FanDuel Daily Fantasy Baseball Helper: Tuesday 6/8/21

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.

If you need help getting started on that trek, here are some of the top options on the board today. We'll be focusing exclusively on the main slate.

Pitching Breakdown

As you'd expect on a 15-game slate, we have a lot of good pitching options. You can make a case for several guys at various salary ranges, so there are a plethora of routes we can take. It's a really fun slate.

Shane Bieber ($11,500 on FanDuel) and Tyler Glasnow ($11,000) are in their own tier in my eyes, and with this being such a massive slate, there are enough value bats out there that it won't be too hard to find the salary for either stud hurler.

Bieber is at the St. Louis Cardinals while Glasnow will be hosting the Washington Nationals, so the matchups are pretty neutral. Bieber and Glasnow both have the strikeout juice we crave, and of the two, I prefer Bieber. In 79 frames this season, Bieber owns a 35.6% strikeout rate, 17.2% swinging-strike rate, and 2.95 SIERA. Dude is a monster. He's got more games with 60-plus FanDuel points (three) than he does outings with fewer than 40 FanDuel points (two). Despite his salary and some enticing pitching plays in the mid-range, Bieber will be a priority for me.

After those two, Pablo Lopez ($9,600), Chris Bassitt ($9,700) and Walker Buehler ($10,800) are plenty viable. Each of them have similar numbers, and I rank them in the order they're listed.

Lopez's combination of stellar matchup and salary discount off Bieber and Glasnow is easy to love. He has a mouth-watering draw at home versus a Colorado Rockies offense that has the lowest road wOBA (.252) along with the fourth-highest strikeout rate (27.0%) in the split. The Rox have the slate's lowest implied total (3.03). Lopez's numbers (3.73 SIERA and 25.0% strikeout rate) are more or less in line with Bassitt's and Buehler's, but neither of them off the salary savings and the elite matchup.

Buehler has a dreamy matchup against the Pittsburgh Pirates and has been really good this season (3.53 SIERA). But with a strikeout rate of 25.7%, the Los Angeles Dodgers' righty doesn't have the upside of Glasnow or Bieber, and he doesn't give you a significant salary discount off them. I'll mostly stay away from Buehler, although I can see the appeal for tourneys if you think he slips through the cracks.

Bassitt has very similar numbers to Lopez and Buehler, carrying a 3.50 SIERA and 26.5% strikeout rate, but he does come at a meaningful salary discount off the slate's big two. He is up against an Arizona Diamondbacks offense that ranks right around the league average in wOBA (.305) and strikeout rate (24.1%). Prior to an 18.0-point dud last time out, Bassitt had put up back-to-back games of 64.0 and 51.1 FanDuel points.

Our algorithm is pretty into Sonny Gray ($8,000), and it makes sense. He's at home against a Milwaukee Brewers offense that boasts the fourth-highest strikeout rate (26.6%) and sixth-worst wOBA (.295). Gray has pitched to a 3.64 SIERA and 29.4% strikeout rate -- numbers that catch your eye at this salary. The big issue with Gray is that he's not getting deep into games, completing six innings only three times in eight starts. We need a ceiling if we're passing on all of the aforementioned arms, and I'm not sure Gray's upside is high enough unless he's more efficient than he has been for most of 2021.

Stacks to Target

Houston Astros

It's the Houston Astros against a lefty. You all know what to do.

Houston -- owners of a slate-best 5.19 implied total -- is at Fenway versus Martin Perez. While Perez has been solid this season (4.27 SIERA), this Astros offense has the third-best wOBA (.343) and second-best wRC+ (125) versus southpaws. In their last series, Houston saw Steven Matz and Hyun-jin Ryu -- two lefties who are better than Perez -- and touched them up for a combined 10 earned runs in 10 innings.

Outside of Jose Altuve ($4,100), no one on the Astros is more than $3,400. Altuve plus Carlos Correa ($3,400), Alex Bregman ($3,100) and Yuli Gurriel ($3,100) is a four-man stack of righties that doesn't break the bank and has massive upside. After posting a .383 wOBA in May, Altuve has a .411 wOBA so far in June. Bregman holds a .353 wOBA overall, including a .400 wOBA with the platoon advantage. He'll likely be one of the slate's chalk bats.

The lefty-lefty matchup doesn't rule out Yordan Alvarez ($3,200) or Kyle Tucker ($3,200). In 232 career plate appearances against a lefty, Alvarez has mashed to the tune of a .397 wOBA and 41.9% hard-hit rate. Tucker has a .312 wOBA and 39.8% hard-hit rate in the split in his career.

One word of warning -- make sure to check the weather before locking in Houston. This game looks like a potential trouble spot.

New York Mets

The New York Mets aren't a good offense (23rd in wOBA), but with a 4.65 implied total for their date with Bruce Zimmermann, they're one of my favorite stacks on this slate. Zimmermann, a lefty, has pitched to a 20.1% strikeout rate and 4.37 SIERA across 49 innings this season. Righties have a .371 wOBA, 38.6% hard-hit rate, and 39.7% fly-ball rate against him, so that's where we should focus.

The Mets have just one bat -- Pete Alonso ($3,500) -- listed at more than $2,900, so they're a superb fit alongside Bieber or Glasnow. They also get a nice park boost at Camden Yards.

With a career .348 wOBA and 39.9% hard-hit rate with the platoon advantage, Alonso is worth a long look if you have the coin.

Francisco Lindor ($2,900) has underwhelmed in his first season in Queens, but he's too good for this to last much longer. Plus, there are some positives in Lindor's profile. His 10.4% walk rate is a career-best mark, and his .242 BABIP is well off his .295 career average. With a .417 wOBA in June, Lindor may be taking off, so his salary probably won't be under $3,000 much longer.

James McCann ($2,700) will likely hit cleanup, and he's got a .394 wOBA against lefties this year. The only bummer is that using both him and Alonso means one has to occupy your utility slot. That's not a huge deal; it just makes it a little harder to find puzzle pieces from another stack that fit alongside the Mets.

Kevin Pillar ($2,100) is one of my favorite plays on the slate, particularly if he's hitting fifth as he has been. If he's healthy enough to play, Jonathan Villar ($2,800) will have the platoon advantage and is eligible at three positions.

Oakland Athletics

The Oakland Athletics have been handed just a 4.64 implied total. I'm hoping it stays that low because it could keep the masses off of them in a stellar home matchup against Jon Duplantier.

Duplantier has a 4.96 SIERA for his career, and with a 5.19 SIERA and 18.2% strikeout rate so far in 8 2/3 frames this year, he's a guy we want to attack. He's also showing reverse splits in his brief career, with righties tagging him for a .382 wOBA with a measly 15.5% strikeout rate, compared to a .334 wOBA and 25.5% strikeout rate for left-handed hitters.

Righty Mark Canha ($3,700) is a top option, while Matt Olson ($3,900) and Jed Lowrie ($3,100) are firmly in play, as well, despite hitting from the left side. Olson is carrying a .393 wOBA against righties. Lowrie's expected wOBA of .356 looks a lot better than his actual wOBA of .315, and Canha has generated a .375 wOBA from atop the order.

Mitch Moreland ($2,600) gives you some pop at a low salary, and Seth Brown ($2,400) has been wildly better at home (.378 wOBA) than on the road (.226).