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MattTruss

Author: MattTruss

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MattTruss

DraftKings: Not Just For DFSers

September 19, 2015 | DraftKings |

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Happy Saturday everyone. If you’re checking in on our DFS content at this stage of the season you’re doing a couple thing right. First off, you haven’t blown your entire bankroll chasing a million dollar pay day. Nice work! You also haven’t abandoned your baseball buddies to focus all your attention to football players turning each others brains into scrambled eggs every Sunday. Nope, you’re sticking around and watching Chris Coghlan turn Jung-Ho Kang’s knee into spaghetti, which is much more civilized. This is part of the season where the rubber meets the road and I would implore anyone with anything left to play for in any leagues to take a peek at our daily fantasy content. I mentioned this very thing all the way back in April with my second DFS article. DFS and your H2H and/or roto team can form a nice little symbiotic relationship this time of year. If you’re in the midst of a heated H2H semi-final match-up and and a little behind your opponent, for example, you could look at adding one of the lower-priced options mentioned here as they’re likely available in your league. H2H points leagues and daily fantasy are essentially cousins and we’re looking for the same things: points. A low-priced, high-upside play is great for DFS but could also help you win a H2H matchup. Smell what I’m stepping in? Big Magoo just touched on the importance of batty calls this time of year. Let’s say you’re a couple HRs back in your roto league and you’re looking for any and all power you can get your hands on. Well, look through our daily picks and see if one of our low-priced calls such as Wilin Rosario might be available in your league. Again, we’re all looking for the same thing here. So, come with me past the jump and let’s look for some players to a) win you some DFS money today and b) win you that virtual trophy to set up on your virtual mantle.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Just Awesome Happ

September 15, 2015 | DraftKings | 4 Comments

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Glad to see you haven’t completely moved on to fantasy football just yet. There’s still money to be had on the baseball side and as a matter of fact, there’s quite a bit. DraftKings is running a baseball version of the Millionaire Maker. To the best of my knowledge, they’ve never run one of these for MLB and I’m pretty excited to take a few whacks at it. I’ve played these for PGA and of course, NFL and playing for a shot at a million is pretty silly to think about. It’s MLB, anyone can win you that dough on a given night, so let’s see if we can dig up some gems for this evening.

J. A. Happ is the pitcher I’m going to be looking at the most when building tonight’s lineups. I can’t understand a couple things about Happ, first is his price. Happ is $7,500 tonight, cheaper than John Lamb. Happ has been on an impressive run lately, much like Josh Tomlin. Tomlin costs $3,000 more tonight and is facing the K-stingy Royals. Happ’s ERA in August was a tidy 1.98 and he’s kept that momentum rolling into September with a 1.38 ERA in 2 starts. Also included in those 7 total starts is 42 Ks and 7 BBs in 40.1 IP. The other thing I don’t quite understand is the Streamonator’s hate for Happ tonight, ranking him as the 12th best pitcher on the day. That seems criminal, much like what the SON wants to do to my kitchen appliances. Maybe DraftKings and SON know something I don’t here. The Cubs are a solid hitting team, sure, but they lead the league in strikeouts and strikeouts mean points in the daily game, so that’s a plus for Happ. The Cubs are also in the bottom 8 in team OPS vs. LHP. This makes sense as their typical 2-4 hitters (Schwarber, Coghlan and Rizzo) are all lefties. Seems like another plus for Happ. Kris Bryant you say? PNC Park is one of, if not the hardest park for RH hitters to go deep in. If that’s not enough, Happ will be pitching the second game of a double header, which means he could be facing an even shakier lineup as the studs take the night off. I don’t know about you, but I’m sold. Let’s all hope Happ is just awesome and look at a few more picks to help us win that million.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Touch Of Gray

