Charlie Morton ($11,300 DraftKings, $10,500 FanDuel, $51 Yahoo)
On a slate lacking pitching at the top, Morton is my favorite candidate to put up a big performance in a tough matchup against the A’s. Oakland is striking out just 21.1% of the time versus righties on the year, but Morton is striking out over 28% of righties and 32% of lefties for a total K% of 30.6%. He has posted at least an 11.4% Swinging-Strike rate in his last seven starts against some tough teams to get swings and misses against, including the Twins, Angels, as well as the A’s in that time. He will likely not grade out as a top value on the slate, especially on DraftKings, but we should be able to get some quality bats with Morton and a cheap SP2 because of the lack of expensive stacks tonight.
Nick Pivetta ($8,200 DraftKings, $7,700 FanDuel, $25 Yahoo)
Pivetta has rebounded nicely since returning the majors after his Triple-A stint, striking out at least six in each of his four starts and reaching 105 pitches in three of them. Tonight’s matchup with the Nationals is certainly not a perfect one for Pivetta, but with the majority of ownership going to other arms in this range (Wainwright vs. Miami), he makes for a contrarian GPP play that has big strikeout upside.
His season-long numbers are underwhelming, striking out only 22% of both lefties and righties, he’s top-30 in the MLB in Whiffs/Swing% in the month of June at a solid 31.8%, around guys like German Marquez, Jack Flaherty, and Jake Odorizzi in that category. The Nats lineup when at full health is scary, but five players in the projected lineup are around league-average in K% vs. RHP (Soto 21%, Turner 21%, Dozier 22%, Robles 25%, Adams 26%), so a guy in Pivetta that is missing bats is a good option to get over the field on in large GPPs.
Dylan Bundy ($7,600 DraftKings, $7,300 FanDuel, $38 Yahoo)
Clicking on Dylan Bundy‘s name is never a comfortable thing to do in DFS, but at this price, he’s one of the better mid-tier options on tonight’s tough pitching slate. The Mariners could throw out as many as six lefties, which wouldn’t be ideal for Bundy, but only one of them (Vogelbach) has shown big power, which is Bundy’s kryptonite.
The lack of lefty power plus the strikeout upside for the righties the Mariners will likely be throwing out there is huge, as Santana, Beckham, and Williamson are all fanning over 26% of the time versus righties since the start of last season, while Bundy has been excellent in that department against right-handed hitters, striking them out at a 30% clip in 2019. The near 5 implied total against Bundy will keep his ownership down, but this is a solid matchup to begin with, and it could get even better depending on how the Mariners decide to construct their lineup.
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