MLB DFS Slate Preview - July 17th
A close look at the first DFS slate of the second half
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We are BACK! It’s the second Opening Day. This is always one of my favorite slates of the year after not being able to get into a DFS slate for five days.
Weather
We have some smoke issues this weekend, as you’re aware if you live anywhere near the northeastern part of the country. Our guy Kevin Roth is on top of it, giving us the forecasts today with those concerns mentioned.
Surprisingly (to me at least), there are only two concerning spots. That’s Pirates at Guardians and Dodgers at Yankees. It looks like Cleveland is the biggest potential issue, which won’t affect the DFS slate too much because a matchup with Gavin Williams and Jared Jones wouldn’t be super appealing on either side for DFS. Williams is good, but the Pirates lineup is also very good. So that’s usually a spot you just ignore. As for Jones, he is good, but he’s limited to 5-6 innings so we don’t have the ceiling we typically want there.
So I think I’d end up being off of that game regardless.
The feature series of the weekend is Dodgers/Yankees. That one is Roki Sasaki vs. Gerrit Cole. So it’s a similar situation for DFS. I don’t think we were going to be excited about playing either of those pitchers, but they aren’t exactly the greatest guys to stack against either with pretty high-priced offenses. I could’ve been interested in some Yankees stacks, but that would be about it.
So I think even if we fade both games and they end up playing fine, it wouldn’t be a big problem for us. I’ll just approach the slate as if everything is fine and see if we end up on anything from those two potential problem spots.
Game Info
I added a new game data page to the web app. So we can just click that instead of opening that Google Sheet every day. It will compare the implied totals and all of that with the projected ownership on the slate. This is the new place to go for the overall slate overview.
I’m writing this early, so I don’t have the ownerships on here yet. But eventually they’ll pop up and then we can see the ownership ranks along with the rank of where the team is implied and where they’re implied above their season average in run scoring.
What we’ll be looking for would be teams that imply 1+ run above their season average without having a ton of stack ownership on them. But I’ll have to come back to that later when the ownership gets working.
The big implications:
Rockies vs. Brady Singer: 6.42 (+1.7)
Cubs vs. Bailey Ober: 6.16 (+1.1)
Reds vs. Gabriel Hughes: 6.14 (+2.0)
Padres vs. Seth Lugo: 5.66 (+1.7)
Royals vs. Michael King: 5.32 (+1.1)
Athletics vs. Cade Cavalli: 5.24 (+0.8)
The Coors game will be very owned, even on a 14-game slate. It’s two bad pitchers and two offenses that aren’t very expensive. Pretty much the perfect DFS spot. The O/U is 12, 1.5 runs above the second highest.
We also have a game in Sacramento, but it’s Gage Jump and Cade Cavalli pitching - two pretty solid arms. The A’s lineup is without Nick Kurtz right now, which takes a lot away. So that is not the most amazing spot on the board. Coors is clearly a runway favorite game.
The surprising implied totals on this one come from that SD/KC game.
The Padres are always in much better shape when they’re away from San Diego.
→ Padres at home: .650 OPS, 40 PA/HR, 46 HR
→ Padres on road: .690 OPS, 32 PA/HR, 53 HR
Seth Lugo has been mega buns this year. He has given up a .280 xBA and a .355 xwOBA with 15 homers allowed. Loving the Padres tonight.
As for the Royals lineup, not sure I get it. Michael King has not been good, but he doesn’t give up homers. I don’t want to play that guy ever, but we’d rather pick hitters on a huge slate that are up against guys who can give up a few homers.
The Cubs might have to deal with some smoke stuff playing in Chicago, but I guess we’re thinking that most of that is gone by nighttime. They’ll face off with Bailey Ober, who is a fantastic guy to stack against. And the winds are going OUT in this one, and that’s what gets you to that 10.5 O/U.
So my offenses to target, not considering ownership:
Reds
Rockies
Padres
Cubs
Athletics
Nationals
Let’s get into the pitcher breakdowns.
