FanDuel Pitching Primer: 4/2/21
In daily fantasy baseball, success starts with nailing the starting pitcher spot in your lineup.
When compared to hitters, pitching performance tends to be much more predictable and stable throughout the course of the season. You know what you're getting from a top-level ace when you roster him: probably a dominant effort with only one or two implosions per season. In contrast, even the game's best hitters have days at the plate when they go 0-for-4.
As a result, lineup construction should begin with the starting pitcher. Which pitchers should you consider on today's main slate?
High-Salaried Option
Blake Snell, San Diego Padres
at Arizona Diamondbacks
FanDuel Salary: $9,500
Making his first turn for the San Diego Padres, Blake Snell will look to have a better debut outing than fellow teammate Yu Darvish had yesterday.
The positive sign for Snell is that Darvish whiffed six Arizona Diamondbacks batters, and as a team, Arizona struck out 12 times yesterday. That should bode well for Snell, who struck out 63 batters over 50 innings pitched in 2020. Snell has produced a swinging-strike rate of at least 15.0% in three straight seasons.
The Diamondbacks piled up seven runs yesterday, but this is an offense that posted only a .306 wOBA and .150 isolated power (ISO) a season ago. FanGraphs' WAR projections have Arizona with the 10th-fewest offensive WAR for the rest of the season. Arizona's 3.43 implied total is the slate's lowest.
Roster Snell with supreme confidence today.
Mid-Salaried Play
Pablo Lopez, Miami Marlins
vs. Tampa Bay Rays
FanDuel Salary: $7,800
On Opening Day, the Miami Marlins and Tampa Bay Rays locked in a 1-0 pitching duel. Pablo Lopez will look to build on what Sandy Alcantara did. In a game that featured a combined 21 strikeouts yesterday, Alcantara was absolutely brilliant, allowing only two hits across six scoreless innings.
After pitching to a 5.09 ERA in 2019, Lopez was really good in 2020, finishing with a 3.98 SIERA, 24.6% strikeout rate and 12.1% swinging-strike rate. All of those clips were career-best marks. The Rays were saucy at the dish against righties last year, slamming their way to a .182 ISO, but they also held a 26.9% strikeout rate in the split.
MLB odds thinks tonight will be another low-scoring contest between these two squads, listing the total at 7.5 runs -- with the under at -122, compared to +100 on the over. Tampa's 3.77 implied total is a number we can attack.
Low-Salaried Play
Cristian Javier, Houston Astros
at Oakland Athletics
FanDuel Salary: $7,000
The banged-up Houston Astros' rotation will certainly need some help from starters like Cristian Javier. Zack Greinke gave a great blueprint last night on how to shut down the Oakland Athletics.
Javier was brilliant a season ago over 54 1/3 innings pitched. The righty logged a strikeout per inning (25.2% rate) to go with a sparkling 3.48 ERA. The A's mustered only six hits and a single run last night in a park that ranks as one of the most pitcher-friendly
There is some risk here. Javier ramped up to only 54 pitches in his last outing, so a win and quality start could be tough to come by. But on a fairly meh pitching slate, Javier is worth a look.
Matt Kupferle is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Matt Kupferle also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username MKupferle. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in his articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.
