Welcome to the daily MLB updates and news article. We'll try and update it right up to line-up locks with as much information as comes across our desks. Let's get to it!
Last night's picks can be found here, so you can wrap your mind around what you need to be looking at before lineups lock today.
By the way - we keep our projection system updated with all of the batting lineup changes as they occur throughout the day right up until lineup lock. Every day. If you want access to that system so you can cut out a lot of the research element, click the button below!
The Houston/ New York has been postponed
So this one is obvious. Don't play guys from this game as they will accrue zero points. Do you like my preachy tone? Weather is much like late breaking injury news in the NBA. It's a critical thing to follow leading into game time.
Some rain in Baltimore
We are many hours out from this game so it's tough to know if it will impact the game. One worry is the likelihood of rain increases as the day goes on. It looks to ramp up around 3PM and keep going until the evening. For me, this is enough to think about taking the game out of contention when I'm putting together lineups in the optimizer. Specifically, Chris Davis and Miguel Sano are guys showing up a lot. I'd hate to get zeros here even though the Baltimore guys look ver juicy.
Cincinnati Reds
I wrote about this in the picks last night and they are guys showing up all over our optimizer this morning. It makes sense. They are coming very cheap across the board and have one of the better pitching matchups on the day in Jeremy Hellickson. He's a pitcher with a career mid-4's xFIP who's allowed more flyballs than grounders. That's bad news in a park like Great American that boosts power all around and was actually right with Coors last season in park factor home runs. The savings you get on the Reds in this matchup will have a lot of people on them.
Arizona Diamondbacks
Paul Goldschmidt is almost good enough alone to warrant a D-Back stack on this slate. And while that's overstating things for sure, it isn't by much. He's a true lefty crushed and the D-Backs are one of the highest expected totals on the board going against Jorge de la Rosa. Outside of Goldie though, they do have cheaper options in Segura, Castillo and Yasmany Tomas who can do damage against southpaws.
Washington Nationals
Much like Goldie above, Harper falls into that same superstar class and he's underpriced heading into the season. I like the matchup against Teheran who pitches to a fair amount of contact. That's great news for Revere, Harper, Daniel Murphy and some other parts of the middle of the order.
Opponent - PHI (Hellickson) Park - @CIN
FD - 35.86 DK - 19.47
I didn't mention him in the main picks article, but I could have. Iglesias is coming off a season that saw him strike out almost ten batters per nine, walk less than three and put up an xFIP of 3.28. those numbers are excellent, hidden somewhat by an ERA in the low 4's. He induces a bunch of groundballs which is great for pitching in Cincy and today faces a Philly team that's um, weak.
Opponent - SD (Ross) Park - @SD
FD - 52.72 DK - 31.08
He's such an easy pick today that I almost feel awkward writing him up again. Because the pricing is so soft to start and pitchers account for so many points, it's difficult to fade Kershaw on this slate. He's pitching in a fantastic pitcher's park against a team that projects for very little power independent of home park. He's a big favorite in a game with a very low expected total. Run him.
NOTE ON THESE HITTERS - With Baltimore/ Minnesota looking iffy, I took those players out of the optimal lineups even though Chris Davis and Miguel Sano were looking to be everywhere.
Opponent - ATL (Teheran) Park - @ATL
FD - 14.14 DK - 10.99
Not a great hitter's park, but like I said in the picks, he's underpriced to start the season. He's an especially great play on DraftKings, but I'll likely play him everywhere. Goldschmidt is only not on here because there is other fantastic first base value and Harper is the other big bat to get in there.
One other note: There are big differences between DraftKings and FanDuel pricing so the optimal lineups are looking quite different.
These are players that show up in each of the top 10 lineups as produced by our lineup optimizer. This doesn't necessarily mean that they're "safe," it just means that their projected weighted-mean point total is a solid building block for a great lineup foundation today.
Good luck out there today! If you want access to all of our numbers, get started with a free trial below of our lineup optimizer, on us!
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View Comments
The FD $200K tournament is not even half full two hours before lineup lock. Guessing this will be the only big $2 tourney of the season. Better play up!
Good call. That's a lot of overlay.
Great Stuff you guys! As always!
LOL All the sharks projections systems are scared to buy in for hundreds of entries
This is probably a stupid question but does the Lineup Optimizer work with an IPhone?
Yup! It does.
Span is a giant now.
Argh, My bad. Brain working overdrive right now. I meant Revere and had Span in my head because I was going to write about a Giants stack as well. Thanks for the catch. Fixed.
All good. You guys do incredible work. Just wanted to let you know.
Grandal on the DL. Optimizer doesn't reflect that.
Great catch. Has to do with how we were labeling DL information. I'm correcting now and he (along with a a bunch of other guys I'm realizing) will be gone shortly.
Doppler says that Baltimore will be bombed with rain 1 hour into the game. Wiping that game off.
Does the pro tool exclude the postponed games automatically ? Also what's the best way to put together a lineup I used the tool yesterday and bombed but again I have no clue what to look for
When we get word on a postponement we push new data as soon as possible with the game eliminated.
Is the balitmore game canceled?
No, but it has rain in the forecast about 1 hour into the game.
Got to love opening day shifts.