MLB DFS Tournament Strategy: Leverage, Home Runs, Optimal Picks | Today, 5/20/21

Thursday’s MLB DFS action is split between the afternoon and evening, leaving just a four-game affair for the main slate on all sites tonight. The short slate is lacking in high-end starters and the tightrope of tonight’s pitching selection is a tougher walk than usual. With only four games on tap, it makes sense to diversify lineup combinations and focus on capturing a range of outcomes, a slate of this size is somewhat less likely to see two full team stacks explode for mandatory scores, bringing alternate stacking constructions more into play. There are enough DFS MLB picks between the eight teams that we do not have to roster hitters against our pitcher. Getting to some offbeat bats within good stacks is a better approach when building DraftKings and FanDuel lineups.

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Tracking the top MLB DFS pitchers will be key, as will monitoring the public ownership distributions on stacks via the Top Stacks Tool. Let’s get into the MLB DFS picks for DraftKings and FanDuel, as well as some home run candidates for each team.

MLB DFS Tournament Strategy: Top HR Options

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Home Run Ratings

Home runs are the holy grail when making MLB DFS picks. Finding the right combination of sluggers who will knock one, or better two, out of the park to drive in the teammates you stack with them is critical to winning GPPs. Identifying the likely home run hitters is trickier than just looking at the big names. Using a model of my own design, based on a blend of several predictive statistics for the batter-pitcher matchup, I will give one of the top choices from each team. However, it won’t always be the absolute top-ranked player, particularly when there is an obvious star who would be in that spot every day.

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Scale: 5-10 Average; 10-20 Good; 20-25 Very Good; 25+ Great

Arizona Diamondbacks: David Peralta — 8.32

Atlanta Braves: Austin Riley — 11.72

Boston Red Sox: Rafael Devers — 19.38

Los Angeles Dodgers: Mookie Betts — 9.11

Miami Marlins: Isan Diaz — 7.77

Philadelphia Phillies: Rhys Hoskins — 7.48

Pittsburgh Pirates: Will Craig — 8.89

Toronto Blue Jays: Rowdy Tellez — 6.74

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Power Index

This is intended to capture the full range of home runs-upside for each team. It is not meant as a stack ranking and does not account for pricing or popularity — only home run potential. The first column is the average rating for the full projected lineup (pitcher bats not included in non-DH games), and the second is for the top six hitters in the projected lineup.

mlb daily fantasy baseball dfs picks expert projections home runs draftkings fanduel lineups stacks leverage correlation

MLB DFS Pitchers, Optimal Stacks & Leverage Plays

This section will feature a few standout MLB DFS spots and teams to look at for potential plays on DraftKings and FanDuel. Make sure to check out the ownership projections for critical updates and monitor the top stacks tool throughout the day for changes.


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On the Hill

After a few days where good pitching options were as plentiful as donuts in Springfield, today’s main slate looks extremely thin. There are several capable starters, but each comes with enough significant downside to not consider them safe. When the top available arms include luminaries like Vince Velasquez, Drew Smyly and Sandy Alcantara, you might be short on quality options.

Of that trio, Velasquez stands out for being the best strikeout option in the best spot. He has been his usual unreliable self early in 2021, putting up a 28.9% strikeout rate but walking 14.8% of hitters through his first 29.1 innings in five starts. Velasquez has a 4.26 xFIP and a 1.40 WHIP. He allows too many runners on base and is constantly in trouble, but his strikeout acumen bails him out from time to time and he will be facing a weak Marlins lineup that bumps the appeal. The Marlins’ active roster strikes out 26.7% of the time against right-handed pitching, fourth worst in baseball this season. They have just a .125 team ISO in the split and create runs 16% worse than average while lagging behind the average pace in home runs in the split as well. Velasquez is more likely to hurt himself in this outing than the Marlins are to do extreme damage. He will be very highly owned on both sites, however, with public exposures basically doubling his probability of being the top starter on the blue site and ranging ahead by about 20 percentage points on DraftKings, where there is more room. Ultimately, Velasquez is the “safe” and most likely option for upside, but getting unique in builds with him will be a challenge.

