Daily Fantasy Baseball Picks for ScoreStreak 6/3/14

DFSR is proud to announce we are partnering with ScoreStreak: a new, innovative style of DFS play. Gone is the salary finagling, mixing and matching, and hair-pulling that goes into setting lineups. ScoreStreak simplifies the process in an easy-to-use interface. Employing a prop-pick style, ScoresStreak leagues are specific outcome dependent with three categories: Total Bases, Hits, and for pitchers, Strikeouts.

Your goal is to hit outcomes. The higher the number, the more points you get. Choose players who will hit their marks and you win.

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Today's picks are brought to you by new DFSR contributor Mike AKA Spetty.

Total Bases

Adam Jones
Nelson Cruz and Adam Jones were #1 and 1A based on our projections, however Nelson Cruz was hit on the wrist with a pitch on Sunday and though the x-rays came back negative, I’m erring on the side of caution and recommending Jones as nothing will sap power more than a wrist injury. If I were confident that Cruz’s wrist was completely fine, he’d be my clear-cut top pick. Though Jones is not historically a lefty-masher, he has been smashing them this year to the tune of a .536 wOBA and a .340 ISO and will be facing off against the terrible Joe Saunders. Though Saunders gets crushed by everyone, he’s particularly putrid against right-handed batters, as evidenced by his wOBA of .409, 1.43 HR/9 and 4.50 K/9 vs right-handed batters last season (Saunders has only started two games this year so it’s too small of a sample size to carry any weight). Given Jones’ recent success vs LHP’s and Saunders’ struggles against RHB’s, Jones may be lucky if he’s not arrested for assault and battery after what he does to Saunders tonight.

Miguel Cabrera
Miggy can hit anyone on any given day, and that’s the bottom line. Though Miggy is historically better vs. lefties, he’s still one of the best hitters in baseball vs all pitchers regardless of their handedness. In fact, he has the 2nd best wOBA (.435) vs. righties behind only Chris Davis from 2013-present amongst all hitters with at least 150 plate appearances, and his .263 ISO is elite as well. The matchup isn’t quite as favorable as it would’ve been if he were still facing Liam Hendriks as originally anticipated, but Miggy facing Drew Hutchison doesn’t dissuade me one bit. Though Hutchison isn’t a terrible pitcher, he’s a young pitcher and they tend to be pretty mistake-prone. If he makes a mistake to Miggy, which he likely will, Miggy will make him pay dearly.

Hits

Robinson Cano
Since 2011, few hitters have hit right-handed pitching as consistently well as Cano, as indicated by his .327 batting average vs. right-handed pitchers over that period, as well as his .325 batting average against right-handed pitchers so far this year. While his power may be lacking this year, Cano’s ability to get hits vs. righties clearly isn’t. Cano’s bat has also been heating up even more recently as he has a .395 batting average over his past 10 games. Today he gets to face the underwhelming Gavin Floyd who is fresh off of Tommy John surgery. Since 2011, Floyd has allowed a batting average of .275 against right-handed batters, and though he’s averaged a respectable 7.55 K/9 vs. right-handed batters over that period, he has also allowed a batting average on balls in play (BABIP) of .311 to them. Cano rarely strikes out vs. righties (only 10.9% of the time since 2011) and has a BABIP of .333 over the same period of time. Given those combination of factors, Cano is my top play in the hits category today.

Xander Bogaerts
Though admittedly a small sample size as Bogaerts is a rookie, he’s hit left-handed pitching very well this season as his .389 wOBA and .296 batting average indicate. He also makes solid contact as evidenced by his respectable 21.2% line drive rate vs LHP. Today he faces a fellow rookie and converted reliever, TJ House. Despite his decent outing the last time out, House is nothing special. Thus far (and as with Bogaerts, this is a small sample size) he has allowed .281 batting average vs. right-handed batters, and he allows them to put the ball in play often against him as his 4.0 K/9 rate indicates. As well as Bogaerts has been hitting LHP recently and as mediocre as House is vs. RHB’s, Bogaerts is my #2 pick in the hits category tonight.

Strikeouts

Zack Wheeler
Wheeler was a pretty easy pick for me for a few reasons. The first reason is that the Cubs are just really bad. They’re striking out at a rate of 20.1% this year vs. right-handed pitchers, and Wheeler is striking out about a batter per inning. They also have one of the lowest walk rates (7.3%) vs. right-handed pitchers in the league, so they’re not taking pitchers deep into counts. This helps to alleviate the biggest concern I normally have with Wheeler: that he doesn’t always pitch very deep into games, however, as witnessed by his last outing vs. the Phillies when he fanned 9 batters in just 6.1 innings, he doesn’t necessarily need to pitch deep into this game in order to rack up the K’s. Given the lack of solid strikeout pitchers going today, Wheeler is my clear-cut #1.

Gerritt Cole
Cole is my #1a today. Though his strikeout rate is 8.0% vs. Wheeler’s 8.9%, the Padres strike out at a higher rate (21.7% vs. right-handed pitchers) than the Cubs (20.1%) do, though they do walk a little more frequently vs. right-handed pitchers than do the Cubs at 8.1%. After watching Charlie Morton fan 9 Padres in 5 innings last night, I shudder to think how many Padres the far-superior Cole should strike out tonight…