure to have some and I’ll try to get over on the big bats for this squad, but it’s not a focus play. I like how Aaron Altherr ($16/$5,100) looks in both Awesemo’s projections and my home run model tonight. He could move further up the lineup again tonight, depending on how the Dinos choose to stack things against the lefty starter. I wouldn’t hesitate to include Eui-ji Yang ($13/$6,000) in Dinos stacks tonight at low-for-him ownership of around 20% on both sites. There is a ton of appeal in Sung-bum Na ($18/$5,700) at basically no public exposure on either site, despite the lefty-lefty matchup. Suk-min Park ($10/$4,600) hasn’t been slumping but his big knocks have been limited recently, taking his projections down and limiting the attention KBO DFS owners are paying him. This is a quality hitter who is still producing with contact at limited ownership in a great spot in this lineup. When you go to the Dinos don’t leave him out.

LG Twins @ Samsung Lions – 10.5 run total (5.66/5.06) – Suggested Stack(s): Twins 1-5

The night’s biggest game last night saw the Lions get out to an early 5-run lead in the bottom of the first, then immediately cough it up by giving up five over the next two innings, but eventually get it back in a wild 9-7 game. Twins slugger Roberto Ramos was a day late in breaking his home run drought, but he got there finally, and numerous popular hitters in the LG lineup came through for KBO DFS players. The Lions ridiculously low pricing and 9-run total made them a key play in GPP standings, it wasn’t a spot that I loved yesterday but this team keeps proving me wrong.

The Twins were a popular play last night and the same looks true again here. They top the stack rankings, but the ownership looks a bit heavy, making me think about how much of them I really want to get to. Then again, they’re facing a 19-year-old rookie who has given up three home runs in 20 innings this season and has the word dong in his name. Yoon-dong Heo is probably a pitcher to target, his 6.93 FIP being just a touch worse than the 3.60 earned run average. DraftKings ownership is a problem on a lot of the bats I want in this lineup, it’s going to be challenging to be unique with these guys. Ji-hwan Oh ($9/$3,700) and Kang-nam Yoo ($10/$4,500) are excellent bookends to the chalkiest stack you could build here. Yoo’s 40% ownership is difficult to swallow on DraftKings, he’s a bit more playable at half that on FanDuel. Oh is a very playable seven percent owned on the blue site, while he leaps to 26% on DraftKings. Exposures to leadoff hitter Chun-woong Lee ($8/$3,200) profile similarly. Roberto Ramos ($17/$5,300) is actually at a low-for-him 28% on DraftKings due to the other quality options at first base tonight.

The Lions have an implied total just scraping over the 5-run mark tonight. This isn’t a great spot against Chan-gyu Lim who is fourth in the league among qualified starters with a glowing 24.3% strikeout rate and quality 3.79 FIP. The Lions bats are cheap as usual, but they don’t rank or project particularly well, and I think people might go to them even more than we’re projecting tonight, just on price and recent performance. Optimizers are going to be pushing these guys into stacks again with the higher-cost options from a team like Doosan being so popular. I do like the idea of getting to Dong-yeo Kim ($8/$3,200) as part of a Lions stack despite the lowered opportunity that comes with the late spot in the batting order. He is projecting for limited popularity, so this makes a high-end way to differentiate a construction. Won-seok Lee ($8/$3,900) and Ja-wook Koo ($10/$4,700) are the two most popular plays in projected ownership on DraftKings, but they aren’t unplayable. On FanDuel Koo is probably too popular while Lee is a bit under-owned. Leadoff hitter Sang-su Kim ($8/$4,900) doesn’t blow away projections, but if no one is looking in his direction in these builds it’s the kind of play that could make a winner of an otherwise duplicated build.

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SK Wyverns @ Lotte Giants – 10.0 run total (4.56/5.67) – Suggested Stack(s): Giants 9-2-3-4-5

With Jeong Choi and Jamie Romak both launching home runs last night, the Wyverns had a much better day than expected in a 7-4 win. Neither starting pitcher in last night’s game was particularly good and the small Wyverns stack in the middle of the order paid off for the few KBO DFS players who went with it.

