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.
Texas Rangers
Bud Norris struggles against lefties. The Rangers have some sweet lefty bats. It's a match made in stacking heaven.
On the season, Norris has a 42.3 percent groundball rate, which is just a bit below average (around 45 percent). However, against lefties, that number falls to 36.8 percent. This should play well for some of the Rangers' best hitters if you're looking for tourney upside.
Considering the dong potential associated with this game, the pricing is pretty gosh darn sweet. The one guy who costs more than $4,200 on DraftKings is Prince Fielder. For $1,200 less, you can snatch Mitch Moreland. Moreland actually has a higher flyball rate against righties and a higher home run to flyball ratio. Pairing him with the other lefty bats in the Rangers order gives you a cheap option that could lead to points aplenty.
Baltimore Orioles
I will be quite sad if the Orioles-Rangers game gets rained out today, as you can see. It's supposed to be 83 with no precipitation in the forecast, so let's ride.
Wandy Rodriguez, to his unending credit, has burned me several times this year. His lack of swinging strikes is starting to catch up to him, though, as he as averaged only 5.97 strikeouts per nine over his past five starts. His groundball rate has also decreased over that time, which is quite enticing with the Orioles coming to the dish.
He may not have the platoon advantage, but Chris Davis is still a fun little play for this one. He has a 43.6 flyball percentage against lefties this year, helping lead to a .300/.342/.543 slash. His hard-hit rate is a bit lower than it is against righties, but it's still juicy at 36.4 percent. He also hit lefties well last year, so this doesn't seem like an issue with small sample size. You might be able to catch people fading him because of his handedness, which would lead to high upside in tourneys.
Los Angeles Dodgers
An offense like the Dodgers' in a park like Chase Field? Whoo, y'all, let them puppies eat.
In his career, Allen Webster has faced 245 left-handed batters. He has walked 33 of them while striking out just 26. That would seem to be a bit troublesome, methinks. This should lead to a high volume of base runners for the team that leads the league in wOBA and walk rate against right-handed pitching.
No matter what lineup the Dodgers roll out, they're going to have enticing options. They have seven batters with a slugging percentage at .450 or higher against righties with five of those at .500 or higher. The pricing at Chase Field does not always reflect the park factor advantage it provides, so stacking a road team there in general is a solid strategy. When that road team is as sick as the Dodgers, you're golden, home slice.
Milwaukee Brewers
I'm fairly hesitant to recommend this stack because of the Brewers' struggles against righties this year, ranking 26th in wOBA. The match-up is one, though, that I found it hard to pass up, especially on a non-full slate.
There are a couple of (interwoven) reasons that Sean O'Sullivan helps reduce these concerns. First, he possesses a 5.34 ERA, a 6.29 FIP and a 5.10 xFIP. That is partially due to his 4.30 strikeouts per nine, which diminishes the negative side effects of the Brewers' 21.4 percent strikeout rate against right-handers.
As a person who has watched him batter my beloved Twins this year, I'm a big believer in Adam Lind's Gucciness. Lind has backed up his always-solid numbers against righties by busting out a .296/.371/.500 slash against them this year. That's coupled with a 37.8 flyball percentage, which is sweet if you're rolling him out in a tourney. I'm still concerned that the ownership on this one may be unjustifiably high, and the pricing isn't ideal, but it's a nice alternative option if you don't want to roll with the other three options.