September 8, 2015 | DraftKings | 1 Comment

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Hopefully everyone had an enjoyable Labor Day Weekend and if all went well, a profitable one. Labor Day weekend is a fine time to cruise for overlay as it’s a busy outdoors weekend for many folks. I, for one, took the weekend off from DFS. I enjoyed some of the great outdoors and took part in a few fantasy football season-long drafts. I’m ready to hit MLB hard for the last five weeks as people become less focused on it and turn their eyes instead to NFL. With any luck, that will lead to some dead money out there. Terrible transition time as we go from dead money to the Grateful Dead. I know there’s a few deadhead fantasy baseballers out there reading Razzball, I’ve seen the steal your face avatars. Truth be told, I’m a fan via love as the woman whom I live with and to whom I’m related by marriage is a huge fan. When I saw that both Sonny Gray and Jon Gray were pitching tonight and both had nice match-ups, I couldn’t help myself. I’m choosing to focus on Jon Gray since, frankly, Sonny Gray has, and will continue to be, a great play all year. Jon Gray on the other hand, gets the hard to handle task of pitching in Coors for his home games. We saw the effect this can have when he faced the Mets at Metco and was on the golden road (6 IP, 1 ER, 5 Ks) and then faced them again a couple weeks later at Coors and had the Mexicali blues (1.2 IP, 7 ER, 0 Ks). Gray faced the Padres in Coors a few weeks ago and made barely a ripple, giving up just one run in 5 IP and striking out five friars. Doing some quick math means he should only give up negative five runs when he faces them in Petco Park. It’s like a box of rain when a promising young arm gets drafted into the Rockies system, but we always have their away games to look forward to. Gray’s got a pretty nasty looking 95+ MPH fastball and a nice change-up (85 MPH)/slider combo that makes him at least serviceable with upside for more. Thanks to his home park and some rough outings there, he’s practically free for $4,600. The pitching friendly Petco Park and a bottom three team OPS for the Padres makes me pretty excited to roster the young gun tonight. You should be too and if nothing else, we will get by, we will survive.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Double Duty Danger

September 1, 2015 | DraftKings | 5 Comments

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Tonight we get to play everybody’s favorite game, “Guess the lineup for Game 2 of the Coors Double Header”. Just rolls off the tongue really. I love me some Coors field, but I dread days like this when there’s a double header with start times spaced 5 hours apart. What stinks about this is when the first game gets finished up around 6:30 EST or so, there’s 30 minutes until most games kick off and zero percent chance that Walt Weiss can muster up a lineup in that small amount of time. This leads us to either fade Coors, yikes, or take a guess at what we think the lineup will look like and leaving our lineup flexible enough to make changes late. This might mean we fade the early games entirely and it creates some interesting opportunities depending on how much you want to gamble. Here’s what I mean: if you think a lot of people will be off the Coors game due to lack of lineups and not wanting to sit around and wait for them, stack away and hope for a big leg up on the field. On the other side, if you think a lot of people will be waiting for those lineups to post and thus ignoring the 7:00 EST start times, load up on earlies, find a nice stacking option and hope you can shoot the moon. If you are going to wait around for the Coors lineups, I’d suggest having a lineup ready and being prepared for as many scenarios as you can. This means going through the options if each player is out of the game 2 lineup. There’s a handy feature DraftKings has that I’m not sure a lot of people know about or use. If you click on “My Lineups” up at the top there’s a button that reads, “Create New Lineup”. Here you can play around with all the lineups you want to create, you can make one for every scenario you can dream up and save them all to your lineups page without entering a contest. Having these lineups ready to go will not only give you a better handle on your options when, say, AJ Pollock is suddenly out of the game 2 lineup, but will also make for a little less sweating as you can simply import your “No Pollock” lineup and be ready to roll while others are floundering. I love fish puns, let’s get to some more picks, just for the halibut.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: INXCES

