MLB DFS Tournament Strategy: Leverage, Home Runs, Optimal Picks | Today, 4/3/21

Day 2 of MLB DFS was another great slate that featured some stellar pitching, right up until Trevor Bauer pressed his no-hitter luck a bit too far and ended up bringing his real life and fantasy baseball performance back to Earth. That one inning allowed several other pitchers to close the scoring gap with the highest-priced play on the board, widening the opportunity for potentially optimal constructions without Bauer. The chalk hit hard across a lot of the bats, making pitching and secondary-stack selection extremely important once again. Saturday’s short five-game slate brings us a number of interesting matchups and several starters who may be off the radar for the public at large, giving us some great opportunities for MLB DFS tournament strategy to kick in and land us on the best of the best.

The split-slate kicks off at 7:10 p.m. ET on both sites, the Awesemo team will be here for all of it, providing updates to tools and data throughout, and we have Live Before Lock from 4-5 p.m. ET. Speaking of tools, if you aren’t visiting the Top Stacks Tool on a regular basis, you’re just making your MLB DFS picks incorrectly. The Top Starters Tool is every bit as important in deciding who takes the hill for your daily fantasy baseball lineup.

[STARTING9]

MLB DFS Tournament Strategy: Top HR Options

Home Run Ratings

Home runs are the holy grail when making MLB DFS picks. Finding the right combination of sluggers who will knock one, or better two, out of the park to drive in the teammates you stack with them is critical to winning GPPs. Identifying the likely home run hitters is trickier than just looking at the big names. Using a model of my own design, based on a blend of several predictive statistics for the batter-pitcher matchup, I am going to give one of the top choices from each team.

Scale: 5-10 Average; 10-20 Good; 20-25 Very Good; 25+ Great

Arizona Diamondbacks: Christian Walker – 6.98

Atlanta Braves: n/a

Baltimore Orioles: n/a

Boston Red Sox: n/a

Chicago Cubs: n/a

Chicago White Sox: Yoan Moncada – 7.14

Cincinnati Reds: n/a

Cleveland Indians: n/a

Colorado Rockies: C.J. Cron – 12.87

Detroit Tigers: n/a

Houston Astros: n/a

Kansas City Royals: n/a

Los Angeles Angels: Shohei Ohtani – 10.58

Los Angeles Dodgers: Cody Bellinger – 12.29

Miami Marlins: n/a

Milwaukee Brewers: Christian Yelich – 8.20

Minnesota Twins: Max Kepler – 7.09

New York Mets: n/a

New York Yankees: n/a

Oakland Athletics: n/a

Philadelphia Phillies: n/a

Pittsburgh Pirates: n/a

San Diego Padres: Fernando Tatis Jr. – 17.09

San Francisco Giants: Alex Dickerson – 9.43

Seattle Mariners: Kyle Seager – 8.66

St. Louis Cardinals: n/a

Tampa Bay Rays: n/a

Texas Rangers: n/a

Toronto Blue Jays: n/a

Washington Nationals: n/a

[JOINMLB+]

MLB DFS Optimal Stacks & Leverage Plays

(Quick note: if it says 1-5 it means hitters 1-2-3-4-5, otherwise I will specify spots)

This section will feature a few standout MLB DFS spots and teams to look at for potential plays here. Make sure to check out the ownership projections for critical updates and monitor the top stacks tool throughout the day for changes.

LAD: Pick ‘Em

The matchup isn’t getting any worse for the best lineup in baseball at Coors Field, as the Rockies cycle through their rotation. Jon Gray has a modicum of talent, but seems unlikely to ever reach the breakthrough some have long forecasted for him. At least not while wearing a Rockies uniform. Gray put up a bumpy 5.69 xFIP in eight starts in 2020, following a better season that saw him post a 4.06 mark in 150 innings in 2019. He had a slightly above average strikeout rate that season as well, coming in at 23.6%, though he cratered to a 12.6% mark in last year’s 39 inning sample.

The Dodgers’ vicious lineup is going to be relentless in attacking Gray today, and there is every reason in the world to go back to them for our most likely optimal lineups for MLB DFS purposes again. They will be extremely chalky, but they have paid off thus far and they could easily do so again today. The projected lineup is playable from 1-8, although we would prefer catcher Will Smith to Austin Barnes on most nights. Finding low-owned combinations of Dodgers is virtually impossible, so the focus should be on highly correlated quality constructions that jibe well with lesser owned pitchers and secondary stacks.


Latest MLB DFS Content


CHW: 9-1-2-3-4 – Madrigal – Anderson – Eaton – Abreu – Moncada

The loaded White Sox lineup took a preseason hit when it lost Eloy Jimenez to injury, but the team is so stacked they should be able to overcome his absence and continue rolling toward the playoffs. The White Sox are in Anaheim taking on the geographically challenged Los Angeles Angels (of Anaheim). The home team will have Alex Cobb taking the hill. Cobb has spent the last few seasons in and out of the rotation for the Baltimore Orioles. In 2018 he threw 152.1 innings, posting a 4.47 xFIP and allowing 24 home runs (1.42 HR/9). In 2019 he pitched just 12.1 innings, somehow managing to give up nine home runs in the process. Last season, Cobb was reliably healthy, throwing 52.1 innings in the short season, yielding eight home runs but putting up a semi-respectable 4.21 xFIP for the season. For his career, Cobb has struck out just 18.7% of hitters, a mark he has been well below for the past few seasons, with last year’s 16.8% the high-water mark since 2017. This is not a good pitcher overall; the White Sox have an opportunity to feast.