Pitchers
Substack just gave me the ability to hide certain sections of a post to paid subscribers only. So I want to try that here. Before, I could only drop a paywall in one place and then everything below it would be hidden. But now I can drop those all around. So I’m going to give the projections only to paid members.
We’ll see how that looks when it’s published.
Chris Sale $10,000 vs. TEX
24.2 Raw Projection, 2.96x value
Sale did not throw in the All Star Game, so he’s the Braves SP1 out of the break. He threw just 43 pitches last Friday due to a rain delay. I don’t think that would matter for him. He should be back to 90+. And the price is back down after it was near $11K the last few times.
He is #1 in projection and #2 in value, and should probably be #1 in value because of what we’ll talk about with Reid Detmers. Sale is certainly in the cash conversation, but I think he’s a reasonable guy to go lower on in tourneys just because he hasn’t been looking fantastic and we might get one inning less out of him because of the recent pitch count thing. At high ownership, I don’t think he’d be worth going all in on.
Reid Detmers $7,300 vs. DET
21.6 | 2.96x
Detmers hasn’t looked very good lately.
The K% since June began is down to 25% after it was way up there early on. 25% is still good, and this price is very nice. I just think my projection model is over-heated on him. It’s hard to project these guys that were in the bullpen the previous year. You’ll typically see bloated K% projections on them for awhile, and we’re still dealing with a little bit of that here four months into the season.
I think he’s an awesome tourney play just in case he has it all going tonight. The Tigers are a perfectly fine matchup. The price does kinda make it tempting for cash, too, but that’s probably not wise since Detmers is so unreliably, generally.
Landen Roupp $8,000 vs. SEA
18.5 | 2.32x
Another projection here that doesn’t make a lot of sense to my quick glance. The game’s in Seattle, which is a good place to pitch, but we like Roupp way more at home in AT&T Park. He has just a 22% K% and a 12% BB% in his last seven starts. The guy is so volatile. He can pitch well, as we’ve seen plenty of times this year, but he can also go out there and just have no command and walk more guys than he strikes out.
Check the home/road splits:
That stuff isn’t very reliable since we’re talking about 50 innings in both splits, but it’s enough for me to know that I don’t want to pay $8,000 for Landen Roupp.
Gavin Williams $8,000 vs. PIT
20.0 | 2.28x
I really like Gavin Williams as a pitcher. He has a 29% K% and an 8% BB% this year. He’s been one of the best by K-BB%. The problem is a home run issue (1.35 HR/9), the matchup (Pirates are tied for the league lead in runs), and the smoke thing going on. Even if the game plays, it might be tougher for these pitchers to last long with that air quality going on. For $10K, I don’t think it’s the right play for Williams in any format.
Troy Melton $8,700 vs. LAA
19.1 | 2.19x
Melton has looked like an ace for a month or so now.
Since June 3rd: 26.6% K%, 5.0% BB%, 1.7 HR/9
That HR/9 is high, and a potential problem. He throws four-seamers and sliders and gives up a bunch of fly balls. That could damage him tonight against Trout/Neto/Adell/etc. But the strikeouts should be there. He has a 13.6% SwStr% over his last six starts. 31% to righties, which the Angels have a lot of.
He’s definitely a tourney play - the ceiling is huge here if he can limit the home run ball. For cash? I’m not so sure. At $8,700, one homer given up makes it tough to be a huge smash. And I think he’s likely to give up one or two of those tonight.
Great tourney play, questionable for cash.
Eduardo Rivera $6,200 vs. TB
This is just a punt. The Rays and Red Sox are playing a doubleheader, so they might need Rivera to stretch it out in the nightcap. He threw 64 pitches in his last outing on July 11th. It’s reasonable to think he could go for 80 tonight and have a decent outing against the Rays.
But the Rays are generally a very bad opponent to pick on with their low K% and tough at-bats. Rivera has a 104 Stuff+, an 11.4% SwStr%, and a 38% Ball% on all of 105 pitches thrown in the MLB so far this year.
