That’s what we’re all chasing here, right?  The White Whale.  We’re all obsessing over this silly little game in the hopes of hitting that four…five…six figure payday.  We pour over stats from wOBA to z-swing % and everything in between hoping to glean some hidden gem that gives us an edge over the rest of the field.  I can only imagine the number of hours I’ve put into looking at match-ups, fiddling with lineups, checking the weather, checking Twitter and pondering game theory.  Well, tonight will be no different.  Friday nights are one of my favorite nights to play DFS.  It’s always a full or nearly full slate, game times are typically 7 EST and all the 10 EST lineups are out by the time lineups are due.  Tonight is no different, and tonight, I’m looking to clobber Tim Melville.  You’re darn tootin’ I went with a Moby Dick reference on a night I’m stacking against Melville.  If you caught that before this point in the paragraph, give yourself a hearty pat on the back for reading a book or two. This call doesn’t take a lot of pondering.  Tim Melville’s AAA numbers last year were a lovely 4.63 ERA with a 6.1 K/9 and a 4.0 BB/9.  You know how Grey uses K-rate minus BB-rate to determine how good a pitcher is real quick?  10 K/9 – 3 BB/9 = 7 = Borderline ace = Chicken diner, or something like that.  Quick math gives us Tim Melville’s difference of 2.1.  If a difference of 7 is a borderline ace, a difference of 2 is a borderline “doesn’t belong in the major leagues”.  All of your Cardinal batters are in play, righties and lefties alike.  Melville was equally generous to both handed batters in the minor leagues.  So, stack ‘em up, hope they hit and let’s see what else can find to help you catch your whale 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?

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See all of today’s starting lineups

# MLB Starting Lineups For Mon 8/11
ARI | ATH | BOS | CHW | CIN | COL | DET | HOU | KC | LAA | LAD | MIL | MIN | NYY | PHI | PIT | SD | SF | STL | TB | TEX | WSH | ATL | BAL | CHC | CLE | MIA | NYM | OAK | SEA | TOR

And if Vince V. is so money, it would make the Padres a bunch of Swingers.  Seriously, tell me Vince Velasquez wasn’t money?  He struck out 16, baby.  He only gave up three hits, baby.  He is a beautiful baby, baby.  C’mon, he’s so money.  You gotta grab him, baby, you gotta.  Call him up on waivers, go ahead, c’mon, baby, call him up.  “Hi, uh, this is a random fantasy baseballer, which is, uh, Grey’s mom’s term.  I saw you struck out 16, uh, Padres, in a shutout and I was, uh, wondering–”  Machine beeps.  Call back, baby!  Velasquez wants you to!  “Hi, Mr. Velasquez, it’s me again.  Ha, silly movie answering machines always shutting off prior to a message ending.  I mean, who even has answering machines like this anymore–”  Machine beeps.  C’mon, baby!  You’re almost through that message!  Then you can go on to direct Iron Man and be the namelganger for a Washington speech writer, while I can go do a lot of blow with Jennifer Aniston and singlehandedly ruin True Detective playing essentially myself.  You gotta, baby!  You are so money!  So, Vince Velasquez went 9 IP, 0 ER, 3 hits, zero walks, 16 Ks, and if he’s still on waivers in your league, I want to be in your league.  Yes, you should grab, like yesterday (preferably before his last start).  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

It’s been a rough season for starting pitching in the early going. If you splurged on Clayton Kershaw or pulled the trigger on Noah Syndergaard in your draft, you’re probably sitting pretty on the pitching side at the moment. However, fantasy mainstays Zack Greinke, Chris Archer, Matt Harvey, Adam Wainwright, and Justin Verlander have combined for zero wins, a 7.30 ERA, and a 1.79 WHIP thus far in 2016. Those ratios are as painful to look at as this video is. Ok, maybe not quite that bad, but still pretty awful. Caught somewhere in the middle of all of this madness is Los Angeles Angels ace Garrett Richards. He’s generally not considered to be a #1 or #2 SP in fantasy circles, but a decent #3. Good, but not great K-rate. Middle of the road ratios. Won’t kill you anywhere but probably won’t be a huge asset either. A fallback option. Is this perception of Richards accurate? What can be expected from him this season?

Let’s take a look at a few things that stand out regarding Richards:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Platoon. The word fantasy baseball owners hate and the word that makes no sense in its context to anyone outside of baseball. The word that makes you wish death upon all left handed pitchers and maybe all lefties in general. (Don’t worry, they die earlier than us pure breeds anyway. Seriously…look it up!)  (There’s also a tool for all platoon splits.)

And as we wish death to lefties, we think to ourselves… is the platoon a death sentence for your fantasy player in a shallow league? How much does it really even affect your player’s value? Well, let me do the dirty work for you.

In this write up, I show you which teams are expected to see the most lefty pitchers for their 162 game season based on the percentage of likelihood they face a lefty in any given game. It sounds like a lot, but I am the king of taking shortcuts. Instead of looking at projected starting pitchers for all 15 NL teams, I used probabilities (based on % lefties in a given teams’ rotation), to identify which platooners might be spending the most and least times on the bench.

