Happy Thursday. It’s really Friday, as tomorrow is the observed July 4 holiday, so Happy Friday. Go go USA, baby. We’re a proper footballing nation now. Get fucked, Belgium.
Smallish slate on Thursday night, but there’s still some money to be won. You can test out our MLB DFS projections, or roll with my MLB DFS picks and stacks below. Let’s build!
Best MLB DFS Pitcher Picks for Thursday
- Bryce Miller ($9,500, vs. Angels)
- Dustin May ($7,500, at Braves)
- Roki Sasaki ($7,700, vs. Padres)
- Framber Valdez ($7,300, at Rangers)
- Nathan Eovaldi ($9,000, vs. Tigers)
- Slade Cecconi ($6,500, vs. White Sox)
- Davis Martin ($8,500, at Guardians)
- Walbert Urena ($8,300, at Mariners)
I’d expect Bryce Miller to be the chalky SP1, just like George Kirby and Bryan Woo before him. The Mariners are still playing the Angels at home, so, yeah. Miller has been absolutely fabulous this season (33% Ks, 3% walks, 2.43 SIERA), albeit in a limited 8-game sample.
Miller’s swinging strikes and Stuff+ numbers are both up, so his improvement looks real. I don’t think the 33% K-rate is real, but he should still generate some Ks given the Angels’ proclivity for seeing 3 strikes (24.8% Ks vs. RHP). I suppose Miller’s reverse right-handed split could bode well for guys like Zach Neto, Jorge Soler, and Jo Adell, but those guys are as likely as anyone else to just strike out 3 times instead. Miller’s the clear-cut SP1.
I expect Nathan Eovaldi to generate about as much ownership as Miller, though I think I’ll be south of the field on Eovaldi. He is good (24.3% Ks, 5.5% walks, 3.43 SIERA), while the Tigers (23.9%) have been a pretty high-K lot against righties. Eovaldi continues to serve up a lot of power, though, especially to lefties (.199 ISO, 10.3% barrels). Detroit may have 6 of those in the lineup here.
I don’t expect Eovaldi to pitch terribly or anything, I just prefer Miller if I’m paying all the way up, and I have enough interest in the cheaper stuff to where I’ll probably target Eovaldi with bats in some primary lineups.
Roki Sasaki has a wide range of outcomes, and this will be his second straight outing against the Padres. The first one did not go well, which is always the risk. Sasaki’s control is so erratic that he can walk himself right out of a game. His 9.6% walk rate on the year ain’t great, but his 23.2% strikeout rate has improved, and he’s closer to 25% over the last month. The Padres get a park boost going into Dodger Stadium tonight, but this offense is still just very light on power (.144 ISO).
It’s generally Sasaki vs. himself more than it’s ever Sasaki vs. the opponent. I do like the $7,700 salary, especially for a pitcher who’s flashed double-digit strikeout upside already this season. There should be some ownership here on such a small slate, but I doubt he’ll be all that chalky given the uncertainty. As was the case last time, I’m in on him.
I’m more into Dustin May, who takes on the Braves in Atlanta. May got his tits lit in his most recent outing, and then the Cardinals skipped his next turn in the rotation due to back soreness. I assume if he’s pitching tonight it’s because he feels fine, and I don’t anticipate any strict pitch limit here. May has been solid overall this year (22.3% Ks, 6.4% walks, .125 ISO allowed, 44.7% groundballs), and he’s ramped up the Ks in a big way (29.9%) over the last 30 days.
The matchup with Atlanta is not without risk, but it’s more of an average offense than an elite one (.170 ISO, 20.6% Ks vs. RHP). Atlanta’s best hitters being lefties adds some risk to the equation, but much of the risk is mitigated by May’s cheap $7,500 salary. I’ll gladly fire him up in all formats even after the rough outing last time out.
Framber Valdez will toe the same rubber as Eovaldi tonight against the Rangers. His first season in Detroit hasn’t been great (18.5% Ks, 52.7% groundballs), but he’s always been more of a groundballer than strikeout guy to begin with. Valdez is still pretty untouchable against LHBs, while RHBs (15% Ks, 49.8% groundballs) have fared a bit better. He’s still not allowing much power to anyone (.129 ISO), but his lack of strikeout stuff makes his outcomes more susceptible to BABIP randomness.
