Daily Fantasy Baseball News and Updates for FanDuel and DraftKings - 6/7/2016

Welcome to the daily MLB updates and news article. We'll try and update it right up to line-up locks with as much information as comes across our desks. Let's get to it!

Last night's picks can be found here, so you can wrap your mind around what you need to be looking at before lineups lock today.

By the way - we keep our projection system updated with all of the batting lineup changes as they occur throughout the day right up until lineup lock. Every day. If you want access to that system so you can cut out a lot of the research element, click the button below!

What We Know

We've a full 15-gamer tonight with gobs of options, especially on the offensive side. As of noon Eastern, the betting markets have 11 teams with a run expectancy of 4.5 or higher, which is unusually high. That should translate into plenty of places to turn in search of DFS value tonight. Let's get to it.

Personnel

• Jhonny Peralta is expected to be activated from the DL today, forcing Kolten Wong back to the minors. The plan is to play Peralta at 3B, Matt Carpenter at 2B and leave Aledmys Diaz at SS.
• Mariners SS Ketel Marte has been activated from the DL. He went 1-for-3 with a steal and a run scored in his return last night.
• Jorge Soler was removed from last night's game with a hamstring injury and could require a DL stint. Stay tuned for more news today.
• David Peralta returned from the DL last night, going 2-for-3 with a homer. He was hitting sixth, but could be moved up if he proves rust-free after a month off.
• Cheslor Cuthbert left last night's game with an elbow injury. From a DFS perspective, his absence is most meaningful if it assures continued playing time for Whit Merrifield, who slid over from 2B to 3B last night.

Tournament Stacks

St. Louis Cardinals
Hey, if you want to fade the Cards based on John Lamb's inexplicable seven innings of one-run baseball in Coors Field last week, go right ahead. But we still think Lamb is bad, and so do the Cincinnati Reds, apparently. Before opting to send Jon Moscot down to make room for Anthony DeSclafani, they were toying with the idea of removing Lamb or Alfredo Simon from the rotation. As they say, you can learn about a guy from the company he keeps and Lamb has fallen in with the wrong crowd. Despite last week's solid outing, his numbers–both peripherals and surface stats–are still awful. He's striking out less than five per nine, walking nearly four per nine and he's been generous with the home run offerings. Exacerbating today's predicament is the fact that the Great American Ballpark is the one of MLB's best venues for homers and the Cardinals have one of the top offenses in baseball. They've actually been better against righties this season, but that doesn't discourage us much in this matchup. Vegas has them pegged for the highest expected total on the board today, and we tend to agree.

Baltimore Orioles
Yordano Ventura is also coming off a solid performance, yielding just one earned run over six innings last week at Cleveland, so maybe the formerly exciting young fireballer is getting things figured out. But we're betting against it. His strikeouts and swinging strike percentage are way down this season, and his command has been atrocious. He's always struggled to find the zone consistently, but in 2016 he's walking 5.11/9, while striking out just 5.98/9. He's also been plagued by the long ball. In fact, his two starts at Cleveland are his only ones away from his pitcher-friendly home park in which he hasn't given up at least one home run. That could be trouble against Baltimore, and especially in Camden Yards, which ranked fifth in MLB for home run factors last year. The Orioles' lineup features power throughout, giving us lots of options to stack, and they lead the AL in ISO while trailiing only the Red Sox in wOBA vs. RHP this year.

Sneaky Pitcher

Julio Urias

It's getting to the point where slotting in whoever is facing the Braves doesn't qualify as sneaky any more (though it's usually pretty profitable). Even Colin Rea could be pretty popular in Petco today, and we're thinking Urias might be more off the radar after a couple of rough outings to start his major league career. Granted, playing the 19-year-old phenom is something of a leap of faith, but in a couple of tournament lineups, we think you can take the plunge. He's a nice-sized favorite, which always helps on FanDuel and other sites that award big points for wins, and Dodger Stadium is one of the best pitcher's parks in baseball. Also: the Rockies rank 27th in the league in wRC+ against lefties and sport a middling .307 wOBA away from Coors Field this season. Of course, that doesn't cover up the fact that Urias has been roughed up his first two times out; by the Cubs (which is notable, because they're really good) and by the Mets, when he walked four guys in less than three innings in his debut. While the context is important, it doesn't give us warm feelings about playing the kid against the Rockies, who have some bats that can definitely hurt him. What we're betting on here is Urias' upside at a discount. He's already flashed some of the stuff the scouts have raved about, and he showed improvement between his first two starts. He's still far from cash-game reliable, but throwing as the favorite in a friendly venue against a lineup that strikes out a fair amount in the split, we think he's GPP-playable.

The "Every Lineup" Guys

Jose Altuve

There's a core of 4-6 guys that the projection system is all over today on both sites (hint: Giancarlo Stanton is $2.9K on FanDuel and facing a mediocre lefty. Spirit-crushing slump aside, that's tough to overlook). But we're going with the two who feel like are the most reliable sources of production, and it's hard to do better than Altuve in that regard. The 26-year-old is on pace for a career year and performing like one of the best hitters in baseball thanks to improving power and a new-found patience at the plate. It's coalesced in a .408 wOBA and .968 OPS this season. Throw in his AL-leading 17 steals and .499 wOBA against southpaws and you've got an absurd blend of safety and upside. Even against a good lefty like Cole Hamels, the projection system sees that as too good to pass up in Global Life Park.

Manny Machado

If you're looking for a softer BvP matchup, consider Machado (or Bryce Harper vs. Mat Latos). As mentioned above, Yordano Ventura is scuffling at a level even John Lamb would find shameful, and Machado falls just behind Altuve with a .405 wOBA through the first two months of 2016. He also ranks fifth in the majors in slugging percentage (.600) and is doing the bulk of his damage against RHP this season, continuing a trend of reverse splits that first emerged in 2014. He owns a 1.002 OPS in the split this season, and hitting in front of Mark Trumbo and Chris Davis, he should see as many pitches to hit as Ventura can muster.

One other note: There are big differences between DraftKings and FanDuel pricing so the optimal lineups are looking quite different.

These are players that show up in each of the top 10 lineups as produced by our lineup optimizer. This doesn't necessarily mean that they're "safe," it just means that their projected weighted-mean point total is a solid building block for a great lineup foundation today.

Good luck out there today! If you want access to all of our numbers, get started with a free trial below of our lineup optimizer, on us!