Take a look at our Daily Fantasy Sports Lineup Tips for Major League Baseball on Tuesday July 3, 2018:
Pitchers:
Jack Flaherty has shown plenty of upside in his somewhat brief stint in the major leagues. This slate is pretty dry and I don’t mind Flaherty in a big ballpark against a team the will K. The Diamondbacks do have multiple offensive threats and are not a team I constantly attack, but the slate dictates that you may not be able to get the best possible situations. This spot has upside and that’s what I need at this price tag on this slate. Flaherty is a fine GPP option, although I will have a couple other plays ahead of him for the price.
Zach Eflin has been really good this year and I don’t think many people are going to want to use him at such a high price tag on both sites. People will remember Eflin as the guy they used to always stack against and steer clear. Eflin has about a strikeout per inning and a wOBA around .250 against right-handed batters this year. That means that this Orioles matchup is just about the perfect storm for Eflin. They will K and Eflin has shown the ability to take advantage of that, and they also roll out a bunch of right-handed hitters against a pitcher that has been borderline dominant against those batters all year. I hope the Eflin ownership will be low because he will be my highest owned pitcher on DraftKings and possibly FanDuel today.
Shane Bieber is another talented young pitcher that faces a weak lineup in a big park. Bieber is a top prospect in the Indians system and he has been quick to show why by posting multiple strong performances right out of AAA-ball. The Royals tend to limit strikeouts, but Bieber should be really good at limiting runs in this spot and seems like a slightly less boom/bust option than Flaherty at a similar price.
Domingo German is for GPP darts ONLY, but if you want to know why to play him, watch his start. Maybe he struggles to find the strike zone or miss as many bats as he usually does against a pesky Braves team, but German’s stuff is electric. German has a 15.4% swinging-strike rate. Last year, he would be second in baseball in that stat, .1% behind AL Cy Young winner Corey Kluber and .1% ahead of NL Cy Young winner Max Scherzer. You see a trend there? Leading the league in swinging-strike rate generally amounts to being REALLY good. No one at the top of these lists isn’t considered a very good pitcher. German gets hurt with the walks at times, and the occasional longball in a bad hitters count to bail them out, but when he’s on his game, I’d pay 11k+ for German in almost any matchup like I would for any other ace. Now, will he be on? NO CLUE. The talent dictates that I have to have a little because the upside is always massive, especially with the Yankees bullpen being slightly depleted after extra innings last night.
Anthony DeSclafani has been “fine.” I might take “fine” here. He has yet to put together a full game since returning to action, but the White Sox generally produce the ability for ANY pitcher to go out and have a good outing. Jose Abreu also left the game yesterday in the 7th inning, which would really help dilute the lineup. I think DeSclafani is viable in all formats because of the K-matchup and his potential upside as well.
I have similar feelings about Estrada so I’ll keep it short and sweet. He has been good recently barring the Astros matchup, but we can forgive that one. He is facing the Mets. Get it? Good. I constantly play pitchers against the Mets and it just always is at least fine with the potential to be great. Estrada is viable in all formats.
Ryan Yarborough is a pretty competent young pitcher facing the Marlins in Miami. I don’t love it, but I DON’T see Yarborough getting hit around. I think Yarborough may be my cash SP2 on Draftkings because of the price and the “safety” the Marlins and their park provide. Yarborough is also viable in GPP’s, but I would probably only do it if he is going to be low-owned.
Stacks:
Coors Field is on the slate and the total is 12. BOOM. DONE. Really though, it may just be this simple for me tomorrow. Chris Stratton’s second most thrown pitch is a curveball. I love the Rockies in this spot against a sketchy pitcher to begin with now going into Coors with one of his better pitches being neutralized by the altitude. I will have a good amount of almost anyone in this lineup besides Tony Wolters (he’s HORRIBLE).
The Giants face Anthony Senzatela, who hasn’t been a complete gas can in Coors like you would expect from anyone. I will have Giants but significantly less than the Rockies unless that is how the field plays it too. I think the field will approach this as a “two bad pitchers in Coors game” so I’ll probably play fewer Giants than the field based on the misconception that Senzatela is terrible. That being said, anyone can get blown up in Coors and Senzatela isn’t great either.
Austin Bibens-Dirkx has been solid this year, but that has been in mostly cupcake matchups. The Astros aren’t a cupcake matchup. I will be loading up on Astros mini-stacks because of their pop all of the place in tournaments. I hope with a few lingering injuries, I may be able to get them lower owned than I would if they were firing on all cylinders.
Giolito is talented, but he has major walk problems. I don’t want to pick on him a lot, but you’re doing yourself a disservice if you are running multiple GPP lineups and not stacking against him in one or 2. He could walk 7 or 8 guys tonight and it would barely be an outlier. Lots of walks are great for stacks because it provides easy baserunners and long innings.
Alex Cobb gets blown up A LOT. The Phillies are an offense that can explode at any time and Cobb is always ready for a good, old-fashioned blow-up game. Cobb has been a major disappointment this year for an Orioles team that may not even be able to feel disappointment after this year. They have 3 guys that have competed with being the worst pitcher in the league, their best pitcher allowed 7 runs to the first seven batters, and even the good is bad for the Orioles. “Well, Manny Machado and Adam Jones have been great this year.” Oh, the two unrestricted free agents next year? Yeah… Stacking against the Orioles always provides for massive upside and I think the other great spots may make this spot overlooked.
Secondary Stacks: Indians, Yankees, Padres, Rangers