August 25, 2015 | DraftKings | 8 Comments

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So you’re telling me if the Mets played in Coors field every night, they’d be the highest scoring team in baseball instead of bottom 5, where they were pre-Coors? Huh, 33 runs in 3 games ain’t too shabby and I hope you benefited from Yoenis Cespedes’ onslaught Friday night. I managed to somehow cash without him, but I couldn’t touch the top spots. The Mets have clearly sacrificed some chickens to Jobu over the past month. The good fortune continues as they go from beating up on Rockies pitchers in Coors to now getting to feast on Philly pitching in Citizens Bank Park. Here’s some fun with numbers: in the month of August, the Mets are 5th in Runs, 1st in doubles, 4th in HRs and 3rd in team OPS, one of my favorite stats to look at. As I write this, I just watched Daniel Murphy hit the 7th HR of the the game for the Mets, tying a franchise record. So, how much of this new found offense is Cespedes induced? Well, he hasn’t exactly been cold, his slash line since joining the Mets: Tonight the human Cespedes gets to dine on the shizz that is Jerome Williams’ right arm. Sky, in his recent roundup, mentioned Jerome’s reverse splits this season. Much like the hips, Sky don’t lie. The numbers this year vs. RHB: .336/.363/.597 and vs. LHB: .315/.379/.399 tell you all you need to know. Of course as you can see, everyone is hitting for a hall of fame average off the guy, so you really can’t go wrong when throwing anyone and everyone out there at him, but righties are especially brutalizing him. Reverse splits are fairly screwy, I tend to think they normalize over time, but there are exceptions, like in everything. For his career, Williams’ marks are generous to both handed hitters. Lefties enjoy a better batting average and OBP while righties have a higher slugging percentage. That’s over a 12 year career of course and things change with age. For example, a bag of garbage left in a black trash can in the middle of summer gets much worse with age. Jerome is said bag of garbage and the hot summer months aren’t being kind to him. With any luck, people will take a quick glance as guys like Curtis Granderson (L) and Michael Conforto (L) are highly owned and Cespedes sneaks under the radar. I need you tonight, Yoenis, don’t let me down. Here are some more picks for tonight’s slate:

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Catching Pollock with Holmbergers

August 21, 2015 | DraftKings | 8 Comments

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I also considered “Yas Many More Holmbergers Please” but the title isn’t really what’s important here. What’s important is how awful David Holmberg is and how happy I am to load up on some Diamondbacks this evening, especially AJ Pollock. First, let’s touch on the dumpster fire that is David Holmberg. Well, he has a 5.95 ERA for starters. That could be a small sample size, though, as he’s only pitched in 4 games and is fresh off a 2 IP, 7 ER outing at the Dodgers. So, before that trainwreck was a 3.06 ERA. Not too shabby you say. Well, his FIP and xFIP tell a different story, they are 7.33 and 5.81 respectively and even before the 7 ER outing they were each sitting around a 4.90. We can even go back and take a look at last season’s 30 IP and see the 7.60 FIP and 5.86 xFIP. Those numbers are eerily similar to this year’s numbers through 19.2 IP. Holmberg has spread the love quite nicely with righties and lefties as each has a wOBA over .350, with righties earning a slight bump (.390) which is why we are focusing our attack there. In addition to all of this, all of Holmberg’s pitches have a negative value and his fastball has been especially bad this season. Guess who the second best fastball hitter (behind Goldy who is simply a beast vs. everyone and every pitch type) on the Diamondbacks is this year? AJ Pollock, come on that one was easy! Pollock is enjoying a very nice breakout season. One of the many great things about Pollock this season is it doesn’t matter who he’s facing, he’s raking. The trouble in DFS sometimes can be when you identify that mint matchup vs. a certain handed pitcher, only to have that pitcher pulled after 3 IP and 6 ER and you mint matchup goes out the window as your play is pulled for a pinch hitter. No fear with Pollock, he’s an equal opportunity masher. Here are Pollock’s slash lines plus wOBA vs. first righties: .309/.365/.471/.361 and then lefties: .316/.368/.490/.372. Pretty remarkable right? All this is to say Pollock is a stud and Holmberg is a dud, so fireworks should be in the air at Great American Ballpark tonight.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 10 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Coors And The High Life

