3 Under-the-Radar Daily Fantasy Baseball Plays for 5/4/17
Ariel Miranda, SP, Seattle Mariners
FanDuel Price: $7,300
Why He Will Go Overlooked:
In such a small main slate (only five games), there's often not a ton of diversity in the picks. Three starters are priced over $8,000 -- Chase Anderson and Adam Wainwright, who face one another, and Dan Straily. They should see the majority of ownership, and of those three, Wainwright is the heaviest favorite at -145.
One mid-priced option to consider is Seattle Mariners starter Ariel Miranda. Over 26 innings pitched, Miranda has sported a 3.93 SIERA, but two tough starts against the Houston Astros and Oakland Athletics have scared the majority of owners away. With the Los Angeles Angels sporting a decent implied team total of 3.99 runs, Miranda shouldn't see high ownership.
Why You Should Use Him:
While Miranda will have to contend with Mike Trout and the recently-hot Kole Calhoun leading the Angels offense, he's shown that he's more than capable of shutting down these kinds of bats lately.
The southpaw has posted a 21.8% strikeout rate so far this season and has limited hard contact to a rate of 29.5%. Miranda is allowing a fairly high fly-ball rate (42.1%), but he's limited production from hitters on both sides of the dish -- righties are slightly better at a .317 wOBA, while lefties are only logging a mark of .302.
His last outing against a strong Cleveland Indians offense revealed some of his potential upside as he struck out 7 hitters over 5.1 innings. If he can keep that up against an Angels squad that doesn't whiff a ton (20.5% strikeout rate), he could be a sneaky play.