He’s like a tourney mix-in if you need the salary. I’m not seeing much ceiling at all, but a lot of the time just getting a dozen points from a $6K pitcher takes you to the top.
Gabriel Hughes $6,000 vs. CIN
This is your 1% owned tourney special of the night (aka a bad play that could luck into working out).
Hughes joine the Rockies rotation on the July 8th and threw six pretty good innings against the Dodgers in LA. He struck out seven and gaveup just three runs on four hits in six innings.
The pitch mix:
It doesn’t look great here. The Stuff+ is useful when you don’t have a big sample, and that doesn’t paint a pretty picture. This is his first start in Coors, so it’s a big challenge.
But the Reds are no strangers to sucking in the big smash spots.
I think it’s actually a pretty solid fade of the Reds in the big tourneys tonight. And you might see me with a few shares of Hughes.
Bryce Miller $9,900 vs. SF
19.2 | 1.93x
Miller is back at home after having his worst start of the year last time in Miami.
The velocity is ticking down though and it bottomed out last time:
He had some bad luck in that Marlins start, but he also had a 12.3% SwStr% and a 38.3% Ball, so he did not have the touch in addition to not having the velo. You start to wonder at this point whether or not he’s hurt. And DFS is the spot you speculate on that with a big old Miller fade at some ownership.
But if he’s healthy and bounces back to normal, he’ll smash the Giants at home.
He has been ridiculous at home this year:
A 37% K% and 2.6% BB% in Seattle with a 20.1% SwStr%. He’s been Misiorowski there.
I think there’s enough injury speculation stuff for me to stay off in cash, but he’s someone you have to mix in for tournies. He could easily lead this slate in scoring.
Gerrit Cole $7,600 vs. LAD
16.3 | 2.15x
Will Cole ramp up the velo and the stuff for this big spot against the Dodgers? I’m not sure he’s really capable of that anymore, but if he is - it’s a good spot to break it out in a statement game for his second half against the Dodgers.
BUT the air quality stuff is really in effect there. And Cole hasn’t shown the ceiling of his old days in quite awhile. He has just a 22.7% K% this year, and I don’t have to tell anybody how tough of a matchup the Dodgers are. I’d sprinkle some in GPPs if the weather seems okay, but he’s off the board for cash. I still think people overrate him because of the name value.
Cade Cavalli $7,200 vs. ATH
14.0 | 1.95x
This is another tourney play to me. Nick Kurtz is a huge loss for the Athletics lineup, and Cavalli does a good job at keeping the ball on the ground, which should negate the ballpark problem here.
Can’t do it in cash with just the 1.95x value projection, but I love him for tourneys.
The Athletics have been brutal offensively lately. Here are the stats on the projected lineup for tonight:
Who do you really have to worry about other than Langeliers? This lineup is trash right now.
I actually don’t think Cavalli in cash is all that insane, we probably just quite have to do it.
But he might be my favorite tourney play.
Logan Henderson $9,000 vs. MIA
15.5 | 1.73x
It’s just a pitch count concern. He hasn’t cleared 85 pitches this year, and he threw 76 in his return last time.
But he pitches really well, and this isn’t a very tough matchup against the Marlins in Milwaukee.
Can you really get to a huge score on 75 pitches, though? Doesn’t seem right at all for cash. The tourney angle would be that he goes for 20 points and the rest of the pitching slate overall disappoints. I think it’s okay. He could certainly get a win as the -150 favorite. And that would be almost necessary for it to work in cash.
Peter Lambert $8,100 vs. BAL
14.3 | 1.77x
Not a great projection, but Lambert has held his own with a 14% K-BB% and 3.14 ERA on the year. He’s tricky to hit, and really hasn’t had many bad starts.
The Orioles have a .243/.324/.410 slash line against righties. THey are much betetr against righties than lefties. They’ve also been bad on the road (.684 OPS). Lambert’s a decent play. I’m not sure he has the ceiling for tourneys, and it doesn’t feel quite right using him in cash. But I’ll have to consider him when we regroup after going through all of these names.
