South Korea's KBO League is bringing live baseball back in our lives, and that means the return of daily fantasy baseball with real cash prizes on FanDuel!
First pitch on Tuesday is at 5:30am ET, and official lineups typically come out an hour before game time at the earliest.
Scoring is identical to what we see in MLB DFS, but FanDuel is condensing the number of starting spots to seven. You start one pitcher as usual, and then only need to roster two infielders, two outfielders, and two utility players to fill out the rest. Your total team salary is also $100 instead of $35,000.
Some websites that can help you get started include MyKBO Stats and Baseball Reference, and FanGraphs has created new player pages for KBO players, too.
We don't have 2019 KBO stats for foreign players making the jump to this league, but foreigners generally perform well overall. Last season, foreign pitchers performed nearly 22% above league average, and hitters performed about 16% better, per MyKBO Stats.
Below is an overview of Tuesday's starting pitchers sorted by FanDuel salary. Last season's KBO stats are listed for each starter, along with their opponent's 2019 hitting stats. And yes, we even have multi-year park factors from the Korean website, Statiz.
Note that on FanDuel these hurlers are listed by their team names (ex: "SK Starting P"), so their team names are also included.
| Pitcher | Sal. | L/R | Opp. | FIP | ERA | WHIP | K% | BB% | Opp. R/G | Opp. K% | Park |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drew Rucinski (NC) | $26 | R | KT | 3.92 | 3.05 | 1.18 | 16.3% | 6.2% | 4.51 | 17.5% | 1012 |
| Eric Jokisch (Kiwoom) | $25 | L | SAM | 3.28 | 3.13 | 1.13 | 18.9% | 5.2% | 4.32 | 17.6% | 979 |
| Raul Alcantara (Doosan) | $24 | R | @LOT | 3.94 | 4.01 | 1.25 | 13.8% | 3.7% | 4.01 | 19.8% | 1022 |
| Nick Kingham (SK) | $24 | R | @LG | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | 4.45 | 17.4% | 959 |
| Min-woo Kim (Hanwha) | $23 | R | KIA | 4.75 | 6.75 | 1.62 | 14.6% | 9.5% | 4.20 | 16.7% | 978 |
| Odrisamer Despaigne (KT) | $22 | R | @NC | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | 4.68 | 15.6% | 1012 |
| Won-sam Jang (Lotte) | $22 | L | DOO | 6.09 | 7.98 | 1.57 | 10.3% | 4.4% | 5.11 | 14.1% | 1022 |
| Ben Lively (Samsung) | $22 | R | @KIW | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | 5.42 | 16.7% | 979 |
| Aaron Brooks (Kia) | $21 | R | @HAN | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | 4.22 | 19.9% | 978 |
| Woo-chan Cha (LG) | $20 | L | SK | 4.27 | 4.12 | 1.43 | 17.0% | 8.1% | 4.55 | 17.4% | 959 |
Let's check out which hurlers and stacks stand out on Tuesday's slate
Pitchers
Eric Jokisch (Kiwoom Starting SP; $25) is one of the first hurlers who stands out, boasting the night's best strikeout rate (18.9%) and FIP (3.28) by a decent margin. He's in a plus spot against the Samsung Lions, who were worse than league average in both runs and strikeout rate in 2019, and Jokisch will also benefit from Kiwoom's pitcher-friendly home ballpark. The Heroes are one of the slate's biggest favorites (-184), too, per FanDuel Sportsbook.
We have quite a few foreign pitchers without any 2019 KBO data on this slate, which is a little tricky, but most of them found success in their debuts.
Aaron Brooks (Kia Starting P; $21) stands out in particular, though, due to his matchup against the Hanwha Eagles. The Eagles not only scored the third-fewest runs in 2019, but they led the league in strikeouts. Throw in the second-cheapest pitcher salary and a ballpark that favors pitchers, and we have a lot going for Brooks tonight.
We've seen some former MLB players with pedestrian big league strikeout rates already rack up the Ks so far in the KBO, with even the likes of Dan Straily piling up 11 strikeouts in his last start. Therefore, Brooks' 17.0% MLB strikeout rate from last year should actually translate well overseas. In his KBO debut versus Kiwoom, Brooks posted six punchouts and gave up one earned run over 5.2 innings.
Nick Kingham (SK Starting P; $24) has a more neutral matchup against the LG Twins but is worth a look in the slate's most hitter-suppressing venue. The former top MLB prospect will be one of the most intriguing players to follow in the KBO, and he had a promising enough first start against Hanwha, allowing three earned runs over 7.0 innings with four strikeouts. Prior to signing with the SK Wyverns, Kingham managed a 19.1% strikeout rate across two seasons in the big leagues.
Stacks
The Doosan Bears were one the best offenses of 2019, and their matchup against Won-sam Jang immediately sticks out in the above chart.
Jang only pitched 14.2 innings last season, so normally you might give his horrific numbers a pass -- except it's been quite some time since he had a good KBO campaign. He's recorded an ERA over 5.00 in each of the last five seasons and a WHIP over 1.40 in six straight. It's pretty clear the 36-year-old southpaw passed his prime a long time ago.
Most of the Bears' top hitters bat left-handed, which isn't ideal, but against such a weak pitcher, we probably shouldn't overthink this. Those lefty sticks include the usual suspects of Jose Miguel Fernandez ($16), Jae-Il Oh ($14), and Jae-Hwan Kim ($13). Kim had a down 2019 campaign by his standards, but he's already launched two home runs this year and was an offensive juggernaut from 2016-18.
Righty leadoff man Kun-Woo Park ($13) gets the platoon advantage and posted a .395 wOBA in 2019. Jae-Ho Kim ($8) is another righty stick to consider as a punt, and Kyoung-Min Hur ($8) is a possibility if he moves up the order (he hit second against a lefty last week).
The Kia Tigers also get a plus draw against Min-woo Kim, who checks in with the second-worst FIP and ERA on the board, along with the worst WHIP. At just 24 years old, there's always the possibility for improvement, but since debuting in 2015, he's put up an ugly career 6.85 ERA and 1.73 WHIP. Ouch.
Hyung-Woo Choi ($14) and Preston Tucker ($13) benefit from the platoon advantage, and both players put together solid numbers last season. Choi produced a .409 wOBA and .184 ISO, while Tucker had a .394 wOBA and .168 ISO in his first KBO campaign.
Meanwhile, Chan-Ho Park ($11) is a real speedster (39 stolen bases in 2019), and Ji-Wan Na ($7) is a potential steal at his price. Na was limited to just 153 plate appearances in 2019, but prior to that, he posted three straight years with 25 or more bombs.
Lastly, the Kiwoom Heroes were last year's top offense, so they're always a good bet for a stack. Ben Lively had a mixed KBO debut against the NC Dinos, allowing four earned runs (two home runs) in 6.0 innings with six strikeouts and three walks. It's just one game, and that's hardly a terrible first effort, but he could have his hands full against the Heroes.
Byung-Ho Park ($15) is practically always in play and is joined by Ha Seong-Kim ($14) and Jung-Hoo Lee ($14) as top options. Keon-Chang Seo ($11) should be batting leadoff and brings decent speed to the table (17 stolen bases). Dong-Won Park ($9) has modest double-digit home run power if you need a value play.