As the calendar turns over to August, a lot of sports fans may shift their attention to the NFL, but we are right in the bowels of the baseball season with playoff races heating up and newly acquired players from the trade deadline making their debuts with their new teams. I’m pumped up for this solid 11-game main slate on both FanDuel and DraftKings tonight.
RotoBaller has all your fantasy baseball and DFS needs! Check our probable pitchers page to see all of today’s starters, and be sure to utilize our MLB DFS Optimizer to create unique lineups for tonight’s slate!
When we're looking for pitchers, we want to target guys who can limit runs and pitch deep enough into games to pick up wins. That said, we don’t always need to target pitchers on heavily favored teams. In fact, we want strikeouts more than anything whenever possible, as the scoring system on both FanDuel and DraftKings really rewards pitchers who rack up Ks.
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Best starting pitchers, sleeper SPs for Friday's MLB DFS contests
By Dan Palyo
Luis Castillo, Mariners @ Angels ($10,200 DK, $10,700 FD)
There is some clear separation between Castillo and the rest of the pack today in my opinion. He comes into tonight’s matchup with the Angels in spectacular form, having struck out 27 batters over his past three starts spanning 21 innings. His most recent start was arguably the most impressive, as he blanked the Diamondbacks over seven innings and allowed just two hits and one walk while striking out seven.
He leads the slate tonight with a strikeout projection approaching nine, as the Angels are now whiffing the second most of any team against RHPs over the past month. This is a very strikeout-prone lineup, and Castillo has been very consistent all season at striking out righties and lefties both (27-28 percent of the time).
Aaron Nola may end up being a chalky pick as he faces the Royals, but I trust him less after seeing the Pirates get to him last week and watching the Royals offense pick up over the past seven days, too. I’d rather prioritize Castillo in cash games as my SP1.
Merrill Kelly, Diamondbacks @ Twins ($8,800 DK, $10,200 FD)
A couple of good pitchers I am skipping over include Jesus Luzardo and James Paxton. Both of those lefties have tough matchups and are guys that I am going to fade today (though Paxton could be in play for larger-field GPPs as he pitched well against Toronto already once this season).
I am a fan of Kelly’s and I like his $8,800 price point on DraftKings quite a bit. Kelly has made two starts since returning from the IL and while he didn’t secure the win in either game, he did pitch relatively well and showed that he can keep striking out hitters at the pace that he was before the injury.
Minnesota is the leader in strikeout rate against RHPs, and they have been now for a few months. They also rank top five in team wOBA, ISO, and wRC+ against righties, too, so this is a spot that comes with some risk, too. If we are chasing strikeouts, Kelly has the ability to pile some up tonight, and I have him projected for around seven. It’s a boom-or-bust spot, but Kelly brings major upside and is a good fit for tournament lineups.
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Hunter Brown, Astros @ Yankees ($8,400 DK, $9,200 FD)
Brown is going to be in contention for my SP2 slot on DraftKings and offers $1,400 of salary cap relief compared to Castillo on FanDuel. His rookie season has been largely impressive even if there have been some ups and downs.
Brown brings a solid strikeout rate of 26.7 percent and an excellent ground-ball percentage of 53.4 to the table, and I can’t help but want to pick on these Yankees, as they have put up middling offensive numbers while striking out quite a bit.
Gleyber Torres and Harrison Bader are the only Yankees in the lineup with strikeout rates lower than 23 percent (the league average is around 22), so Brown should have plenty of chances to rack up Ks today.
Reid Detmers, Angels vs. Mariners ($8,200 DK, $9,000 FD)
Detmers is a tough nut to crack. At one point this season, he reeled off five straight 20-point outings on DK, and it looked like he had arrived as a top-end starting pitcher. He’s come back to Earth a bit since then, but he has still shown some nice strikeout upside in the right spots.
This is one of those spots where we have to consider him, especially since DraftKings priced him back down quite a bit to just $8.2K. Seattle is striking out the fourth-most of any team against LHPs over the last month. Other than Teoscar Hernandez and Tom Murphy, the rest of this lineup has failed to do much against lefties this season.
Detmers is always a risky play because he can be his own worst enemy with walks that lead to big innings and run his pitch count up quickly. He’s well worth some exposure in tournaments tonight, as he could easily put up a big number against this Seattle squad, too.
Logan Allen, Guardians vs. White Sox ($7,900 DK, $8,800 FD)
Last but not least we have Allen. He just saw this Chicago team in his last start and pitched pretty well through four innings before giving up four runs in the fifth and sixth innings.
Since that game, the White Sox have traded away Jake Burger, Lance Lynn, Lucas Giolito, and Joe Kelly. Chicago will still have most of their lineup intact for this one, but this team feels dejected and is coming off a series sweep in Texas where it was outscored 19-4.
In that series, lefty Andrew Heaney piled up 11 strikeouts, Dane Dunning added 11 more (and Dunning is not a strikeout pitcher), and Max Scherzer finished with nine Ks yesterday. The White Sox are whiffing like crazy, and it’s possible the rookie Allen learned a thing or two about how to approach them this time around.
Allen is a talented young pitcher and he’s the only guy under $8k on DraftKings that I really want to use, though there are a few others that are close (see honorable mention below).
Honorable Mentions: Aaron Nola vs. KC, James Paxton vs. TOR, Dean Kremer vs. NYM, Colin Rea vs. PIT
