The Monday night slate is an 8-gamer, which begins nicely at 6:40 PM EST. We have 3 east coast games, 3 central games and 2 west coast late night games.
WEATHER
No issues
You should not overthink paying up for both pitchers on DraftKings tonight. There are just too many good pitchers and too few mid-range/cheap pitchers that are worthy of using. Guys like Matt Waldron, Tyler Anderson, Tylor Megill aren’t consistent enough for me to use them tonight.
JUSTIN VERLANDER (DK: $8800, FD: $9200)
St. Louis’ power has woken up a little bit to bring them back to ‘normal’, but it’s not a spot to fear attacking and considering Verlander likes to live up in the zone and this is a bottom of the zone lineup, I really don’t fear them off the Sunday Night game.
MACKENZIE GORE (DK: $9000, FD: $9800)
There is a strong theory I have that left handed pitchers tend to reach their career peak later than RHH. Why? Sorry, I have no scientific theory on this one, but the data with Gore is really supporting it, so lets go with it here. This is the long way of pointing out that Gore, now in his third full season, is sporting a near 30% strikeout rate, .247 xAVG and .119 xISO. All career bests for the 25 year old lefty whom I have been following for well over 5 years now as someone I think is a future star. That stardom is limited by virtue of being a National, but also helped out when you get to face the Mets as he does tonight!
TARIK SKUBAL (DK: $10500, FD: $10400)
Speaking of lefties. Skubal too is enjoying some of his best pitching and he took his full leap in his third full season a year ago. As noted yesterday, we’re still riding lefties against the Rangers & in this case this is an elite lefty to be fine paying up for.
OTHER PITCHING THOUGHTS
- Grayson Rodriguez & Kevin Gausman are both priced to where if they hitched up and got into a pitchers duel tonight you could be thinking you are doing really well. But there’s too many other good arms and I think the park and potential for HR upside is too great here.
- I am expecting the ball to carry in Citizen’s Bank Park. No Wheeler.
- Andrew Abbott might get some interest in Coors for $6800. It looks like the type that comes in around 7%, looks nice for about 3 to 4 innings and then the Rockies drop a 4 spot on him. No upside IMO.
Nobody? I really do not like anyone tonight for a full stack. A bunch of one offs with some value bats and we’re moving right along tonight. That said, here’s the two teams that jumped out at me first.
GIANTS
Mike Yastrzemski, Patrick Bailey, Thairo Estrada
No, Ryne Nelson has not “figured something out” by suddenly becoming a 1.25 WHIP guy instead of a 4+ WHIP guy. I might be exaggerating a little bit, but it sure feels like that was how he was pitching most of the season and should give up lots of runners here again tonight.
REDS
TJ Friedl, Jeimer Candelario, Will Benson
After saying we’re paying up for pitching it might feel weird to read “Coors Field” in the group of offenses to target, however you have sub 5k plays here to make it work just fine. It’s going to be warm in Coors, Feltner is terrible and so too is the Rockies bullpen.
CATCHER
- JT Realmuto
- Patrick Bailey
- Logan O’Hoppe
FIRST BASE
- Ryan Mountcastle .. Mr. Skydome
- Rhys Hoskins
- Jeimer Candelario
SECOND BASE
- Thairo Estrada
- Brendan Rodgers
- Jonathan India
THIRD BASE
- Alex Bregman … Bregman has been really good for the last week or two, something he does annually around this time of year and yet the price is almost the same as Arenado who hasn’t done anything all season. Free square, take it.
- Donovan Solano
- Matt Vierling
SHORTSTOP
- Bo Bichette
- Brett Wisely
- Edmundo Sosa
OUTFIELD – Mt. Rushmore
- Kyle Schwarber
- Yordan Alvarez
- Joc Pederson
- TJ Friedl
OUTFIELD – Value
- Mike Yastrzemski
- Willie Calhoun
- Rhys Hoskins – 1B – Brewers – Chairman of The Dongers Club
- Yordan Alvarez – OF – Astros
- Kyle Schwarber – OF – Phillies
- TJ Friedl – OF – Reds
- Patrick Bailey – C – Giants
- Alex Bregman – 3B – Astros
- Bo Bichette – SS – Blue Jays
- Brendan Rodgers – 2B – Rockies
- BONUS …. Ryan Mountcastle – 1B – Orioles
TOP BETS
- Nationals ML (-125)
- Giants ML (+114) — Up 2 Early Win
- Brewers/Phillies OVER 8.5 … As I mentioned, I like offense in this game. Hard to stack Phils though at their prices.
- Reds/Rockies OVER 10.5
- Tigers/Rangers UNDER 7.5