MLB Daily Fantasy Helper: Tuesday 5/23/17

The beauty of daily fantasy baseball is that the top targets are different each and every day. Whether it's the right-handed catcher who destroys left-handed pitching or the mid-range hurler facing a depleted lineup, you're not going to find yourself using the same assets time after time.

While this breaks up the monotony, it can make it hard to decide which players are primed to succeed on a given day. We can help bridge that gap.

In addition to our custom optimal lineups, you can check out our batting and pitching heat maps, which show the pieces in the best spot to succeed on that slate. Put on the finishing touches with our games and lineups page to see who's hitting where and what the weather looks like, and you'll have yourself a snazzy looking team to put up some big point totals. We've also got our Solo Shot Podcast, which breaks down the MLB daily fantasy slate each day. Here's today's episode.

If you need help getting started on that trek, here are some of the top options on the board today.

Pitchers to Target

High-Priced Pitchers

Clayton Kershaw ($12,600 on FanDuel): If you've ever wanted to fade Clayton Kershaw in a tournament, you may finally have the justification for doing so. Kershaw's strikeout rate this year is down to 26.1% from 31.6% last year, putting a serious dent in his upside. Because his batted-ball numbers are still ridiculous and he's not walking anybody, Kershaw's a tremendous cash-game play entering his matchup with the St. Louis Cardinals, who have a 22.2% strikeout rate against lefties. However, until Kershaw's strikeout rate starts to creep back up, it's okay to look elsewhere in tournaments, even if we do wind up missing out on a vintage Kershaw start as a result.