Well hello. We’ve still got a couple of days til Sunday, which means you can spend your time in the interim in the MLB DFS streets. The season’s almost over, so you’d better get your licks in while you still can. Who doesn’t love a good lick?
We’ve got a behemoth of a slate on tap for Friday, and, much to my chagrin, my arch nemeses – the Seattle Mariners – are making a pilgrimage to Coors Field. What could possibly go wrong? What, I ask you!?
Let’s discuss.
MLB DFS Pitcher Picks for Friday
- Dylan Cease ($11,300, at Rangers)
- Tyler Glasnow ($10,500, vs. Giants)
- Cade Cavalli ($9,300, at Cardinals)
- Gerrit Cole ($9,000, at DBax)
- Nick Pivetta ($8,800, vs. Marlins)
- Ian Seymoooooour ($8,700, vs. Red Sox)
- Joey Cantillo ($7,500, vs. A’s)
- Dustin May ($7,500, at Orioles)
- Connor Prielipp ($7,100, at Angels)
- Grayson Rodriguez ($6,000, vs. Twins)
- Cooper Hjerpe ($5,300, vs. Nats)
Pretty good pitching slate with plenty of options. At the top, we have Dylan Cease, his mustache, and his unstable jersey number on the road in Arlington. Cease (35.2% Ks, 10.7% walks, 3.06 SIERA) is the best pitcher on this slate, and we prefer righties against the Rangers (22.8% Ks, .154 ISO, .308 wOBA). This is a big game for the Wild Card with both teams currently tied in the standings, so I guess we’ll see a full leash here for the right-hander.
Texas isn’t a particularly patient lineup, which should suit Cease well, while the ballpark is great. The only stumbling block is that $11,300 salary. I’d still be playing him plenty, though he won’t be my highest-exposed pitcher on this slate, because there’s plenty of else.
One of those elses is Tyler Glasnow for $800 less at home against the Giants. He hasn’t pitched a ton this season due to injury, but a 32% strikeout rate will do just fine. The Giants – despite a collective 18.8% strikeout rate vs. RHP – still have several high-strikeout bats in their current watered-down lineup, and they’re just not hitting for any power (.137 ISO). Glasnow’s borderline control tends to be his undoing, but the Giants are generally less potent than the Rangers, so I’m happy to take the discount from Cease here and play him over Cease straight-up.
It looks like Cade Cavalli is shaping up to be very popular at $9,300 on the road in St. Louis. The Nationals just happened to give him a contract extension today, so his pupils have been replaced by dollar signs, I assume. I will say that Cavalli has been excellent this year (28.2% Ks, 7% walks, 50.8% groundballs), with even more excellent numbers (39.4% Ks!) over the past month.
St. Louis (.150 ISO, .324 wOBA, 21.1% Ks) is nothing special, and I’m sure Cavalli’s impressive game logs will inflate his ownership further. I think the pitching is too good on this slate for Cavalli to warrant the ownership he’s likely to get, so this is someone I will be fully fading in all formats.
I also don’t see much of a need to play a $9,000 Gerrit Cole against the DBax’ low-strikeout bunch (18.7% vs. RHP). I suspect he’ll be fine, but Arizona is a hitter-friendly park, and the Snakes have an implied run total of 4, which is not necessarily among the lowest on the slate.
Nick Pivetta has also spent much of the year injured, but he does have a 31% strikeout rate with low walks and limited damage allowed at the MLB level. I doubt we’re getting more than 80 pitches here considering he’s been held under 70 in both of his starts since returning, so there’s a low floor here at $8,800. I’d play Pivetta sooner than I’d play Cavalli or Cole, but that’s not meant to be a ringing endorsement. Fine secondary GPP play, large-field.
Ian Seymoooour is yet another option with terrific numbers (29.4% Ks, 5.9% walks), though he has allowed quite a bit of power, too (10% barrels, .215 ISO). The Red Sox have come back to earth a bit vs. LHP (.152 ISO, .321 wOBA, 20.9% Ks), and the Rays haven’t let Seymoooour crack 90 pitches since mid-August. Similar play to Pivetta.
Sounds like the Guardians will use an opener before Joey Cantillo, who gets a mention because he’s just $7,500 and facing the A’s. Cantillo does have a 27.3% K-rate vs. opposite-handed hitters this year, and the A’s are projected to have 7 of those in the lineup here. The A’s – with Shea Langeliers back – look a little more dangerous against lefties (.182 ISO, .343 wOBA), so Cantillo’s another guy I’d relegate to large-field-only status.
Dustin May is the better $7,500 option on the road against the Orioles. He should be fine here if he can avoid getting drilled by a comebacker or attempting to eat a leaf of lettuce. The O’s are rather heavy on the Ks (25.2% vs. RHP), while May has shown occasional strikeout upside. Wide range of outcomes here, but the ceiling is high enough to win you something.
Connor Prielipp is also shaping up to be chalky thanks to the matchup against – you guessed it – the Angels and their 25.8% strikeout rate against lefties. Prielipp (23.9%) has been solid on the strikeouts front, and, weirdly, he’s had more issues against lefties than righties. That’ll suit him well with the Angels’ righty-heavy status. There is enough righty power and Prielipp will be chalky enough to make a Halos stack very viable, but it’s hard to argue against playing him at just $7,100 here.