Atlanta’s Drew Smyly is also projected to be popular, though he is facing a Pirates team that is just around league average in strikeouts against lefties this season, at a 15th-ranked 23.5%. The Braves have lacked power in the split however, hitting just six home runs this year and putting up a meager .125 ISO as a unit. The Pirates create runs 23% worse than average in the split, a combination of factors that give Smyly some appeal and at least the comfortable illusion of safety. He is having a tough opening to his 2021, sitting at just a 5.27 xFIP and a 1.35 WHIP with only a 19.3% strikeout rate. Last season those marks were 2.57, 1.10 and 37.8% in a 26.1 inning sample. For his career, he is closer to a league average strikeout option, at 23.8%. Last year’s improvement came with a big bounce in swinging strikes, which has disappeared back to career norms around 10% this season. Smyly has thrown fewer called strikes as well, which has contributed to the early downturn. He has been solid over six innings in each of his last two starts, however, suggesting he could be rounding into form. If the strikeouts follow, there could be upside in Smyly tonight, though he is not at all a secret and will be very popular.

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Sandy Alcantara is on the other side of the matchup from Velasquez and rostering both to wall off the potential for a win bonus on the two pitcher sites seems a viable approach to at least some lineup shares. Alcantara faces a Phillies lineup that is fifth worst in baseball with a 26.1% strikeout rate against right-handed pitching this season. Philadelphia has a .142 ISO that stands below average, and they create runs 8% worse than average in the split. Philadelphia is thought of as a more capable offense than they have been on the field this season, which is leaving just the slightest bit of leverage upside on the Alcantara play. He has a 24.2% strikeout rate and is getting a 14.4% swinging strike rate this year, which is well up from his standard marks of around 10.5%. Alcantara has made a specific change to his pitch mix, throwing his changeup far more and his slider less. This sets up his full arsenal of pitches to work more effectively off of one another, as he features an excellent four-seamer that averages 97.6 mph and a 97.0 mph turbo-sinker. Mixing in a 91.6 mph changeup 26.3% of the time while inducing a 37.8% whiff rate on the pitch is a devastating change to which opposing hitters have not been able to adapt. Alcantara has thrown 51.0 innings in nine starts this season, completing at least 6.0 innings in all but two turns. The first was his fifth start of the season that saw him get through five good innings, but he walked four hitters and rang up a pitch count that got him pulled early. The second was in his most recent turn against the Dodgers, an outing that saw him get torched early, yielding eight runs on seven hits while striking out just three and walking two in 1.1 innings. The length and quality of the average starts should be the focus, not the recent result. Alcantara is a strong option, stronger if he remains under-owned.

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Boston Red Sox

The powerful Red Sox lineup is closing out their series at Toronto’s temporary Florida home, which at last check is a parking lot behind a supermarket featuring a 200-foot home run distance down the line in right and a brick wall acting as the automatic catcher. That is only minor hyperbole for the Blue Jays’ laughable minor league stadium, which has yielded plenty of offense early in the season. The Red Sox will be taking on lefty Steven Matz, who has had issues with giving up power in his career. Matz is sitting at a 3.57 xFIP and a 1.29 WHIP with a 25.6% strikeout rate, though he is inducing only 9.6% swinging strikes so far in his 42.0 innings of work. He has given up six home runs already in that sample and sits in just the 44th percentile of hard-hit rate but the 73rd of average exit velocity allowed. Matz could be in a tough spot against a Red Sox lineup that features daunting right-handed power. The changeup that he uses to keep right-handed bats honest has an expected slugging percentage of .517 this season, worst among his four offerings.

Enrique Hernandez has had an effective start to his Boston career, largely hitting out of the leadoff spot this season. He has a .254/.308/.459 slash over 133 plate appearances, hitting five home runs and putting up a .205 ISO so far. Hernandez has created runs 9% better than average, giving the Red Sox quality at bats as a utility player. He will be a popular component of Red Sox stacks on both DraftKings and FanDuel tonight, given the spot in the batting order, the positional flexibility and the low cost. Of the Red Sox top of the lineup, Hernandez is both the most easily rostered and the most easily skipped.

Alex Verdugo has not quite made Red Sox fans forget that he was the main return in the trade of Mookie Betts, but he has certainly eased their pain with his excellent play. Verdugo has a .288/.347/.468 slash with six home runs and three stolen bases through his first 173 plate appearances this year. He remains relatively inexpensive for his quality, and while he loses power upside in same-handed matchups, he has displayed a better hit tool in a still-small career sample. Against right-handed pitching, Verdugo has a .284/.347/.476 career line with a .192 ISO, creating runs 19% better than average. Against fellow southpaws he is at .304/.341/.425 with just a .121 ISO, while still creating runs 6% ahead of the field. Verdugo is still a good option in Red Sox stacks, let the public skip him for the handedness against a pitcher who — if all goes to plan — the team will chase early.