Shortstop Tim Anderson is batting title competitive with his hit tool, putting up a .322/.357/.529 slash in 2020 after a .335/.357/.508 mark in 2019. The batting average standout has power as indicated by those slugging percentages, and he adds speed with five stolen bases in his 221 plate appearances last year and 17 in 518 chances in 2019. He is a stud at the top of the lineup and White Sox stacks on both DraftKings and FanDuel and has a strong chance of being the optimal shortstop play today.

Following Anderson in the lineup should be veteran outfielder Adam Eaton who will get the primary role in filling Jimenez’ shoes in the outfield. Eaton has a long track record of being a viable MLB DFS play, as well as an on-field multi-tool player in real life. Eaton posted a .279/.365/.428 slash in 656 plate appearances in 2019, hitting 15 home runs and stealing 15 bases. He had a down season in the wonky 2020, seeing 176 plate appearances and managing just a .226/.285/.384 mark, he is much more the 2019 player and we can roster him with confidence, particularly at the prices he is listed for on both sites.

Slugger Jose Abreu should need no introduction. He has the team-leading mark in my home run model for today, against a pitcher with a proven propensity for giving them up. Abreu hit 19 home runs in just 262 plate appearances in 2020. The year before he hit 33 in 693 opportunities. The slugger is in a prime spot to drive the White Sox offense and our daily fantasy baseball lineups today.

Moncada has been a productive MLB player since coming in as a highly touted prospect from Cuba. He seemed on the verge of stardom in 2019, putting up a .315/.367/.548 slash with 25 home runs and 10 stolen bases in his 559 plate appearances. A down year last season in the oddball COVID-19 year might have him slightly off the radar, and it has his FanDuel price suppressed from where it should be, giving us some opportunity in the middle of this loaded lineup.

The lineup keeps giving, with Yasmani Grandal at catcher, one of the better options for offense at the position in the entire league. The slugging switch-hitter blasted eight home runs in just 194 plate appearances in 2020, a year after posting 28 in 632 opportunities. He sees more plate appearances than the average catcher and has the talent to do more with them. He fits in particularly well where we are required to roster a catcher, but is playable everywhere.

Join STOKASTIC+ today!
Use accurate data and advanced tools crafted by the #1 DFS player.

Luis Robert is another up-and-coming star in the White Sox organization. Another Cuban import on a team loaded with talent from the island nation, Robert arrived on the scene last year and immediately delivered, mashing 11 home runs and posting a .203 ISO, though his WRC+ landed just 1% above average and he struggled with the hit tool, putting up a .233/.302/.436 slash that needs improving. There is upside for days in the outfielder, and he is likely underpriced on FanDuel.

With multi-position eligibility, Leury Garcia provides solid flexibility from deep in the lineup, and he does not cost much to roster. We can use Garcia for salary relief and differentiation, while still expecting a modicum of production. In 2019, Garcia saw 618 plate appearances and put up a .279/.310/.378 slash with eight home runs and 15 stolen bases, scoring 93 runs in the process. Garcia is not a standout, but he is a cog in a valuable MLB DFS machine.

Yermin Mercedes is something of an afterthought and should not be rostered ahead of Grandal for any purpose other than differentiation. The player from the bottom of the lineup who could add value is second baseman Nick Madrigal. In 109 plate appearances in his rookie debut year in 2020, Madrigal showed off his strong hit tool, putting up a .340/.376/.369 slash. There is an obvious lack of home run pop with the player, it’s simply not part of his skillset, but he makes up for that with an ability to get on base and with his speed. Madrigal makes sense as a quality wraparound play back to the top of the White Sox lineup.

HR Call: Cody Bellinger – Dodgers


Follow us on all of our social channels! Check out our Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube for more great Awesemo content.

Looking for more MLB DFS picks content? We have loads of articles, data, cheat sheets and more on the Awesemo MLB home page. Just click HERE.

Author
Terry used to do other things, now he writes words on the internet. He hopes his more than 20 years’ experience in season-long and daily fantasy sports and his custom models for MLB, NBA, and NFL don't steer you too wrong when he writes columns and makes picks on Awesemo.com. A lifetime of experience keeping odd hours make Terry ideal to cover KBO baseball overnight until the world returns to normal. Most of those late night hours have been spent on the couch watching sports, T.V., and movies; just try to shut him up about any of the above. You can find his pop-culture ramblings and more on Sideaction.

Stokastic +

Premium Data and Tools
PREMIUM TOOLS
Lineup Generator
Stokastic Sims MLB
PREMIUM DATA
Projections
Top Stack %s
MLB Data Central
FREE DATA
SoRare MLB Rankings
DraftKings Night Owl
FANTASY CRUNCHER (ADD-ON)
MLB Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
MLB Discord Server
PREMIUM DATA
Projections
Ownership Projections
PREMIUM TOOLS
Fantasy Cruncher (ADD-ON)
NHL Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
NHL Discord Server
PREMIUM TOOLS
Lineup Generator
Stokastic Sims PGA
PREMIUM DATA
Ownership Projections
Top Golfers Tool
PGA Tournament Models
FANTASY CRUNCHER (ADD-ON)
PGA Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
PGA Discord Server
Ownership Projections
Top Drivers Tool
NASCAR Discord Server
NASCAR Fantasy Cruncher
USFL Projections
USFL Discord Server
Ownership Projections
Top Fighters Tool
MMA Discord Server
MMA Fantasy Cruncher
NFL Betting Tools
Stokastic Discord Server
Best Ball
Best Ball Rankings
Best Ball Stat Projections
Stokastic Discord Server
Season Long Fantasy (Coming Soon)

Premium Data

DFS Winners from the Stokastic Community

Subscribe to the Stokastic newsletter

DFS advice, exciting promos, and the best bets straight to your inbox

Stokastic.com - Daily Fantasy Sports and Sports Betting Data, Tools, & Analytics

Please play responsibly. Only customers 21 and over are permitted to play. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-GAMBLER.