Now if your head isn’t spinning by now, then I failed at my job. Take a look for yourself and hopefully it makes more sense:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

REL baseball logo newJust over a week’s worth of games are now in the books, and while it’s too early to look at standings in most leagues, in the REL it’s not too surprising to see who is on top.  The Cubs are crushing the NL standings especially after a night where they rockem sockemed the Reds, and the Orioles and their 7-0  undefeated start – before losing last night – lead the field in the AL.  Probably the biggest surprise thus far are those aforementioned Reds, who sit at 3rd in the NL standings with a strong start offensively.  Speaking of offensive, check out my recap for how I just got my heart ripped out in a trade ala Temple of Doom.  Kahli-ma!  Kahli-ma!  Keone Kela-ma!!!  Here’s how week two has gone down in the 2016 REL League:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Stacking against a stud pitcher on DraftKings is a lot like forgetting your pants when you get dressed in the morning. It’s normally an inexcusable mistake. However, I am about to recommend that you stack against a stud… Cole Hamels is well-regarded as one of the true aces in the game of baseball. He plays Baltimore on Thursday, and it’s not like Hamels is very homer prone. However, Thursday will be a different story as the right-handed bats in Baltimore’s lineup may just have a field day. Continue to remember your pants in the morning, but feel free to forget the rule about stacking against a stud, at least for a day.

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?

Glen Perkins hit the DL with a shoulder strain.  Or, for those of you who have Siri read these posts to them, “Sorry, Grey, there’s no set closers in the Minnesota area, would you like to open up your search to waivers?”  Thanks, Siri, I would.  “Googling theater times for The Wood.”  Ugh, Siri.  True Story Alert!  Because my pronunciation on everything is fudged up worse than See’s Candy.  I tried having Siri call a friend of mine when I was pulling up to their house to pick them up, and Siri came back with, “Calling Israeli consulate to tell them you’re outside waiting.”  I then immediately pulled over to stop a call that sounds like it would be flagged by the NSA.  So, Perkins’s situation is hairier than a merkins’ situation; Kevin Jepsen should be the first go-to guy in the pen, but he’s no guarantee.  Everyone is in play for the Twins’ job, Jepsen, Trevor May, Fernando Abad, Casey Fien and Ryan Pressly.  Jepsen has experience, May has stuff, Fernando is a Abad righty, but an okay lefty for situational saves, Fien is not F-I-N-E and Pressly is the closer if everyone else leaves the building.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

I teased this post a bit in my profile of Sean Manaea last week, and truthfully I’ve been excited about having an opportunity to write about Bradley since I took the reins in February. If there’s one thing I like more than a good looking woman in a pant suit, it’s prospects with power. Just ask some of my Razznasty league mates, they’ll tell you I’m blinded by power like Whitney was with Bobby Brown’s antics. Do I own Bradley anywhere? No, unfortunately I don’t. It’s not for lacking of trying either, but when you own a 19 year old who hit 27 homers in his first full year in pro ball you’re probably not letting him go for nothing. Not that I was offering nothing, but you get the gist. So as we always do at this time lets take a deeper look at Bobby Bradley, and see if he’s worth your tradeable assets.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

I considered entitling this post “Taking The Buy Out Of Byron”, but that might have inaccurately implied that this was a buy/sell piece. Instead, this is me saying “drop this bum”. But before you do, please read the following disclaimer. The advice herein does not apply to dynasty leagues. However, if you are in a redraft league or league in which you can only keep four or five players, I think the right move is to actually drop this potential future all star like a bad habit. Yep, I said it. In deep leagues you might want to hold on to him for sh*ts and giggles, if you’re a sh*ts and giggles kinda fantasy player.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

So J.A. Happ was almost a tourney call for me and then I looked at the Yanks so far. I looked at how their offense was rolling. I looked at how they did when everyone was healthy last year. I looked at how it seems the old guys get their licks in early in the year, and when it was all said and done? I said to myself, ‘you know how that should go’. What, you want more Drake references? Look, I ain’t hip, I ain’t with it. For visual proof, here’s Drake and I together and I gotta say…well, I gotta say my turtle neck game is also on point but yeah, you don’t want that free-styling to open the post. Rather, we should talk about what bats we want to have a Happ attack. Alex Rodriguez at $4k? Check. Mark Teixeira at $4,200? Only if you can spell his name right. A little pricy but as a contrarian play, Aaron Hicks at $4K? I used to live in the country, so I’m fine with Hicks. Carlos Beltran for salary relief at $3,600? Sure, dive right in. This world is your oyster here and I strongly suggest you shuck the hell out of it. So with that, let’s move on. Here’s my Hotline Bling takes for this Wednesday DK 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?

Noah Syndergaard steps into a giant metal milk can and submerges himself.  At first, bubbles come up, then nothing.  Only Houdini has ever been able to escape this, and even then Tony Curtis struggled to keep his life in order afterwards.  The beautiful-despite-her-pantyhose girl locks him in.  Everyone watches, and Noah just sits there, locked in.  The audience shifts, then realizes this is what they want.  They want Noah to stay this locked in.  This locked in leads to Cy Young awards.  This locked in carries teams to championships.  One man stands in the audience and screams, “Grow gills and stayed locked in!”  The crowd erupts.  Harvey’s looked just okay, that other Mets pitcher put out the welcome Matz to opposing hitters and deGrom is battling an injury.  Syndergaard?  Oh, he’s so locked in.  Yesterday, he went 7 IP, 1 ER, 8 baserunners, 12 Ks and looked like he could’ve beat the 1927 Blue Jays in Coors Field.  If you own him, ‘gaard your grill and knuckle up if anyone tries to trade you for him.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?