Each day here on numberFire, we'll be providing you with four potential offenses to stack in your daily fantasy lineups. These are the offenses that provide huge run potential on that given day based on matchups and other factors.
After reading through these suggestions, make sure to check out our daily projections. These can either let you know which players to include in each stack, or which guy best complements said stack.
Another great tool is our custom optimal lineups, which are available for premium subscribers. Within the tool, we've added the option to stack teams -- you choose the team you want to stack, show how many players you want to use within the stack, and the tool will create a lineup based on this that you can then customize.
Now, let's get to the stacks. Here are the teams you should be targeting in daily fantasy baseball today.
Toronto Blue Jays
If your John Danks-dar persists longer than four hours, seek medical attention. As you do so, just know that your (potentially quite painful) excitement is fully justified. Not only is this deliciously stackable lefty on the mound, but he's also facing the team that goes all Monstars on lefties. Proof of the existence of a higher being.
As a team, the Jays are hitting .311/.368/.494 off of lefties. Their average hitter against lefties is the equivalent of Freddie Freeman. That slugging percentage is currently higher than Adam Jones' and was higher than that of Giancarlo Stanton until he hit a bomb last night. They good.
Even better about all of this? Some of their best lefty-crushing bats are hella cheap on DraftKings. Danny Valencia, who costs $3,100, is slashing .455/.455/.545 off of lefties. Chris Colabello ($3,400) is at .421/.476/.789, though it's just through 21 plate appearances. When you add in the juiciness of Josh Donaldson and Russell Martin, it cancels out any sweetness you lose out on if Jose Bautista is out again.
Houston Astros
The warmest weather game of the night involves two teams that hit lots of dongs and are facing bad pitchers? Y'all could set the over/under at fiddy and I'd at least be tempted.
I'm not generally big into the Astros outside of tourneys. I would consider reversing that tonight against Chris Tillman. Their biggest weakness is their crazy strikeout rate, but Tillman only records 6.31 punchouts per nine. The Astros rank 12th in wOBA against right-handers, but I'd imagine that would be higher against righties that are low in strikeout volume.
Ever since his call-up, Preston Tucker has unleashed the silliness against right-handed pitchers. Entering play yesterday, he was slashing .296/.387/.630 with a pair of bombs and three doubles in 31 plate appearances. This is a super small sample size, but he was also clubbing them at a .298/.362/.660 clip at Triple-A. For $3,700 on DraftKings gimme somma dat tastiness.
Baltimore Orioles
If given the choice between having the aforementioned Tillman and Scott Feldman on my team, give me Feldman. He walks fewer people and induces ground balls at a much higher rate. He just doesn't have a great match-up today against the Orioles.
Feldman has a bunch of things going for him, and his 5.17 ERA is in no way indicative of how he has pitched. That said, right-handed batters have been absolutely railing him the past two years, and the Orioles have some luscious right-handed bats. These fellas have slashed .321/.351/.532 off of Feldman this year through 114 batters. His ground-ball percentage also decreases nearly 10 percentage points against righties vis a vis lefties. Not a great formula for facing the O's.
Coincidentally, one of Baltimore's best batters against right-handed pitching also happens to be right handed. Manny Machado is just chilling at a .290/.357/.508 slash off of righties, which is superior in each category to his numbers off of lefties. He's no Jimmy Paredes, but he could still be a good play tonight.
New York Yankees
So, yesterday was fun. A Yankees stack would have netted you roughly all of the points, give or take none. The matchup isn't as sweet today with a left-hander on the bump, but there's still plenty to be excited about here.
Even though they're chock full of lefty bats, the Yankees still rank 13th in the league in wOBA against lefties. Normally, that's on the fringe of the stack zone. But because they are facing Jason Vargas, I can see this being a profitable endeavor tonight.
The Yankees are similar to the Blue Jays in that they have some low-priced bats that absolutely murk when they have the platoon advantage. Chris Young, Stephen Drew and Alex Rodriguez all entered yesterday with slugging percentages of .470 or higher against lefties. Of those three, A-Rod is the only one that costs more than $3,500 on DraftKings. If you're looking to pay up for pitching, a little combo stack between the Yankees' and Jays' right-handed bats might end up as a dandy little option to pursue.