Gage Jump $7,700 vs. WSH
13.2 | 1.71x
We have to cut the player pool down to a handful or so of names, and I don’t think Jump will be on that. The Nats are pretty left-handed with their impact bats, but they’ve hit lefties really well this year:
I think that’s the long list I’d be looking at.
CASH OPTIONS
Chris Sale $10,000
Troy Melton $8,700
Bryce Miller $9,900
Reid Detmers $7,300
Sale would appear to be a lock in cash. The SP2 is a tough one. If it weren’t for that Miller dud with the low velo last time, I’d say he’s a lock at home. But what if he’s hurt, right?
I might be looking to take the $1,200 discount from Miller down to Melton. But the SP2 will be a risky click tonight.
GPP OPTIONS - SMALL POOL
Chris Sale $10,000
Cade Cavalli $7,200
Bryce Miller $9,900
Reid Detmers $7,300
Troy Melton $8,700
Gavin Williams $8,800
Jared Jones $7,200
I really don’t see Jones getting into the sixth. He’s capped around 80 pitches and he’ll be breathing some bad air. I don’t think we’ll get crushed by fading him, but he is very good at a per-inning basis (if the command is there, which is no guarantee) and the matchup can’t get a lot better.
Hitters
So I’m not as pumped about the Reds as I was at the beginning. But maybe I’m giving a Rockies pitcher way too much credit. For cash, I think you just trust the spot:
Padres vs. Lugo
Rockies vs. Singer
Reds vs. Hughes
Cubs vs. Ober
Tourney stacks, still before seeing ownership:
Cubs vs. Ober
Rockies vs. Singer
Padres vs. Lugo
Nationals vs. Jump
Braves vs. Quantrill
So the Braves offense hasn’t been good since losing Acuna, and the implied total isn’t popping off the board. The books, for some reason, respect Cal Quantrill. But Quantrill is bad, and the Braves have some dudes. So we can stack them up.
Hitters - By Position
Let’s do top five raw projections and top five values for each position. Whenever we see the same name in both, that’s a cash play.
Catchers
Top:
Values:
No repeat names on this one. Austin Wells ($2,100) feels like a fantastic price up against Roki in Yankees Stadium if that game goes off. Alejandro Kirk ($3,000) gets the lefty (Anthony Kay) and he projects very well for a 2.5x value at a 7.5 projection. One of those feels good for cash if you’re not buying into Drake Baldwin ($4,500)’s recent form.
Stud Pick: Drake Baldwin
Mid Range: Alejandro Kirk
Cheap Play: Austin Wells
First Base
Top:
Values:
Josh Bell ($3,200) vs. Colin Rea stands out here. The model loves when the Twins are up against a righty. He’s very cheap and has good numbers this year.
Michael Busch ($3,800) is right there at #2 in the raw projections for 10.5 points at a 2.76 value. The model is liking the Cubs spots, and Busch is very cheap.
Ben Rice ($6,000) and Shohei Ohtani ($6,700) are the crazy high ceiling plays, but they’re priced way up. Both Cole and Sasaki can give up homers, and this game being in NYY is very good for that. Advantage to the hitters with the air stuff, I’d say, since the pitchers are out there on the field exerting themselves for longer stretches than the hitters.
Sal Stewart ($5,800) is priced to his career high. That makes sense in Coors, of course. Note that this is a projection-down spot for homers for the Reds. Their home park is much easier to homer in than Coors, but everything else benefits them here (lower K projections, higher for all the other forms of base hits). I don’t think Stewart makes sense as a one-off play, but him and Elly are the staples of the Reds stack.
Royce Lewis ($3,500) gets the wind boost here at $3,500. Big value projection on him if he’s hitting #5 for the Twins.
Stud Pick: Shohei Ohtani
Mid Range: Michael Busch
Cheap Play: Josh Bell
Second Base
Top:
Values:
Kody Clemens ($4,900) is at the top, surprisingly. The model has bought into his breakout 2026 season, and this is a great spot for what he does best - hitting bombs.
