Hey there, party people. Not sure what party people is supposed to mean, but it sounds cool, and I think you’re cool if you’re reading this, so it applies.
I’m listening to the Monkees as I write this. I used to watch their show on Nick at Nite back in the day, because I am elderly. Not even sure why I’m admitting to this!
6 games on the board for Thursday night. Let us discuss.
MLB DFS Pitcher Picks for Thursday (9/3)
- Tarik Skubal ($10,500, vs. Cardinals)
- Logan Henderson ($9,500, at Cubs)
- Michael Wacha ($8,500, vs. Marlins)
- Kevin Gausman ($8,100, vs. Brewers)
- Shane McClanahan ($7,700, at Rangers)
- Jake Bennett ($7,500, vs. Orioles)
- Kade Anderson ($7,200, vs. A’s)
- Jack Perkins ($5,500, at Mariners)
Not a bad pitching slate for a wee 6-gamer. Tarik Skubal has looked a lot more like Tarik Skubal over his past couple of starts. For the season, the 2-time reigning AL Cy Young holder has a 30.9% K-rate, 4.2% walk rate, and 2.73 SIERA. His ERA is higher than it was last year, as he’s run into slightly worse luck in terms of BABIP and stranding baserunners.
We’ve seen Skubal top 100 pitches in 2 of his last 3 outings, which is a positive sign considering he rarely cracked 100 pitches during his Tigers days. The Dodgers’ bullpen is also in a fairly shambolic state, so they need some length here. THe Cardinals are a very low-strikeout offense against lefties (17.4%), and their team .187 ISO vs. LHP is heavily inflated by some small-sample noise. For the most part, this is a pretty weak offense. It’s not necessarily a great spot to be hunting ceiling with Skubal, but I also don’t think a $10,500 salary is particularly tough to fit. He is the top pitching play on the slate by some distance.
Logan Henderson is $1,000 cheaper, but in a much tougher matchup in Chicago against the Cubs. The numbers say Hendo has been about as good as Skubal (30.1% Ks, 4.9% walks, 3.09 SIERA), but we have a much smaller sample of his work. Wrigley seems fairly wind-neutral tonight, but the Cubs (.183 ISO, .336 wOBA) are a much more potent offense than the Cardinals. Chicago does have more Ks in the order, though (21.3%).
Henderson’s topped 90 pitches in each of his last 4 games and 5 of his last 6, so we don’t really have leash concerns. I think he’s a fine play, but the Cubs’ 4.25 total is considerably higher than the Cardinals’ 2.77 mark.
Michael Wacha is always more of a leftover than a priority. Over his last 2 starts – against the Tigers and Guardians – he has 16 strikeouts across 15 innings. He’s still only at 19.8% strikeouts for the season, albeit with low walks and limited damage allowed. Miami has several high-K hitters in the lineup, along with a decent amount of power (.179 ISO). He’s fine. $8,500 is more than I’d usually want to pay for this guy, though, and there are clearly better options elsewhere.
Kevin Gausman has a 26.2% strikeout rate since coming ot Chicago, an improvement upon his 23.7% season-long rate. The control is always good. He’s allowed more power than usual as a member of the Cubs, though it seems a little fluky considering he hasn’t had many issues with that in the past. Milwaukee’s offensive numbers are pretty average (.161 ISO, .338 wOBA, 22.2% Ks vs. RHP), though it seems like they’re putting up big scores just about every night. $8,100 is a reasonable asking price, so I’d rank him slightly ahead of the more expensive Wacha if I’m shopping in this range.
Shane McClanahan used to be a legit ace before missing a couple of seasons with injuries. He still has above-average Stuff+ numbers, though they also pale in comparison to what he was doing pre-injury. His 22.1% strikeout rate, 8.2% walk rate, and 4.11 SIERA certainly don’t jump off the page. He’s also on the Rays, we can’t necessarily bank on anything higher than an 80-pitch ceiling. The Rangers haven’t been a pushover offensively against southpaws (.197 ISO, .356 wOBA, 22.9% Ks), but McClanahan is cheap enough ($7,700) to make the GPP pool, I guess.
Jake Bennett has given the Red Sox some good innings, but a 19.8% strikeout rate is nothing to write home about unless you’re weird and write letters about strikeout rates, while his 4.00 SIERA says his 3.27 ERA is on the lucky side. I do have some interest considering the Orioles are the highest-strikeout lineup in the majors (25.8%) against lefties, but we also have some potentially worrisome weather in this game. I think Bennett can pay off this salary at low ownership, keeping him in the mix for large-field stuff, weather permitting.