The total tonight is once again unfavorable for the Wyverns. They rank among a large collection of teams between 8% and 6% chance of success in the stack tool tonight, but there isn’t much ownership edge and the best bats are obvious to the KBO DFS public. Last night’s Tae-in Chae ($5/$2,500) worked out as part of the stack with Romak and Choi so we can go that route here again tonight. Kang-min Kim ($7/$3,300) is the same quality option as well, despite the $300 price bump on DraftKings. Ji-hoon Choi ($5/$3,00) and Jong-wook Ko ($7/$4,300) are cheap options up top as well. If you aren’t risk averse this lineup does come together in interesting ways with some of the bigger teams on the board.

The Giants have the second highest implied total on the board tonight, facing shaky part-time starter Joo-han Kim. While Kim has been decent in his two starts there’s not much to like here and the career numbers are a total mess. The Giants are one of the top four stacks on the board on both sites, but they look too popular on FanDuel. On DraftKings I like where the exposure projections are a lot more, and I think they make a strong play. Getting them to work with some of the other desirable stacks on the site tonight might be a challenge, however. Many of the go-to bats on a team like Doosan play the same spots as the key hitters on the Giants, making it tough to click together these stacks in the highest-upside constructions. Still, there’s a lot to like here. Ah-seop Son ($13/$4,100) has been one of the KBO’s top hitters this year. Dae-ho Lee ($10/$4,100) is a masher who is among the KBO’s career home run leaders, and Chi-hong An ($9/$3,400) is back up the order, making a great three-man build. The hitters around them at the top of the lineup are high quality as well, and you can drop down the order for Dixon Machado ($10/$4,800) or Byung-hun Min ($9/$3,300) if you don’t mind limiting a plate appearance opportunity.

Kiwoom Heroes @ KT Wiz – 10.0 run total (5.46/4.76) – Suggested Stack(s): Heroes 2-4-5

Totals bounce back a bit in this one after KBO DFS owners were treated to the high-quality pitching duel we all expected from last night’s contest. Eric Jokish and Odrisamer Despaigne both came through in style with each allowing a lone run over their six and seven inning respective performances. The Wiz eventually picked up the 3-2 victory on a walk-off single in the bottom of the ninth.

The Heroes total comes up to third highest on the slate tonight despite the matchup against import starter William Cuevas. Cuevas has been pitching roughly to expectation so far this season. He doesn’t strike out a ton of hitters for an imported pitcher, but something about the total doesn’t sit quite right with me. That said, the Heroes rank among the top teams in the stack tool and look great in projections, which is what we care about. On DraftKings I look right to Byung-ho Park ($14/$4,500) and Dong-won Park ($9/$5,300) again here tonight where they don’t come up as the highest owned players on this team. On FanDuel the popularity on Byung-ho is a lot stronger. Keon-chang Seo ($10/$4,400) remains under-owned on both sites as a major part of this team’s offense, and Hye-sung Kim ($9/$3,100) is a strong FanDuel option at limited public exposure from late in this lineup.

The Wiz land near the bottom of our stack rankings again tonight and there aren’t a ton of amazing KBO DFS picks against a quality pitcher in Won-tae Choi. Choi has been mostly dealing so far in 2020. He isn’t a strikeout option on the pitching side, but his ability to limit the number of walks that he allows has helped him keep opportunities and runs down this season. With an implied total below five it’s difficult to recommend many Wiz hitters here. Mel Rojas Jr. ($17/$6,000) is a pricey option who delivers frequently, while Baek-ho Kang ($16/$5,200) ranks well again in the home run model. Jae-gyun Hwang ($11/$4,800) and Kyung-soo Prk ($8/$3,100) are reasonable options to attach at either end of the full stack here.