August 18, 2015 | DraftKings |

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It’s good to be back my friends. After a week away, I’m ready and raring to go. I took a full week off from DFS (That’s a lie, I played in the PGA Championship MIlly Maker, but who’s counting) and it was a nice reprieve. MLB is a crazy long season and in the midst of the dog days, it can really be a grind. Taking some much needed time off was great and if you’re feeling sluggish when building lineups I suggest you do the same. Enough about my time off though, let’s get back to business: the business of making cash. Obviously, you have a decision to make tonight and that is what to do with Coors field. Bryce Harper is ludacris expensive tonight, $6,400, but for good reason. Bryce gets to face off against David Hale and his 5.69 ERA, 5.23 FIP and 2.0 HR/9 in Coors field. Do you dare fade the kid? If you do choose to fade Coors this evening, I’d look to the game over in Miller Park. Miller Park, believe it or not, is numero uno in HR park factor in 2015. Of course, park factors are victim to small sample size noise when only looking at a single season, but being number one in HR by a comfortable margin this year isn’t nothing. Miller is top five in runs for good measure as well. I’ll be making a few Miller and Coors recommendations below so you don’t forget, so raise a glass and follow me.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 12 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Wood Chucks

August 4, 2015 | DraftKings |

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I’m still not entirely sure what the Braves were doing at the trade deadline, but Alex Wood found himself in a much more favorable position. For his first start in Dodger Blue, he’ll be on the road facing a familiar foe in the Philadelphia Phillies. The Phillies are, of course, always a team we like to target. Being in the bottom 5 of just about every offensive category will earn you that dubious honor. Alex Wood hasn’t exactly been peaches and cream this season, his Ks have disappeared and he’s been a bit WHIP-y. These are things I’m willing to deal with when the price is right and $7,400 is right. The best part of the match-up is Jerome Williams is on the other side of the mound so a win is all but guaranteed. The Dodgers should tee off on Williams, pushing him ever closer to the retirement he deserves and Wood should be able to cruise to the easy win. With any luck he gets to relax early and can let it fly vs. the woeful Phils. Wood is one of the biggest favorites on the night and makes a nice second tier pitcher to throw alongside the ace of your choosing.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 15 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Pheast on Phillie P(h)itching

July 28, 2015 | DraftKings |

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Last week it was lefties beating up on Shane Greene, this week we have the Canadian lefty killers, the Toronto Blue Jays. If you read me at all this season you’ve noticed some themes. Mainly the pitching staffs I enjoy picking on most, Texas and Philadelphia. When one of those two waltzes into a home stadium of the highest scoring team in MLB, I get a little excited. The cherry on top is the first starter just so happens to give the platoon advantage to Toronto’s three best hitters. Not only have the Blue Jays scored 70+ more runs than the next best team, but they own the best team OPS (.832) vs. lefties by over 50 points. This is almost too good to be true, a dream matchup that most likely everyone will be on. Do with that info what you will, but you won’t catch me fading Josh Donaldson tonight, even at a lofty $5,800. Whether it be tournament or cash game, Dongaldson and his 1.051 OPS vs. LHP (or .441 wOBA if that’s the language you prefer to speak) this season will find his way into my lineups to pheast on Adam Morgan. You can fade him if you like, but if he goes triple dong, don’t say I didn’t warn you. Let’s see who else I’ll be looking at on tonight’s slate.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 20 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Left on Greene

July 21, 2015 | DraftKings | 29 Comments

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Remember when Shane Greene was a thing?  Those were the days, spring had just sprung and there was so much hope, so much optimism.  Your team ERA was so pretty then.  You had a shiny new toy fresh from the free agent pool and after his second of two 8 IP, 0 ER gems, you were feeling like the smartest guy your league.  Then, April 24th happened.  4 IP, 8 ER vs. the lefty-heavy Indians lineup.  Still you believed and then, 4.1 IP, 7 ER.  You were wounded, beaten, bloodied and you team ERA was approaching the double digit mark.  If this sounds familiar, it’s OK, we’ve all been there.  Now is the time to act and seek a little revenge against the one who hurt you.  It became apparent fairly early that Greene had some trouble with southpaws.  In fact, his season splits read like a hall of famer to be, lefties are slashing .349/.401/.592.  There are a handful of pitchers I adore stacking against and when Greene was optioned to AAA, I was sad to lose one of the best.  Aaron Harang and Bud Norris can only do so much here.  Greene is back now though and in his first start back in the majors proceeded to go 4.2 IP and give up 7 ERs.  There’s the Shane we know and love.  I really can’t dream up a more nightmarish match-up for Shane besides maybe the Yankees in the house that Jeter built.  Seattle can go lefty-heavy with the best of ‘em and I could easily see another 3 IP, 8 ER outing here.  There’s not a Seattle lefty I won’t be trying to squeeze into my lineup tonight and I’ll mention one or two below so you don’t forget.  Just remember, left on Greene and you’ll be on the road to sweet redemption.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 20 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Wilin To Fade Coors?

