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. This does not include the Rockies and the Cardinals at Coors Field as all of you know to work hitters at Coors into your lineup. Here are the other teams you should be targeting in daily fantasy baseball today.
Toronto Blue Jays
Spiderman could sense a predator. Little homie in The Sixth Sense could sense dead people. DFS players can sense left-handers facing the Blue Jays.
The Jays entered play yesterday with a .370 wOBA against lefties, which was 33 points higher than the Marlins, who were second. That is quite good. They have six players that have a wOBA at .400 or higher against lefties with a minimum of 25 plate appearances. Edwin Encarnacion is not among those six, which means there are juicy options aplenty in this one.
This will just be Brad Hand's third start since his move to the rotation. In 176 career innings as a starter, he has a 4.40 ERA with opponents hitting .254/.330/.425 off of him. He has also seen his groundball percentage regress a significant amount while in the rotation, which helps give a boost to an already delectable matchup.
Minnesota Twins
The Twins' offense plunged into the pooper over the weekend against Milwaukee, but they're still a pretty solid little squad against left-handed pitching. Enter Jason Vargas and his 4.79 ERA. Hello, slump buster.
Vargas has, admittedly, been on a bit of a roll as of late. He has allowed exactly two earned runs each of his past four outings and never more than eight hits. That came on the heels of back-to-back rough outings in which he allowed nine earned runs over 8.2 innings. Against which team were both of those starts? The Twins, of course.
The good thing about this mini-slump for the Twins' offense is relaxed pricing on DraftKings. Brian Dozier and Torii Hunter are the only hitters that'll cost you more than $4,000. Trevor Plouffe is chilling at $3,700, which is a steal. They also possess plus dance skills, which should most definitely factor into your nightly stacking decisions.
Los Angeles Dodgers
For the most part, Rubby de la Rosa's 5.09 ERA is overinflated. He's racking up a decent number of strikeouts, and he induces ground balls more than the average pitcher. The problem is that, tonight, he faces the best team in the league against right-handed pitching.
The Dodgers are to right-handed pitchers what the Blue Jays are to lefties. Los Angeles has posted a .348 wOBA against righties this year, which is 10 points better than Colorado in second and 19 points better than Toronto in third. Poor Rubby drew the short end of the stick this time through the rotation.
Part of this is because of a crazy home run to fly ball ratio, but left-handers have been lighting de la Rosa up this year. They're slashing .310/.368/.629 with eight jacks in 137 plate appearances. His ground-ball percentage also dips all the way down to 36.6 percent against lefties, meaning the high slugging percentage is potentially sustainable. With both Joc Pederson and Adrian Gonzalez having more than realistic pricing on DraftKings, they are gorgeous high-upside plays for tonight's slate.
Atlanta Braves
I don't know what in the world has gotten into the Atlanta Braves, but it's working. They are up to 12th in the league in wOBA against right-handed pitching despite being essentially counted out of contention before the season started. This success has come with a .301 BABIP, so it even seems sustainable. Tonight, they get Ian Kennedy, whom Lady Luck has bit in the bum this year.
Kennedy has allowed home runs on 25.5 percent of all fly balls this year, even though the league average is around 10.0. That is crazy, crazy high, which accounts for the difference between his FIP (5.85) and his xFIP (3.84). He has created some of his own luck, though, by walking 3.20 batters per nine, so he's not totally off the hook here.
The reason the Braves are a terrible match-up for Kennedy is they never strike out against righties. Their 16.7 percent strikeout rate against right-handed pitching is the second lowest in the league behind the Boston Red Sox, and that's even with pitchers taking their hacks. Kenndy's strength has been his strikeouts at 9.00 per nine innings. If you take that away, brudduh could be in for a long night tonight.