Sunday brings the usual beefer of a main slate tipping off at 1:35 PM ET. We’ve got a few minor weather concerns in St. Louis and Minnesota, while some other games – including Boston and Kansas City – have excellent hitting conditions.
It looks like a fairly straightforward approach on DraftKings, where it looks like we could have overwhelming ownership on one pitcher, while things may otherwise be fairly spread out.
Let’s dive in.
SP1 – Garrett Crochet
…and that’s it. Nathan Eovaldi is another terrific pitcher going today, but I’m not paying $10,600 for a guy facing the low-strikeout Blue Jays.
Crochet is the one who’s likely to be wildly popular at home against Miami. Even with hitter-friendly weather, it’s hard to overlook the guy with the 31% K-rate and stellar all-around numbers. The Marlins aren’t the cakewalk of a matchup they used to be, but they did just lose a big power bat, Kyle Stowers, to injury. What’s left has just a .263 wOBA and a .117 ISO vs. left-handed pitching. Even in a subpar strikeout matchup, it’s hard to fade Crochet this afternoon.
SP2 – Will Warren, Javier Assad, Dean Kremer, Chris Paddack, Thomas Hatch
It’s gross out there, folks. The next best option is probably Will Warren, who toes the rubber against the Cardinals in a game with a rain chance. If we get the all-clear, Warren is cheap enough at $8,200 to make for a solid partner to pair with the $11,100 Crochet, and I suspect that’ll be a very popular way to build.
The Cardinals (23.9%) are striking out plenty these days against RHP, and they don’t have enough patient bats to exacerbate Warren’s control issues. He’s still not really a guy I’m ever excited to play considering that erratic control can lead to some very short outings, but it’s not like we’re excited to play anyone but Crochet on this slate.
Javier Assad isn’t any good, but he’s at home against a Pirates team with a collective .100 ISO vs. RHP on the year. Most importantly, he’s only $6,800, so he gives you the savings you’d want given the state of the sketchy SP2s. Ditto for Thomas Hatch at only $5,300 against the Tigers, but he likely doesn’t have a lot of pitch count upside. Playing Hatch means you’re essentially forfeiting SP2 to pay up for hitters, and I don’t think it’s necessarily an awful strategy.
Mean Dean Kremer ($8,300) is a little more expensive than I’d like, but I think he’s a fine ownership pivot from Warren in Houston against the righty-heavy Astros. Chris Paddack (at MIN) will already face his old team for the 2nd time since his trade to the Tigers last month. They hit some dongs off him last time, and I suspect they’ll hit some dongs off him this time, too. As is the case with Assad, Paddack’s just a price play at $6,600.
Primary Stacks – Red Sox, White Sox, Royals, Guardians, Orioles
Lots of the league’s best offenses aren’t actually on this slate, so we’re kinda left with some rubbish. The Red Sox are at home in hitter-friendly Fenway against Janson Junk. This guy isn’t a bad pitcher – his control is legitimately excellent – but the strikeouts aren’t really there and the weather bodes well for a team that should be putting the ball in play.
The high salaries make it tough to stack the Red Sox with Crochet, but Masataka Yoshida ($2,900) is nice and cheap, while the price tags on Roman Anthony, Wilyer Abreu, and Trevor Story are all fair enough. Paying up for Jarren Duran sounds nice, but I don’t think it’s a must.
Cleveland faces the woeful Erick Fedde, a man who’s been utterly destroyed by left-handed hitters all year. Jose Ramirez is the top hitter on the entire slate, and Gabriel Arias is actually the only RHB in Cleveland’s entire lineup. Kyle Manzardo, Steven Kwan, and Daniel Schneemann are next behind J-Ram in terms of priority.
The White Sox and Royals get that hitter-friendly weather in KC for a matchup between Ryan Bergert and Davis Martin. Martin’s splits are neutral enough to keep all of Bobby Witt Jr., Salvador Perez, Mike Yastrzemski, Maikel Garcia, and Vinnie Pasquantino in the pool. Bergert has pitched to a reverse split from the right side, so I’d start with Miguel Vargas, Lenyn Sosa, and Luis Robert before Colson Montgomery and Andrew Benintendi.
Baltimore faces Cristian Javier in just his 2nd start of the season. He’s always been pretty splitsy from the right side, and the Orioles do still have some capable LHBs in Jackson Holliday, Gunnar Henderson, Colton Cowser, and Adley Rutschman.
Secondary Stacks – Braves, Yankees, Brewers, Rangers
I like a MIL mini-stack against Andrew Abbott in an elite park for power – Andrew Vaughn, Caleb Durbin, Danny Jansen.
The Yankees are always fully stackable wherever they are, especially if they’re facing the dusty Miles Mikolas. The problem is they’re expensive, so it’s a tough team to stack if you’re spending up for Crochet. Lefties – Ben Rice, Jazz Chisholm, Cody Bellinger, Trent Grisham – generally have the edge against the Lizard King.
I’m never enthralled by the Rangers, but Berrios has been susceptible to lefties over the years – Corey Seager, Josh Smith, Evan Carter – plus the super-cheap Joc Pederson/Rowdy Tellez.
You can target Logan Allen with right-handed power – Ronald Acuna Jr., Sean Murphy, Jurickson Profar, Marcell Ozuna, Ozzie Albies.
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