3 Under-the-Radar MLB FanDuel Plays for 8/30/19

When being contrarian in daily fantasy sports, there's a fine line between taking a calculated risk and being reckless. But differentiating your lineups from everyone else is the name of the game if you plan on taking down one of those highly lucrative DFS tournaments. Whether it's because of Vegas totals, other options at a given position, or some gem you've found that everyone is overlooking, we can always find potential under-owned plays if we look hard enough.

Here are three such players to consider branching out for on FanDuel's main slate.

Ivan Nova, P, Chicago White Sox

FanDuel Price: $7,900

There are some nights in the MLB season when you simply know a player is going to be lower owned and Ivan Nova is that player tonight.

Nova isn't the best pitcher by any stretch of the imagination, but he is pitching well right now and might be worth considering on this 14-game slate. If ownership is going to be spread out a bit, and we are looking to take some savings in order to get hitters at Coors Field, Nova at his $7.9K price tag is in the mix tonight.

First off, he only comes in with a 14.5% strikeout rate, which is super low and can often limit his upside. That lower strikeout rate often pushes most DFS players away since a massive amount of points won't be there on a nightly basis.

But, even with that said, Nova has shown in recent starts that he can go deep into games and limit the damage. Over his last seven starts, Nova has allowed a total of four earned runs, picking up the quality start points in four of them and the win in five games. The veteran is getting it done, and those games have come against the Minnesota Twins twice, the Philadelphia Phillies, and the Houston Astros in some of those starts. He's able to limit the damage via his 49.0% medium-contact rate and his 46.8% ground-ball rate. Keep the ball down and limit hard contact.

Eduardo Escobar, 3B, Arizona Diamondbacks

FanDuel Price: $3,700

The Arizona Diamondbacks come in with a decent 4.30 implied run total, and much like last night, they should be able to hit the over on that. If you are looking for a bit of a secondary stack tonight, Arizona should be on that list, since their hitters aren’t too expensive and should be lower owned.

Eduardo Escobar should be at the top of the list since he is having an awesome season and has great numbers in this split. He comes in with .242 ISO, high 45.8% fly-ball rate, and a 37.9% hard-hit rate versus right-handed pitchers. All of those numbers jump up even higher when he is at home in this same split.

Arizona is up against Tony Gonsolin, who only has 23 innings pitched this season, which is his first year in the Major League. There isn’t much we can draw from over his smaller sample size, but he is allowing a hard-hit rate at 50% or higher to both sides of the plate. I like the Diamondbacks tonight and specifically Escobar.

Randal Grichuk, OF, Toronto Blue Jays

FanDuel Price: $2,900

The Toronto Blue Jays aren’t a great team, but they are facing Wade Miley, who isn’t amazing by any means.

Miley is priced at $9K, which might have some people assume he is a “good/great” pitcher, but he holds a 4.45 xFIP against righty hitters and is allowing 1.18 home runs per nine innings and a 37.3% hard-hit rate. Those are really average numbers and nothing you need to be afraid of. A 4.52 implied team total for the Blue Jays should tell you that they can get to Miley tonight, hopefully, at lower ownership.

Randal Grichuk, on the other hand, isn’t the best hitter, but he has some solid underlying numbers against lefty pitchers and could be due for a home run tonight. He has a 41.2% hard-hit rate, .201 ISO, and a 37.8% fly-ball rate. At face value, his .252 average isn’t good, but we don’t want to look at that -- we want his peripheral numbers to see where he really stands.