The chalk SP2 to pair with Skuby-Doo will be Kade Anderson. The Mariners’ top pitching prospect has made just a couple of starts at the MLB level, and the results (19.5% Ks, 12.2% walks, 5.25 SIERA) haven’t been great. His matchups (vs. Cubs, at Blue Jays) were both tougher than the one he’ll face tonight in his pitcher-friendly home yard against the A’s. The Athletics are another high-K offense against lefties (25.1%), and Anderson posted a gaudy 40.5% strikeout rate at Double-A this year along with elite control. There’s a lot more upside than he’s shown thus far, even if he seems like he’s an anti-analytics troglodyte.
I guess he thinks it’s cool to be incurious! Regardless, he’s way too cheap for his talent level at $7,200, and the A’s have the 2nd-lowest total on the board (2.82). This is certainly not safe chalk, but it’s chalk I’ll be eating plenty of.
The other pitcher in that one – Jack Perkins – is on the board as a viable $5,500 punt. Perkins has a 6.42 ERA, but everything about that looks like a fluke. He has a 25.2% strikeout rate. He’s only managed to strand about 61% of baserunners, while hitters have a .322 BABIP against him. His 3.89 SIERA is legitimately good. The Mariners have been weak offensively for most of the season. They’ve shown some signs of life lately, but you don’t need Perkins to put up 40 fantasy points in order to be worth the asking price.
SP Rankings
- Skubal
- Anderson
- Gausman
- Henderson
- Perkins
- Wacha
- Bennett
- McClanahan
MLB DFS Stacks for Thursday
- Red Sox (at Brandon Young)
- Marlins (at Michael Wacha)
- Royals (vs. Sandy Alcantara)
- Brewers (at Kevin Gausman)
- Dodgers (vs. Quinn Mathews)
- Mariners (vs. Jack Perkins)
- A’s (vs. Kade Anderson)
- Orioles (vs. Jake Bennett)
This is another slate without much standing out on the hitting side. If the weather cooperates, I’ll have interest in the Red Sox against Baltimore RHP Brandon Young. Young hasn’t even pitched poorly – he has a solid groundball lean – but lefties profile pretty well against him, and the Boston lineup is a little healthier these days. Roman Anthony, Mickey Gasper, Wilyer Abreu, Jarren Duran, and Nick Sogard will hit from the left side here, and it’s a pretty cheap stack once you get past the $5,300 Abreu.
Bennett has also pitched well, but the O’s have enough righty power between Coby Mayo, Pete Alonso, Christian Encarnacion-Strand, and Luis Robert to look like a solid mini.
Both teams in the MIA-KC game have mid-4 implied run totals. On this slate, that’s good enough. Most of Wacha’s issues have come against his fellow righties – good for Heriberto Hernandez, Otto Lopez, and Javier Sanoja – but Kyle Stowers and Griffin Conine have both flashed massive power against opposite-handed pitching this year.
Sandy Alcantara is still a decent real-life pitcher, but he’s not what he used to be, and the strikeouts have really evaporated. Bobby Witt Jr. is right up there as arguably the slate’s top overall hitter. Carter Jensen and Jac Caglianone are the standout lefties, while we can otherwise find value with Isaac Collins, Nick Loftin, and Sal Perez.
The Dodgers have the slate’s highest total at 5.23 runs against rookie lefty Quinn Mathews. We generally prefer the Dodgers against righties, though. Shohei Ohtani is clearly injured, and there’s a decent chance he won’t even start this game. On the bright side, that makes the Dodgers a little cheaper. Tommy Edman, Mookie Betts, Will Smith, and Teoscar Hernandez are the standout RHBs.
I’m on the side of believing in Jack Perkins, but I will admit he has allowed a ton of power (.204 ISO), especially to lefties over the last month (.311!). Cal Raleigh, Dom Canzone, Lazaro Montes, Cole Young, Josh Naylor, JP Crawford, and “Brock Rodden” will all swing it from the preferred side of the plate. Perky hasn’t been impervious to righty power, either. In spite of the pitcher-friendly ballpark, Seattle looks pretty good.
You can also play some righty power against the unproven Anderson, namely Henry Bolte, Zack Gelof, The Fake Max Muncy, and Jonah Heim.
Both offenses in the weird Chicago/Milwaukee game are playable, though I have more faith in the Brewers against the more blowup-prone Gausman. Lefties have a .203 ISO since Gausman showed up in Chicago, so fire up Brice Turang, Jakob Bauers, Christian Yelich, and Garrett Mitchell. Jackson Chourio always makes the cut.
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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