The other pitcher in that game – Grayson Rodriguez – used to be good, and he’s been occasionally good again since returning from injury. He has also mixed some disaster outings in there, so some people fond of dated references might say he’s like a box of chocolates. The Twins have hit for a lotta power against RHP (.192 ISO), and I certainly don’t trust in G-Rod to play him a ton outside of larger-field stuff.
Lastly, Cooper Hjerpe is only $5,300 and getting the ball for the Cardinals against Washington. I assume his Rather Uncomfortable Name and the fact that he’s likely to pitch bulk relief behind Kyle Leahy will lead to no ownership, but this is a $5,300 pitcher with a shit ton of strikeout ability. He was at 35.1% in the minors, and his K-rate at the MLB level so far this year is north of 39%. Tiny, untrustworthy sample, but you won’t often find a legit strikeout pitcher in the low-$5,000 range. He’s probably only throwing 60 pitches, but I don’t mind rolling these dice.
SP Rankings
- Prielipp
- Glasnow
- May
- Cease
- Seymoooour
- Rodriguez
- Hjerpe
- Pivetta
- Cantillo
- Cavalli
Best MLB DFS Stacks for Friday
- Mariners (at Gabriel Hughes)
- DBax (vs. Gerrit Cole)
- Rockies (vs. Bryan Woo)
- Tigers (at David Sandlin)
- Dodgers (vs. Cesar Perdomo)
- A’s (at Joey Cantillo)
- Guardians (vs. Mason Barnett)
- Yankees (vs. E-Rod)
- Brewers (at Cade Povich)
- Braves (at Peter Lambert)
Alright, so the Mariners are in Colorado, and they’ll face rookie RHP Gabriel Hughes to open the series. This team officially sucks, while Hughes really hasn’t pitched poorly, especially by the Rockies’ standards. His strikeout numbers are considerably lower against lefties, so that’s where I’d start if stacking Seattle. Cal Raleigh, Dom Canzone, JP Crawford, Josh Naylor, Lazaro Montes, Cole Young, and Brock Rodden give the Mariners plenty of LHBs to consider. There isn’t much to really say about this. I’m fine with it if you want to play them, but you can always fade any offense with confidence in this game, especially a poor offense projected to be chalk, regardless of the environs.
Bryan Woo has been considerably better at home than on the road this season. By that logic, he should suck in this game, but I’m also not going to put a huge amount of stock in home/road splits. Independent of that, it’s still Colorado, and the Rockies have fared better vs. RHP all year. Lefties (.267 ISO) have hit for lots of power vs. Woo over the last month, as well. Jake McCarthy, Cole Carrigg, TJ Rumfield, and Mickey Moniak are your left-handed priorities, while Hunter Goodman and Connor Norby are the standout righties.
Cole is another good pitcher allowing some power (.189 ISO). I doubt Arizona is on anyone’s radar tonight, so a Corbin Carroll-Lars Nootbaar-Ketel Marte-Gabriel Moreno-Jesus Sanchez/Nolan Arenado stack will be different. I think it’s kinda good tonight.
I like the White Sox’ RHBs against lefty Andrew Sears – Chase Meidroth, Miguel Vargas, Tommy Kerataconus Pham, etc. – but a full Detroit stack against David Sandlin is also interesting in this game. Lefties (.261 ISO, 10.9% barrels, .374 wOBA) seem to have the edge here: Kevin McGonigle, Riley Greene, Colt Keith, and Max Clark.
I have never heard of left-hander Cesar Perdomo, but, apparently, he’s starting for the Giants tonight at Dodger Stadium. There are no Cesar Perdomos among the Giants’ top 30 prospects, so he’s presumably just some random sacrificial lamb out there tasked with eating some innings amid a lost, depressing season. Mookie Betts, Will Smith, Teoscar Hernandez, and Tommy Edman are generally the Dodgers’ headliners against lefties. Kyle Tucker has a long history of hitting lefties well, and he’s finally started to look like Kyle Tucker lately, so I’m fine with it.
The Guardians have an implied run total north of 5, which has to be a season-high. They’re facing the power-prone Mason Barnett, who has absolutely ghastly numbers across the board, especially against lefties. There is a grand total of one Guardian with a double-digit barrel this year against RHP, and that is Nathaniel Lowe. I still like Chase DeLauter and Travis Bazzana well enough. I assume Jose Ramirez is injured. I guess you can play him. Don’t love it!
The A’s figure to take a few turns against Joey Cantillo, and they do have a few hitters smoking lefties this year – Henry Bolte, Shea Langeliers, Zack Gelof, mainly.
I still don’t buy what E-Rod is selling. His long track record as a reverse-splits lefty makes guys like Ben Rice and Cody Bellinger interesting GPP plays, while I’m otherwise fine playing the usual Lefty Mashers – Aaron Judge, Paul Goldschmidt (revenge!), and Heliot Ramos.
Milwaukee isn’t generally a standout offense vs. LHP, but Jackson Chourio, Andrew Vaughn, and Gary Sanchez look pretty good, while Jakob Bauers (.270 ISO, .392 wOBA) has been crushing same-handed pitching this year.
Peter Lambert is kinda just whatever. Low-owned Braves sluggers – Matt Olson, Ronald Acuna Jr., Drake Baldwin, Michael Harris – are interesting enough.
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.
Want more winning DFS plays like this? Get our daily core plays, leverage spots, and strategy sent straight to your inbox.
Leave a Reply