July 7, 2015 | DraftKings | 4 Comments

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DraftKings was actually a little late to the DFS party.  You’d never know it by looking at how prevalent they are everywhere.  They have done a wonderful job marketing, nabbing up partnerships with MLB and several major sports franchises along the way.  They are one of the two big fishes in the sea right now.  Back in the early days of DFS every site had a little chat box that was a place for three things usually.  1) Trash talking, 2) Whining, 3) Immature potty humor that quickly degenerated into things that you’d read on a Yahoo! article comments section.  DraftKings came into being after the chat box phenomenon had started to fade away.  It’s really no surprise these chat boxes have gone the way of the buffalo, but there are a few smaller sites where they still exist.  All of this was a long introduction into me reading one of these chats the other day and seeing someone whining about “stupid Coors stacks”.  I’m a Coors stacker, it’s what I do.  I try every way I can to get as much exposure to that place as I possibly can on a given night.  For me, it’s a worthwhile gamble and one that pays off more often than not.  It’s not everyone’s bag though, but you have to be aware of the situation.  You can always fade Coors in a  tournament, figuring most people will be on that game.  If Coors is a dud and your guys go off, you should have a nice advantage.  You could go with the flow and stack Coors, or you could just sprinkle in Coors action and pick your spots.  The final option of course, if the Coors stacks really bother you is to just sit those nights out.  No one will think any less of you.  If you are playing tonight, one name I highly discourage fading is Wilin Rosario.  Wilin is a beast with the stick and is superhuman when he’s got the platoon advantage (.325/.360/.623 career slash line).  Toss in the Coors factor and for $3,600 with eligibility at first base or catcher and there’s no excuse for fading Wilin tonight.  Here are a few more fellas you shouldn’t be fading this evening.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 18 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
MattTruss

DraftKings: Play The Rush

June 30, 2015 | DraftKings | 8 Comments

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Poker players tend to make good DFS players.  Some of the top DFS pros are former poker pros.  I think there are several reasons for this occurrence.  First, there’s the element of the grind that is familiar, then there’s of course a similar aspect with bankroll management and also there’s a familiarity with odds and statistics.  There’s a lot of carry over and I want to chat a little about one of my favorite carry overs.  Most self respecting poker players have at least perused Doyle Brunson’s Super System.  This book is a bible on playing power poker.  For those that might be unfamiliar with the book and/or the term, it’s an aggressive style of play, but not being aggressive just for the sake of being aggressive.  It’s calculated aggression.  One of my favorite takeaways from this book was playing your rushes.  The cliff notes of Brunson’s thoughts when it comes to playing a rush is this: after he wins a hand in no limit hold ‘em, he plays the very next hand regardless of what two cards he is dealt.  If he wins that hand, he’s in the very next one and so on and so forth until he loses a hand.  In each of these subsequent hands, he’s a little more loose than normal.  This is something I always do when I play cards and it carries over to DFS for me as well.  If I have a winning night, you can bet I’ll be playing the next night.  If I win again, I’ll be right in there the next night as well, this time maybe making a jump to a higher buy-in tournament than I typically play.  Rudy would probably jump all over this saying there’s no data that backs up “running hot” or being on a “heater”, but that’s no fun.  There’s times where the lineups almost build themselves and things just click.  Maybe it’s a little thought of player that you’re riding or an underpriced player you are plugging and playing (Billy Burns at under $3K for 3 weeks anyone?).  Whatever the reason, have a little fun with your winnings and take a couple shots when you’re hot.  Now, let’s get to some picks to start that hot streak.

New to DraftKings? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well try out this 18 teamer of Razzball writers and friends to wet your DK whistle. Just remember to sign up through us before you do. It’s how we know you care! If you still feel helpless and lonely, be sure to subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays.

Please, blog, may I have some more?
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