Ketel Marte ($5,000) and the snakes are up against Pallante, and he’s pitched somewhat well lately - at least in terms of limiting damage. He’s good at keeping the ball on the ground, I really don’t like to stack against him.
Jake Cronenworth ($2,600) is still very cheap. He has a .333/.349/.500 slash in July after coming off the IL. Looking pretty good there because we like the Padres as a unit.
JJ Wetherholt ($4,500) has been over-priced for some time, but we like him tonight against Merrill Kelly. The 2.17x value is very nice on him.
The mega punt is Luis Urias ($2,000). He’s no good, but he’s in the lineup and can get some balls in play. Especially against the lefties like the one they’ll see tonight.
There’s not much to like at 2B, and that’s not uncommon.
Stud Pick: Kody Clemens
Mid range: JJ Wetherholt
Punt Play: Luis Urias
Third Base
Top:
Values:
Sal Stewart bests Junior Caminero for the top projection. This will be a sort of bullpen game in the night cap for the Red Sox. Caminero’s in a nice spot, but the price is pretty restrictive.
Manny Machado ($4,200) is still too cheap with this game being outside of San Diego. I’ve been playing him a lot and it’s been working well.
Do you believe in Alex Bregman ($3,800)? Big weekend for him before the break, and now he gets the good spot in Wrigley. He’s still awfully cheap.
Stud Pick: Junior Caminero
Mid Range: Manny Machado
Punt Play: Ryan McMahon
Shortstop
Top:
Values:
Bobby Witt ($6,000) up top like usual, but not before Elly De La Cruz ($6,500) in Coors. Hughes, for the Rockies, is a righty, and Elly has been much better as a left-handed bat this year (.660 SLG!).
Stud Pick: Elly De La Cruz
Mid Range: Geraldo Perdomo
Punt Play: JP Crawford / Jim Jarvis
Outfield
Top:
Hard not to love Pete Crow-Armstrong ($6,300) at home. He’s the top projection on the board at any position.
Yordan Alvarez ($6,400) is up against Dean Kremer - so that’s a good spot to pay up for Yordan.
And Cole Carrigg ($4,200) is the best play on the Rockies by a good margin. Big 2.3x value for him. He’s a priority tonight.
Fernando Tatis ($5,200) has lost 2B eligibility, which will lower the ownership.
Values:
Josh Lowe ($2,400) has been showing up a lot on the projections recently since he’s been near minimum price. Not a great spot against Melton, but there is big home run upside there.
Kahlil Watson ($2,700) is kind of an enticing player with power and speed (12 HR, 15 SB in the minors in 211 AB), but his 35% K% shows that he’s having trouble hacking it in the bigs. Not too interested there, but we do need another cheap play on this slate for the outfield.
Alan Roden ($2,200) should land in the Twins lineup for this one. He hit .272/.397/.512 in AAA this year before getting the call-up. It’s worth checking the fScores on these guys:
Very good discipline with some power. I like that as a punt that nobody will click on. These are the kinds of plays you just don’t find unless you’re looking at decent projections.
PROJECTED OPTIMAL
SP Sale
SP Detmers
C Baldwin
1B Bell
2B Clemens
3B Crawford
SS Bogaerts
OF Crow-Armstrong
OF Dominguez
OF Merrill
Padres + Cubs + Twins here. The optimizer jams Detmers in there with the big projection, but we’ve already talked about how that’s pretty risky given Detmers’ history and recent form.
Here’s what I put together for cash as I went through this:
Or this, going from Kirk → Wells, Busch → Bell, and Watson → Carrigg:
For tourneys, I’ll reiterate the pitcher pool I’d be boosting up:
Chris Sale $10,000
Cade Cavalli $7,200
Bryce Miller $9,900
Reid Detmers $7,300
Troy Melton $8,700
Gavin Williams $8,800
Jared Jones $7,200
And the five-man stacks I’d have it build:
Rockies
Reds (lightly though)
Cubs
Padres
Twins
That’s my take! Hope you enjoyed the article and here’s hoping we can kick off the second half with a splash.