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.
New York Yankees
Okay, listen, y'all: I will never stack or not stack a team simply because of their price. I think that can lead to a lot of bad decisions that you may end up regretting. However, I just want to note that the pricing on the Yankees is bananas tonight. It's certainly a hindrance, but here's why I still like this puppy for tonight.
Matt Harrison took a big step forward in his last start out by holding the Rockies down (at Coors, no less) to no runs on seven hits over six innings. However, that Rockies' team, despite playing half its games in baseball's playpen of delight, ranks 26th in wOBA against left-handed pitchers. The Yankees are fifth on that list. That's danger, captain.
Thankfully, in the jacking up of prices, Chris Young slipped through the wickets. He's only $3,200 on DraftKings, even though he sports a .374/.430/.692 slash and a 33.3 percent hard-hit rate against lefties this year. That can help give you the flexibility to roster Alex Rodriguez or Mark Teixeira, both of whom have provided extra-base upside against lefties this year.
Texas Rangers
Stop me if this sounds familiar. Player returning from an injury. Not a lot of strikeouts, but a lot of walks. He's facing a team that has had success against his handedness this year. No, this is not a repeat of Harrison versus the Yankees (which sounds like a Supreme Court case), but it is the same game. The Rangers could have some fun against Ivan Nova tonight.
Nova, even in this period of ineffectiveness, has still done a nice job of inducing ground balls with his 50.0 percent ground-ball rate this season. However, in his five starts, he has racked up more than three strikeouts just one time while walking multiple batters four times. His SIERA sits at 4.84. No bueno for him.
His struggles have been especially defined against left-handed batters. That ought to be fun against a team with guys as Gucci as Mitch Moreland, Shin-Soo Choo and Rougned Odor. Prior to yesterday's game, Odor had a .365/.406/.661 slash since his recall. That on-base percentage went down because he only went 2-5 with a home run. He's slipping. Fade immediately, and don't take advantage of his $3,800 salary on DraftKings tonight.
Chicago Cubs
Jorge de la Rosa gets a bad rap because of Coors Field. His 3.81 xFIP shows that he's really not as horrendous as that 4.62 ERA would indicate. One thing he does do, however, is give up a crazy number of walks. The Cubs have the highest walk rate in the league against left-handed batters. The batters will rain upon the basepaths in this one, leading to potentially high run and RBI totals.
There is a downside to this, however. The reason de la Rosa is effective is that he does get strikeouts with those walks in addition to his high ground-ball rate. The Cubs also rank sixth in the league in strikeout rate against lefties (hello to you, Cole Hamels). That does make this thing risky, but not necessarily enough to diminish the upside.
Kris Bryant is young, but it's possible we've already forgotten how good he is. Maybe that's how the hype train works. But, either way, he's got himself a sporty little .262 isolated power against left-handed pitchers. Additionally, Dexter Fowler will be leading this on-base barrage, and he has had a walk rate of 11.4 percent or higher against lefties each of the past six years. He's had a tough year, but he's heating up, and he should be a part of your squad if you stack the Cubs tonight.
Kansas City Royals
I generally don't like stacking the Royals because of their apparent distaste for extra-base hits. Tonight, though, they present an ideal cash-game situation against the low-strikeout stuff of Cody Anderson.
Although Anderson has walked only three batters in his first 33.0 Major League innings, he has also only picked up 12 strikeouts, equivalent to 3.27 strikeouts per nine innings. He's about average as far as ground-ball rate goes, but he allows line drives on 23.9 percent of batted balls. That has jacked his SIERA way up to 4.53, which is most certainly stack material.
As much as I loathe the Royals' lack of power, they do have some batters that don't conform to that notion. Kendrys Morales couples his 37.6 percent hard-hit rate against righties with a .229 isolated power, and he's only $3,800 on DraftKings. And then there's Mike Moustakas, who is clubbing at a 34.8 percent hard-hit rate. They are cheaper options you can piece around Lorenzo Cain and his speed for a stack that presents a respectable floor.