Daily Fantasy Baseball News and Updates for FanDuel and DraftKings - 8/10/16

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 got a full day of baseball ahead, with three early games featuring a noon start and a solid 12-game slate tonight that's light on aces but heavy on decent arms and offenses in good spots, so opportunities for all kinds of action abound. Let's get to it.

Personnel

• Giancarlo Stanton is out today after being removed from last night's game due to a hip issue.
• Denard Span is sitting today. That'll move Eduardo Nunez to the leadoff spot, while Gregor Blanco is filling in in CF and hitting eighth.
• Bryce Harper sat again last night as he continues to deal with a lingering neck issue. Consider him day-to-day until further notice.
• Gregory Polanco returned the Pirates lineup last night in style, blasting a three-run homer. He had missed the last week with a shoulder injury.
• After sitting for nearly a week, Cameron Maybin has been placed on the DL with a thumb injury.
• Yasmany Tomas was scratched last night due to a neck issue. He's considered day-to-day.
• X-rays were negative on Carlos Gonzalez's tweaked ankle, but it's unclear when he'll be able to return to the Colorado lineup.
• Ketel Marte has been activated from the DL after sitting for three weeks with mononucleosis.
• Scott Schebler was pulled last night with a calf issue. He's a good bet to get the day off with the Reds facing a lefty tonight.
• Geovany Soto was activated from the DL last night. Carlos Perez was sent down in the corresponding move.

Tournament Stacks

Chicago Cubs
It'll be interesting to see where the Vegas line settles on this one. The Cubs have opened as a massive favorite, but as usual, there's no over/under posted as of this morning, as oddsmakers wait to see which way the Wrigley winds will blow. Forecasts are calling for a breeze in from right, which isn't ideal, but considering the matchup, we're still feel fine about loading up on Cubs bats tonight. For starters, the Cubs are a top-10 offense against RHP this season in terms of wOBA, wRC+ and OPS. Their power numbers aren't quite as impressive, but Ricky Nolasco should help in that regard. He's giving up nearly 1.5 HRs/9 this year, and splits aren't huge factor for him. Righties have the higher wOBA, his xFIP is higher against lefties, he gives up more homers to righties (1.8 per 9), while lefties also put the ball in the air and make plenty of hard contact. So the potential is there for a big night from all the usual suspects in the Chicago lineup. Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo are your obvious building blocks, and depending on how the lineup takes shape, you should be able to stack in either direction off of them.

Los Angeles Dodgers 
Jeremy Hellickson has been mostly respectable this season, so this wasn't the most obvious stacking choice when I first pulled up today's slate, but if you're playing the early games, we think the Dodgers deserve a long look. It's pretty much all about the splits here, because when Hellickson struggles it's against lefties, who own an xFIP north of 5.00 against him this season. His ground ball-to-fly ball ratio is as favorable to hitters as you're going to find among the guys taking the hill today, and we always like to see that when we're hunting for power. Meanwhile, the Dodgers have been baseball's eighth-best offense against RHP this season, and most of that was compiled without the services of Josh Reddick, who owns a .375 wOBA in the split. Dodger Stadium isn't a great hitter's park, but you can live with the .172 ISO Los Angeles has posted there this season. The targets here are pretty clear: All the lefties are in play, but don't sleep on Justin Turner, either. Even though Hellickson has been solid against righties this season (3.22 xFIP) Turner's massive reverse splits (.381 wOBA, .247 ISO) make him a viable option on a slate that's pretty loaded at 3B.

Sneaky Pitcher

Dallas Keuchel

Here's the thing about hot streaks: they always end and we never know when the end is coming. Exhibit A: the Minnesota Twins, who went bananas on the Cleveland Indians last week, but have since returned to being the same middle-of-the-road offense they've been for most of the season. But those hot streaks linger in the collective DFS mind, and when you throw in the fact that the Twins have some guys who can hit lefties and Keuchel's 4.56 ERA, I'm guessing he's going to be lightly owned tonight. And that's a big part of the attraction here on a slate that's light on elite pitching options. Also worth mentioning: While Keuchel hasn't been nearly as good as he was in his 2015 Cy Young campaign, his xFIP is still a full run lower than his ERA, so the skills he relies on (limiting homers, inducing ground balls) haven't totally deserted him. He's also had only one real clunker in his last nine games, with eight quality starts. To be clear, we're not predicting he'll follow last week's shutout with another one, but in a decent pitcher's park, we do think he can return solid value at moderate prices (especially on DraftKings, where he's a nice SP2 option).

The "Every Lineup" Guys

Scott Kazmir

Like we alluded to above, today's slate is overrun with middle-class pitching. So when the projection system hones in on a single pitcher on that kind of slate, it's worth investigating, and the algorithm is all over Kazmir today. We'll start with the obvious, which is the Phillies. They're really bad against LHP this season, and an inexplicable big game against Madison Bumgarner notwithstanding, they're always a good offense to pick on when facing a southpaw. As for Kazmir, his 4.00 xFIP tells us he hasn't been great this year, but with more than a K per inning, he remains a guy we can use in the right matchups, and this one should qualify. While his best work comes against lefties, he's been excellent at limiting hard contact to hitters on both sides of the plate and actually owns one of the highest K percentages (26.7%) against righties of any pitcher going today. He's also been much better within the pitcher-friendly confines of Dodger Stadium, with a 3.54 xFIP at home this year. He's obviously not the safest guy, and on one pitcher sites, we wouldn't blame you for siding with Verlander in cash games. But as an SP2 and/or in your tournament lineups, Kazmir is in a good spot today. And on the early slate, he's our top choice in all formats.

Kris Bryant

Our only hesitation here is that there a lot of third basemen we like today and most of them are going to be cheaper than Bryant. So on FanDuel you might want to spread around your exposure a little bit. But on sites like DraftKings where he has multi-positional eligibility, we can stick Bryant in the outfield, and that's what we'd suggest. Like we mentioned earlier, Nolasco's splits are all over the place and we have no hesitation playing righties against him. That goes double for a guy like Bryant, who does nice work against pretty much everybody. He's put up a .374 wOBA and a .235 ISO against RHP this season. He's also homered in back-to-back games, and recency bias being what it is in DFS, that's likely to push his ownership higher, which is kind of a bummer in GPPs. But we think the matchup is too good to fade him completely, and whether you're stacking Cubs or looking for a cash game one-off, we see Bryant as one of the top offensive options available tonight.

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!