The Rangers are likely to throw 6-7 right-handed hitters his way, but this is not a murderer’s row by any means. Valdez is also super cheap at $7,300. We probably don’t need both of our pitchers to rack up 30+ FPTs to win GPPs on this slate, so I’ll likely have more exposure to Valdez than to Eovaldi.
Slade Cecconi, Davis Martin, and Walbert Urena are just leftovers. Martin has been the best pitcher of that bunch this year, but regression has started to show up lately, and he’s still not all that cheap at $8,500. Meh all around here.
SP Rankings
- Miller
- May
- Sasaki
- Valdez
- Eovaldi
- The rest
Top MLB DFS Stacks for July 2
- Royals (vs. Ian Seymour)
- Rays (at Stephen Kolek)
- Cardinals (at Hurston Waldrep)
- Tigers (at Nate Eovaldi)
- Padres (at Roki Sasaki)
- Dodgers (vs. Randy Vasquez)
- White Sox (at Slade Cecconi)
Both teams in the TB-KC game have implied run totals north of 5. The Royals will take their swings against lefty Ian Seymour, while the Rays take on Stephen Kolek.
Unfortunately, Bobby Witt Jr. is really the only hitter you’re going to like against lefties. Salvador Perez has still flashed some power, while Nick Loftin and Lane Thomas should get decent lineup spots. Jac Caglianone has actually handled same-handed pitching well enough (.217 ISO, .335 wOBA), while Carter Jensen is an alternative to Perez who should be lower-owned. I can’t say I love it, but I get it.
Kolek has pitched over his head for most of the season, though he finally regressed a bit in the last game. Kolek is really just a groundballer with little else to his skill set, and righties (9.1%) are still barreling him up well enough to keep Junior Caminero and Yandy Diaz very much in play. Jonathan Aranda is next on the list. Beyond that, it’s not great, but Cedric Mullins, Victor Mesa, and Chandler Simpson are fine. Simpson, eh?
I probably should’ve led with the Dodgers against Randy Vasquez, a man they pummeled in San Diego a few nights ago. Vasquez’s numbers have predictably regressed after his good start to the season. He’s allowing a ton of barrels (13.3%), a ton of power (.206 ISO), and not striking anyone out (16.9%). The Dodgers are more than equipped to tattoo his face again. Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Max Muncy, Kyle Tucker, Andy Pages, Teoscar Hernandez, Tommy Edman, Dalton Rushing…you know it already.
“Hurston Waldrep” pitched pretty well last season, but it looks flukier than real. He can generate some groundballs, but the control comes and goes. Mostly goes. I’d still build around the Cardinals’ LHBs (Alec Burleson, JJ Wetherholt, Lars Nootbaar, Nathan Church), while Jordan Walker, as always, is the headlining right-handed bat.
Sasaki sure ain’t safe, so playing the Padres against him and his wildness makes sense. Fernando Tatis Jr., Gavin Sheets, Manny Machado, Jackson Merrill, and Samad Taylor is my preferred 5-man approach.
I’m also into the Tigers’ lefties against Eovaldi, given his aforementioned power issues, and this is my favorite way to get direct leverage against a chalky arm. Kevin McGonigle, Riley Greene, and Kerry Carpenter are plus power bats with the platoon advantage. I’d play Dillon Dingler and Spencer Torkelson next in full stacks.
The White Sox are very good, and they’ve met “stack every day” status. Miguel Vargas, Andrew Benintendi, Colson Montgomery, Braden Montgomery, Sam Antonacci, and Kyle Teel are all excellent. Even Tristan Peters has pretty good numbers vs. right-handed pitching, though the Cleveland bullpen is deep after Cecconi.
Noah Simpson is a New England-based DFS writer who has spent the better part of a decade obsessing over MLB DFS. He got his start playing DFS recreationally before realizing he was spending more time building spreadsheets than actually watching games, and decided to make it official. At DFSBuild, Noah covers MLB DFS strategy with a focus on finding edges that casual players overlook. When he’s not staring at Statcast data, he’s somewhere on a hiking trail in Maine with his two dogs, Sandboy and Johnner, who are undefeated at ignoring his lineup advice, because they are dogs. They don’t have the cognitive or motor skills required to operate a computer, let alone process complex theories and information.
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