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J.D. Martinez has smashed through any talk of his decline like the Hulk being asked to wait in line at the DMV. Martinez has obliterated all comers, putting up a .329/.404/.596 slash with a .267 ISO and 11 home runs in his 183 plate appearances this year. He is expensive at $4,300 on FanDuel and $5,500 on DraftKings, but he is also one of the better options on the entire slate for a home run or two, should you find yourself forced to pick one to save the planet.

Shortstop Xander Bogaerts is the highest priced Red Sox player on DraftKings but costs just $3,600 on the blue site tonight, a hilarious discrepancy in which DraftKings is the site getting it correct. He is a legitimate star, sitting at .346/.402/.597 with a .252 ISO and a WRC+ 74% above average in his 174 plate appearances. He has made light work of left-handed pitching in his career, with a .309/.385/.479 slash and a .170 ISO while creating runs 32% better than average in the split. Bogaerts is the tasty center of the Sox mid-lineup sandwich. Getting to him and the two hitters on either side is the key to all things with this stack.

Third baseman Rafael Devers is another lefty bat in the Sox lineup who will perhaps lose a bit more luster for facing a same-handed pitcher early in the game. Devers has a .262/.316/.406 slash with a .144 ISO against southpaws, while creating runs 10% worse than average. Against righties, Devers is a .286/.340/.546 hitter with a .260 ISO who creates runs 28% better than average. Gamers can roster him as part of stacks, ignoring the relative power outage early while hoping to land on two or three plate appearances against opposite-handed pitching later in the game as teams struggle to match hands against the likely lineup configuration.

Catcher Christian Vazquez is no stranger to DraftKings MLB DFS players at this point. He has been a solid option for power the past two seasons, hitting seven home runs in 189 plate appearances last year and 23 in 521 tries the season before. Vazquez has three long balls already this season and is at .252/.301/.363 in his first 146 plate appearances. He hits in the middle of the loaded Boston lineup, which should add to the appeal even on FanDuel, despite the lack of needing to roster a catcher. Vazquez costs just $2,400 on the site and his ownership is falling below 10%, which makes him interesting.

[osBestBetsSingleGameOdds league=”mlb” date=”05/20/2021″ team=”red sox”]

Outfielder Hunter Renfroe has tremendous power against anyone, but he can really put on a show against left-handed pitching. He has a .301 career ISO in the split, creating runs 35% better than average while putting up a .260/.341/.561 slash and hitting 37 home runs in just 537 plate appearances in his career — essentially a season’s worth. Adding in his 21.0% strikeout rate and 10.6% walk rate in the split over his career, Renfroe would be one of the best power hitters in the game were he to hit against exclusively southpaws. For the $2,500 on FanDuel and $3,700 on DraftKings, he is well worth eating some minor chalk when hunting for power upside.

Bobby Dalbec is a hitter at the bottom of this lineup who remains worth discussion. Dalbec is out to just a .208/.264/.392 start but has a .183 ISO and four home runs in his 129 plate appearances. In 2020, Dalbec saw 92 opportunities as a rookie and responded by blasting eight home runs and a .338 ISO. There is titanic power in his bat, but Dalbec is an all-or-nothing type who also strikes out 33.3% of the time this year and was at 42.4% in that killer debut last year. Dalbec is worth a spot as an endcap to mid-lineup stacks, but he should not be viewed as someone to turn the lineup over and create added opportunities as a wraparound.

The confirmed lineup features Michael Chavis hitting in the nine spot, which creates more of an interesting option that may wind up under-owned for his general skills. He has a .259/.259/.481 slash with a .222 ISO over his first 27 plate appearances this year. Last season he was at just .212/.259/.377 in 158 tries, but MLB DFS players may remember his solid debut in 2019 when he went .254/.322/.444 with a .190 ISO and 18 home runs in just 382 plate appearances. Chavis has upside if he is under-owned.

HR Call: Bobby Dalbec — Boston Red Sox

To get even more action down on tonight’s MLB slate, check out the betting markets and Awesemo’s expert MLB betting locks for today.


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Author
Terry used to do other things, now he writes words on the internet. He hopes his more than 20 years’ experience in season-long and daily fantasy sports and his custom models for MLB, NBA, and NFL don't steer you too wrong when he writes columns and makes picks on Awesemo.com. A lifetime of experience keeping odd hours make Terry ideal to cover KBO baseball overnight until the world returns to normal. Most of those late night hours have been spent on the couch watching sports, T.V., and movies; just try to shut him up about any of the above. You can find his pop-culture ramblings and more on Sideaction.

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