Saturday brings wall-to-wall baseball with multiple featured-slates getting underway a 1:05 p.m. ET on DraftKings, FanDuel and Yahoo. Before you build lineups, several Stokastic tools can help identify daily MLB DFS Top Stacks, key pitchers and MLB DFS picks. Let’s dig into the player projections and popularity for DraftKings, FanDuel and Yahoo lineups.
MLB DFS Picks: Spotlight Pitchers and Top Stacks
MLB DFS Picks: Spotlight Pitchers
Main Slate Pitching Target: RHP Domingo German vs. Boston Red Sox — 4.2 implied runs
First Pitch: 7:35 p.m. ET
- DFS Salary: DraftKings $9,900 | FanDuel $8,500 | Yahoo $39
There are six proverbial tomato cans taking the mound on the slimmed down featured-slate tonight. It would seem the real trick on DraftKings and Yahoo will be to roster a pair of pitchers that reach double-digit fantasy points. This leaves us with the dreaded “vote of confidence” going to RHP Domingo German.
German is absolutely fine as a pitcher and the 30-year-old is having another solid season with a 3.69 ERA, a 4.19 xERA and a 4.04 xFIP. While his strikeouts are trending down when compare to previous campaigns, he still has a respectable 8.7 per nine innings rate. The real challenge will be coaxing fantasy points from the Boston offense, which has scored the sixth most runs in the league this year.
Over the last season-plus, the Red Sox projected lineup has a stellar .239 ISO and a low 15.6% strikeout rate versus right-handed hurlers. Their best hitters all swing the stick from the left-side of the plate and account for most of the aforementioned production. Fortunately, German is relatively neutral with his splits, which hopefully will be enough to edge out the rest of the pitching options for this slate.
Afternoon Slate Pitching Target: RHP Kodai Senga at Pittsburgh Pirates — 4.1 implied runs
First Pitch: 4:05 p.m. ET
- DFS Salary: DraftKings $9,800 | FanDuel $9,400 | Yahoo $45
None of the afternoon pitching options feel safe. RHPs Nathan Eovaldi and Taj Bradley are squaring off in Tampa against their respective juggernaut offenses and Aaron Nola and the Phillies are hosting the Los Angeles Dodgers. LHP Cole Irvin simply cannot be trusted and neither should RHP Julio Teheran, even with two quality starts under his belt and the Athletics on the schedule.
By default, that leaves RHP Kodai Senga as the most appealing option – so hopefully the Pirates used up most of their runs for this series on Friday after waxing the Mets 14-7. While Senga is technically a rookie by MLB standards, the 30-year-old has a decade-plus of success in the Nippon Professional Baseball League.
Senga has been solid in 11 starts with a 5-3 record, 3.75 ERA, 1.44 WHIP and 11.4 strikeouts per nine innings rate. Over the last season and change, the Pirates have been in the bottom-third of the league from a power (.148 ISO) and scoring (93 wRC+) perspective. The projected Pittsburgh lineup has a 20.1% strikeout rate against right-handed pitching during this same timeframe. New York has been spacing out Senga’s starts, so he should be good to go after a rough outing last Sunday against the Blue Jays.
Early Slate Pitching Target: RHP Michael Kopech vs. Miami Marlins — 4.4 implied runs
First Pitch: 2:10 p.m. ET
- DFS Salary: DraftKings $9,100 | FanDuel $9,600 | Yahoo n/a
Though the Marlins have scored the fifth fewest runs this season, they are averaging a tick shy of four per game which is an appreciable 10% increase, year-over-year. Having Luis Arraez at the top of the order is helpful and the reigning American League batting champion currently leads the league with 88 hits, a .400 average and a .449 on base percentage. When Jazz Chisholm Jr. (toe) and Avisail Garcia (thumb) are healthy, this will be a pesky offense.
April was a rough month for RHP Michael Kopech as he was saddled with a 7.01 ERA along with eight home runs through five starts. In his last seven appearances, Kopech has been money with a 2.72 ERA, .144 average against and a 10.9 strikeouts per nine innings rate. Power is still an issue with seven home runs in these 43 innings and his 4.37 FIP also portends to a higher ERA. However, as long as the strikeouts keep coming and the longballs are with the bases empty, Kopech looks to be back on a path to becoming a reliable frontline starter.
MLB DFS Picks: Top Stacks
Main Slate Target: Los Angeles Angels vs. RHP Bryan Woo — 4.9 implied runs
First Pitch: 10:07 p.m. ET
The Mariners are turning to RHP Bryan Woo for a second start as they try to figure out how to fill the void created by LHP Marco Gonzales’ injury. Woo was brought up from Double-A and clearly lacks polish with only 44 of his 101 innings at that level. After three mediocre seasons with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo (6.36 ERA, 11.6 K/9, 69.1 innings), Woo was selected in the sixth round of the 2021 MLB Draft. While the 23-year-old does have a plus-fastball, that helped him to a 12.7 strikeouts per nine innings rate in the minors, he has no secondary pitches that are within hailing distance of average. This is not going to be helpful when facing a loaded Los Angeles lineup that will be sitting on dead-red.
Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout are the obvious plays, but we should also look to Hunter Renfroe who is expected to be activated from the paternity list. Taylor Ward and Brandon Drury can be employed for full-stacks, while catcher Matt Thaiss and first baseman Jared Walsh will enjoy the platoon-advantage and discounted popularity from the bottom of the order.
Afternoon Slate Target: Washington Nationals at LHP Jared Shuster — 4.1 implied runs
First Pitch: 4:15 p.m. ET
There are ample pitchers to target across the 4 o’clock games, but it seems that the field is not on the Washington Nationals. Yes, the team with the seventh fewest runs and a 2-8 record in their last 10 tilts is our recommended play. The nice thing about the Nats is that none of them should be considered budget busters on any of the DFS sites.
Looking first at LHP Jared Shuster, we can see that control has ben a major issue with 19 walks in just 30.2 innings. Making things worse is a low strikeout rate and a high contact rate. Across his six outings, he has allowed only two home runs, but with just 21 strikeouts, that means most everything else is in play.
Though they lack start power, Washington has three strong right-handed options in the first half of the lineup in Lane Thomas, Joey Meneses and Stone Garrett. The only unfortunate thing is that this is a pair of outfielders and a first baseman, which burns three power slots. Of course, most gamers are not going to take this path, so a mini-stack of the Nationals at a discount, opens up salary cap at the other positions, which will create two-fold differentiation.
Early Slate Target: Arizona Diamondbacks at LHP Matthew Boyd — 4.9 implied runs
The Stokastic Top Stacks tool recognizes that LHP Matthew Boyd has a pair of one-run outings in his last three appearances and it does not care. Arizona has scored the fifth most runs in the league and are averaging 5.1 per tilt, which is an 18% increase over last year. Switch-hitter Ketel Marte and the light tower power of Christian Walker continue to propel the offense, but the biggest surprise has been rookie Corbin Carroll who leads the team with 13 home runs and 18 stolen bases. While we would prefer Carroll facing a right-handed pitcher so he has the platoon-advantage, there is only one southpaw in the Detroit bullpen, so when Boyd heads to the showers, Carroll will be well positioned to produce in the later innings.
Veteran Evan Longoria can still get it done against left-handed pitching and the former superstar can be had for a song on DraftKings ($2,900) and FanDuel ($2,700). Emmanuel Rivera should also be hitting in the heart of the order and while he is still developing his home run power, he has plenty of extra-base hit upside. Rounding out the rest of the righties, Gabriel Moreno is a fine catcher choice on DraftKings ($3,000).
Circling back to the right-handed bullpen, Jake McCarthy is in play as part of a “wraparound” stack from the bottom of the order. Since returning from his demotion to Triple-A, he has 10 stolen bases in 12 games, while also being more effective at the plate.
Other DFS and Sports Wagering Opportunities
This afternoon, the San Diego Padres are taking on the Colorado Rockies in Coors Field. Both teams are sending out weak left-handed hurlers in Ryan Weathers and Kyle Freeland. Currently the projected run total is sitting at 12.5, which is just absurd. Clearly we should be loading up on hitters partaking in the Coors Field Extravaganza both in DFS as well as in the sports wagering market,
OddsShopper has created a new “True Odds” feature which is powered by the MLB Bet Pro and Stokastic DFS projections. This helps identify which books are putting out soft or sharp lines. For example we can see that Elehuris Monterano is +520 to hit a home run, while his “True Odds” are +448, this is the equivalent of receiving a 15% booster from the sportsbook, without actually doing any legwork.
We can see that this works in reverse as well with Michael Conforto having a +470 home run line against a broken Kyle Hendricks. While we would want Conforto in the DFS world with the platoon-advantage against a replacement level pitcher, his “True Odds” of hitting a home run are +899, which indicates the books are looking for suckers who do not have the OddsShopper and BetPro tools at their disposal.
Here are some other notable home run matchups:
Long shot Brett Baty +900 with +782 True Odds (+15.1%) in Pittsburgh against RHP Johan Oviedo.
Respectable option Nolan Arenado +350 with +299 True Odds (+17.1%) at home versus rookie LHP Andrew Abbott.
Same-Game Parlay candidates Joey Meneses +560 with +492 True Odds (+13.8%) and Lane Thomas +600 with +529 True Odds (13.4%) against struggling LHP Jared Shuster.
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Final Thoughts for Saturday, June 10 | MLB DFS Picks
The smoke from the Canadian wildfires has subsided, so we are back to just worrying about weather. Currently only Colorado and St. Louis have any precipitation risk, though neither appears headed for anything more than a delay.
Check out today’s Stokastic MLB Strategy Show, at 11:00 a.m. ET, brought to you by Sorare. Get 1 FREE “Limited” card after completing your first 5 card purchases on the primary market!
