FanDuel Daily Fantasy Baseball Helper: Tuesday 5/2/23
We have a compelling list of pitchers are every salary tier tonight, and on top of that, it's a Coors Field slate! In all, we get 12 games to sift through on Tuesday's main offering.
Our daily helper is available every day to analyze FanDuel's main slate and help give you a starting point when you're building lineups. Be sure to also incorporate our great tools into your research process. Whether you're looking for daily projections, the latest starting lineups and weather, or batting and pitching heat maps to find the best matchups -- we've got you covered!
Let's check out the top options on today's main slate.
Pitching Breakdown
Zac Gallen ($11,800) has been an excellent pitcher over his career, but this could be the makings of his best campaign yet. Through six starts, he's posted a 2.48 SIERA, 36.2% strikeout rate, and 3.5% walk rate, and while we should probably expect those punchouts to come back down to earth a bit, his 33.0% called-plus-swinging-strike rate ranks fifth among qualified starters.
As his slate-high salary would suggest, Gallen's impressive numbers have led to boatloads of fantasy points. After a pair of forgettable starts to begin the year, he's since gone four straight starts without allowing an earned run, scoring 64, 51, 64, and 65 FanDuel points.
He's facing the Rangers, and while many of Texas' bats are coming off a strong April, this active roster has modest numbers versus right-handers going back to last season, owning a 96 wRC+ and 24.1% strikeout rate.
Put it all together, and there's an excellent case for making Gallen your top pitcher tonight despite the sky-high salary.
Gerrit Cole ($11,500) and Joe Ryan ($11,000) are the other two players at $11,000 or higher.
Cole is up against a Guardians team with a slate-low 3.16 implied team total, and although his peripheral numbers are a smidge down from what we're used to, it's difficult to complain about a 3.54 SIERA, 29.3% strikeout rate, and 7.3% walk rate. What's more concerning is his upside against an opponent that rarely strikes out, as Cleveland's active roster has the second-lowest strikeout rate versus righties this year (19.2%), and that mark plummets even further if we include 2022 (15.7%).
This is Cole's second time facing the Guardians in 2023, and sure enough, he logged a season-low three punchouts against them. There's no doubt that he could still do well tonight, but given the high salary cap hit and viable alternatives, he could be more of a secondary choice in tournaments.
Ryan also finds himself in a somewhat tricky situation, but in his case, it's because we could see 12 mph winds and above blowing out in Chicago against the White Sox. While temperatures in the low 50s should counter the effects of the wind, Ryan doesn't tend to induce grounders (35.0%), making him more vulnerable to these conditions, which could be why the White Sox have a higher implied team total than we might expect (4.01).
But I otherwise like Ryan's matchup against a Chicago team with a mere 88 wRC+ versus righties this season, and they're just average in the split if we expand out to last season. Ryan has been crushing it this year with a 3.20 SIERA, 29.3% strikeout rate, and 3.3% walk rate. Chicago is more of a neutral matchup for strikeouts at best, but that's still a significant step up compared to Cole's matchup with Cleveland.
Hunter Brown ($10,200) and Julio Urias ($9,400) have fairly high salaries, but they come at significant discounts compared to those first three.
Brown's enjoyed excellent results this season, and he's put up a promising 26.7% strikeout rate and 53.3% ground-ball rate through five starts. While his 8.3% walk rate could be better, the punchouts and grounders have helped him remain efficient, as he's gone seven innings three times.
The Giants are a difficult matchup for righties, but they have the second-highest strikeout rate in the split (24.4%) from 2022-23, and they also have a low implied team total (3.48). Brown's cap hit is $1,600 below Gallen's, making him an excellent way to spend up at pitcher without completely breaking the bank.
Urias has gone through a recent rough patch and tends to be better in real life compared to DFS, but he's still put up a cool 3.72 SIERA, 25.7% strikeout rate, and 5.1% walk rate over six starts. Similar to Brown's matchup, the Phillies are dangerous but have a middling implied team total (3.62) and come in with the third-highest strikeout rate versus southpaws (24.8%) going back to the start of 2022.
This might not be a bad time to buy in on Urias if you're looking to save salary, but in terms of upside, he tends to get capped at six innings, and he lacks that elite punchout rate. Add in the shaky recent form, and it might be worth finding that extra bit of cap space to get up to Brown.
In the value range, Tanner Bibee ($8,400) and Mason Miller ($7,500) are potential targets.
