4 Daily Fantasy Baseball Stacks for 8/21/20

In the world of daily baseball, stacks are often the backbone of the most successful -- and profitable -- lineups. Correlation is the key.

When an offense hangs runs in bunches, it means hitters are scoring runs and teammates hitting behind them are driving them in. By rostering stacks, you’re maximizing the fantasy scoring by essentially double-dipping on a run-scoring event.

This is your daily home for the top stacks on the daily fantasy baseball slate. Whether you’re looking to identify the projected highest-scoring stacks or contrarian stacks that can help you separate from the pack in GPPs when they explode, they’ll be thrown under the spotlight here.

Gamers who are numberFire premium members can throw these highlighted stacks into an optimized lineup using our DFS Sharpstack tool. The tool allows you to select the team and number of players from that team you’d like to include in your lineup. If you’re looking to identify other potentially high-scoring stacks beyond those featured in this space, check out our hitting heat map, a tool that provides valuable info such as implied total, park factor, and stats to identify the quality of the opposing pitcher.

Without further ado, let’s dive into today’s main slate’s featured stacks.

Cleveland Indians

The Cleveland Indians are my second-favorite stack tonight. They'll look to tee off on Michael Fulmer. Fulmer's building his workload in his return from Tommy John surgery. He's totaled only 8 and 1/3 innings in three starts this year, but he's been crushed in that small sample of work.

Fulmer's tallied a 7.56 ERA and a 5.72 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA), per FanGraphs. Hitters have torched him for a .482 weight on-base average (wOBA) and a nearly identical .478 expected wOBA (xwOBA), per Baseball Savant. The league average for wOBA this year is .313 and xwOBA is .333, and Fulmer's bloated xwOBA is the seventh-highest out of 422 pitchers who have a minimum of 25 plate appearances against them.

As for which Indians make for the best stack, turn to the second through fifth hitters. Jose Ramirez ($4,000) is the first explosive option in the lineup batting second, and, since 2017, he has team-highs in OBP, isolated power (ISO), and weighted runs created plus (wRC+) with a .373 OBP, .271 ISO and 138 wRC+ against righties. Stud shortstop Francisco Lindor ($3,500) hits third and packs a serious punch against righties with a .244 ISO against them since 2017.

Carlos Santana ($3,300) and Franmil Reyes ($3,100) round out my favorite stacking options from the cleanup spot and fifth spot in the order. Santana is a more well-rounded offensive contributor while Reyes is a boom-or-bust option with only a .300 OBP but tasty .249 ISO against righties since reaching the Majors in 2018. Reyes' pop also checks out in the Statcast data with him ranking tied for 27th out of 267 hitters in barrels per plate appearance and tied for 11th in fly-ball and line-drive exit velocity at a scintillating 97.8 miles per hour, according to Baseball Savant.

Chicago White Sox

Once again, I'm going to suggest stacking against Jon Lester. This time, I'm suggesting doing so with the Chicago White Sox. The veteran southpaw has avoided getting shelled with a 2.74 ERA, but he's taking an extreme pitch-to-contact approach this year with only a 15.2 percent strikeout percentage and 4.6 percent swinging-strike percentage that both fall well short of the league averages of 23.4 percent and 11.2 percent. Lester's 5.00 SIERA is indicative of a pitcher who's gotten lucky and one who's great to stack against.

The Pale Hose offers more stacking depth than any of the other teams in this piece. They can basically be stacked from top to bottom with Nomar Mazara ($2,300) representing the only hitter I have truly zero interest in using. Of course, while they can be stacked throughout the entirety of the lineup, a few players stand out as my favorites.

The first is leadoff hitter Tim Anderson ($3,700). The toolsy shortstop broke out last year but has kicked things up to a whole new level this year with a .414 OBP, 379 ISO, 217 wRC+, 6 homers, and 3 stolen bases. Sophomore outfielder Eloy Jimenez ($3,200) has ripped seven homers this year and totaled a .226 ISO against lefties in his young big-league career and is another of my favorite stacking options from the White Sox.

Salary and catcher/first base alternatives considered, though, Jose Abreu ($3,100) is probably my favorite -- or at least co-favorite with Anderson -- option from the Pale Hose. Since 2017, he has a .395 OBP, .251 ISO, and 162 wRC+ against lefties. He's also in good form this year with five homers, a .330 OBP, .217 ISO, and 130 wRC+.

Los Angeles Angels

Perhaps I'm burying the lede by waiting until the third team to include my favorite stack, the Los Angeles Angels. Having said that, it's really a three-man stack of studs from the Angels that has my heart a flutter. David Fletcher ($3,000) and Tommy La Stella ($2,700) warrant honorable mention honors as usable in a full four-man stack, but it's the Mike Trout ($4,500), Anthony Rendon ($3,900) and Shohei Ohtani ($3,000) show for this stack.

The cases for using Trout and Rendon basically write themselves, but -- right down to his salary relative to the other two -- Ohtani doesn't seem to get his full due for his hitting ability. Ohtani actually matches Rendon in wRC+ (148) against righties since coming stateside in 2018 and bests the third baseman's .244 ISO with a gaudy .286 ISO. His numbers thus far this year leave something to be desired, but his Statcast data remains strong and should result in improved results sooner rather than later.

All three of these studs and the rest of the Angels hitters should be licking their chops at the prospect of squaring off with Mike Fiers. Through five starts spanning 25 and 2/3 innings, Fiers has been creamed for a 5.96 ERA and nearly identical 5.95 SIERA. Further, out of 59 pitchers with 100 plate appearances against them, Fiers' .381 xwOBA is the fifth-highest mark.

San Francisco Giants

With Fiers' horrific rank in xwOBA fresh in mind, the San Francisco Giants draw one of the four pitchers with a higher xwOBA allowed in the form of Robbie Ray and his .391 xwOBA that's the third-highest mark among pitchers who have at least 100 plate appearances against them this year. Ray's been a roaring tire fire with an 8.59 ERA, 6.04 SIERA, 18.5 percent walk percentage and 2.86 homers per nine innings allowed this year, and the Giants will be looking to toss more tires on that fire as opposed to putting it out.

Ray's massive struggles really make the entire lineup stackable, but special attention should be given to Austin Slater ($2,800), Mike Yastrzemski ($3,600), and Wilmer Flores ($2,500). Slater's tearing the cover off of the ball this year, ascended to the top of the order and adds speed to the equation as well with five stolen bases thus far this year. Yastrzemski continues to prove quite the savvy acquisition and is unfazed in same-handed matchups against lefties with a .389 OBP, .301 ISO, and 164 wRC+ in 126 plate appearances against southpaws. Flores is a punt option at the keystone position with a rock-solid .209 ISO against lefties since 2017.

Joshua Shepardson is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Joshua Shepardson also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username bchad50. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.