Bibee came in with promising minor league numbers and shined in last week's MLB debut (44 FanDuel points), mowing down 8 batters in 5 2/3 innings for a massive 34.8% strikeout rate while allowing just 1 earned run. That start may have come against a poor Rockies offense away from Coors, but he now gets a watered-down Yankees lineup that isn't nearly as scary without Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton. The rookie also logged 91 pitches in his start, so even his workload should be in a good place tonight.
Miller, another flashy rookie, has an even lower salary if you want to go all-in on your bats. While it hasn't quite come together for him in his two big league starts, the right-hander has produced a 3.35 SIERA, 30.6% strikeout rate, and 5.6% walk rate, and he had an absurd strikeout rate above 60% in two minor league starts before his call-up.
The 24-year-old topped out at 86 pitches his last time out and hasn't reached five innings in either outing, so there's definitely some risk that he falls short of a quality start even if he's dealing. But the potential is undeniable, and his salary could be a gift tonight.
Hitting Breakdown
Part of the reason you may be inclined to spend less at pitcher is because the Milwaukee Brewers have an eye-popping 6.02 implied team total at Coors, and their salaries, while not completely inflated, are a tad higher than we've seen on a lot of Coors slates this year.
Right-hander Ryan Feltner has a respectable 24.5% strikeout rate, but that's about where the good news ends, as he also comes in with a 4.74 SIERA and 12.7% walk rate. Just one of his five starts have come at Coors Field this year, so his 4.68 ERA and 1.48 WHIP figure to only get worse from here.
On paper, Willy Adames ($3,700), Rowdy Tellez ($3,800), and William Contreras ($3,500) are the top Milwaukee power hitters, though Contreras has been slow to get going in that department this year and hits far too many ground balls (54.8%). It's actually Brian Anderson ($3,800) who leads the team in barrels per plate appearance, and Michael Brosseau ($2,900) is showing some nice pop over a small sample.
The Colorado Rockies are naturally in play on the other side, though their matchup versus Freddy Peralta is less appealing. Peralta has put together a rock-solid 4.02 SIERA, 25.6% strikeout rate, and 7.4% walk rate, and despite being a fly-ball pitcher, he's consistently limited home runs throughout his career (0.95 per 9 innings), so it has to be considered a skill at this point. The matchup could lower the Rockies' roster percentages, but they aren't necessarily a must on Tuesday, either.
The Minnesota Twins (4.99 implied team total) are one such possibility against Michael Kopech.
Kopech may have gotten positive overall results in 2022, but his underlying numbers suggested it was all smoke and mirrors, and poor early returns in 2023 back that notion. Over his five starts, the right-hander has been lit up for a 7.01 ERA, and underneath that lies a 5.12 SIERA, 22.7% strikeout rate, and 13.4% walk rate. Kopech is also getting absolutely throttled by hard contact and has struggled to keep the ball in the park.
The former top prospect has demonstrated reverse splits over his career, and that's been the case in 2023, generating a 14.3% strikeout against right-handed batters. That makes rostering Byron Buxton ($3,500) all the more enticing, and Carlos Correa ($3,000) is a great value at his salary. Kopech gets more whiffs versus lefties, but he's still getting pummeled with hard-hit balls, too, so all of Joey Gallo ($3,400), Jorge Polanco ($3,300), Trevor Larnach ($3,000), and Max Kepler ($2,700) are fun additions to stacks.
The Toronto Blue Jays have the third-highest implied team total (4.97). Right-hander Tanner Houck induces a 52.6% ground-ball rate, but he has an otherwise unremarkable 21.6% strikeout rate and 9.0% walk rate. You'll have to go with a value play at pitcher if you want to roster Matt Chapman ($4,200), Vladimir Guerrero Jr. ($4,200), and/or Bo Bichette ($4,000), but we can still buy low on George Springer ($3,100) if he's back in the lineup, and the same can be said for lefties Daulton Varsho ($2,800) and Brandon Belt ($2,600).
The St. Louis Cardinals and Baltimore Orioles are two other teams that stand out. Left-hander Patrick Sandoval has skated by but owns a meh 17.7% strikeout rate and 10.6% walk rate this season, and the Cardinals can attack him with nearly an entire lineup of righty sticks. Baltimore gets Ryan Yarbrough, who inexplicably has a 9.3% strikeout rate across 17 innings.
