Daily Fantasy Baseball News and Updates for FanDuel and DraftKings - 7/20/16

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

It's Wednesday, and that means double the DFS fun. We've got a true split slate today with seven day games (not counting the Braves/Reds or the Cards/Padres makeup game) and seven more on the docket tonight. Let's get to it.

Personnel

• Adam Duvall is sitting today for the Reds. It's apparently just a rest day for the Cincinnati slugger.
• Anthony Rendon was out again Tuesday due to illness, and it's apparently going around the the Nationals clubhouse, as Stephen Drew was unavailable for the same reason last night. Keep an eye out for updates. Rendon, who previously hadn't missed a game this season, has been out since Saturday.
• Ketel Marte also missed last night's game due to illness. It's the second straight the Mariners shortstop has missed and he was replaced again by Shawn O'Malley, who was slotted at the top of the order on Tuesday.
• Looks like we're in the midst of some sort of flu epidemic specific to MLB infielders. Corey Seager also missed last night's game with a stomach virus, and like the rest of those mentioned above, consider him day-to-day for now.
• Hyun Soo Kim has been placed on the DL with illness. Just kidding. It's the same hamstring injury that's kept him sidelined since before the All-Star break.
• Jhonny Peralta has been placed on the DL with a thumb injury, and April darling Jeremy Hazelbaker has been recalled to take his roster spot.
• X-rays came back negative on Matt Wieters' foot, and the Orioles backstop is considered day-to-day for now.
• Chris Davis missed last night's game due to illness. Not kidding this time. He's missed the last couple of games now and had to be taken to the hospital to receive fluids over the weekend.
• Mark Teixeira continues to sit with discomfort in his foot, and it's unclear as of now when he'll be ready to return to the Yankees' lineup.
• The Pirates activated Francisco Cervelli off of the DL on Tuesday. He hit sixth and logged a stolen base in his return.
• Joc Pederson is back off the DL and went 1-for-5 with a pair of RBIs last night.

Tournament Stacks

Tampa Bay Rays
As always, you're going to want exposure on both sides at Coors, even if, like me, you're tempted to fade the Rockies out of pure spite after last night's four-hit blunder. We're siding with the Rays tonight, not because we're bitter toward Colorado, but becauuse we're expecting to see a Tampa lineup full of righties more than capable of lighting up Jorge de la Rosa. Tampa Bay has been a little on the boom-or-bust side all year, but they've been most reliable against lefties, ranking third in MLB in wRC+, fourth in ISO and sixth in wOBA in the split. It's worth noting here that de la Rosa has been slightly (and confoundingly) better at home over the course of his career, but regardless of locale, he's a pretty mediocre dude and is giving up more than 1.5 HRs/9 this season. Righties own a .380 wOBA against him this season, and make enough hard contact (31-plus percent) to overcome de la Rosa's ability to coax grounders.

Detroit Tigers
They are dead to me.

Boston Red Sox
Even with Coors on schedule, it's the Red Sox who have today's highest projected total in Vegas, and we tend to agree with the betting markets here. Boston remains MLB's best lineup against righties in terms of wRC+, wOBA and OPS, and today they'll have the offensive luxury that comes with facing Matt Cain. Cain, you'll remember, kinda sucks. He's making his first start in about a month after spending time on the DL and getting slapped around (4 IP, 9 runs) in his rehab start last week. Prior to that, he was getting pounded by big leaguers. For a long time, Cain was able to outpitch his peripheral stats, but that skill deserted him about three years ago, and over the last couple of seasons his ERA has been much more in line with his xFIP (both hovering in the 5.00 neighborhood). Digging a little deeper, it only looks better for the Red Sox today. Cain's ground-ball percentage is at its lowest point (35.3%) since 2008, and righties are putting up more than 1.6 HR per 9 (and a 32.7% hard contact rate and 44% fly ball rate say that's no fluke).

Sneaky Pitcher

Marcus Stroman

A lot of the pitching options today are pretty gross. At first blush, Stroman might fall under that description as well; he's got an ERA north of 5.00 and he's pitching in a great hitter's park, and those two factors should keep his ownership low. But we think he's worth a look as an SP2 or in tourneys on FanDuel, mostly because the Diamondbacks don't really scare us and the other pitching options aren't unfadeable. Make no mistake, we're chasing a win here if we're playing Stroman on FanDuel, because he's not a threat to reach double-digit Ks. But Arizona is a middle-tier offense against righties and can be neutralized (as Aaron Sanchez showed last night) by a pitcher who can keep the ball on the ground. That's one area where Stroman excels (nearly 60% GBs this year), and it's a big reason we think he's a decent option to help you fit in some of those expensive bats at Coors and on his own team.

The "Every Lineup" Guys

Bryce Harper

The projection system's love of Bryce Harper cannot be tamped down by a sub-.250 batting average and it's distrust of Bud Norris is greater than a month or so of decent results can overcome. If you're a frequent reader here, you know Harper is one of the most popular picks in this section for reasons we detail frequently: he walks more than he strikes out, he gets on base nearly 40 percent of the time, and he's among the best power/speed guys in baseball this year.  As for Norris, he's shown some improvement this year as a result of a change in his pitch mix. It was enough to raise his value in the trade market, but a 4.17 ERA and a 3.94 xFIP tell us he's not the kind of guy we have to avoid. Lefties are still hitting him extremely well (41 percent hard contact, .373 wOBA), so we're happy to pay Harper's upper-middle class salary tonight.

Miguel Cabrera

Sigh. After burning untold bankroll on them the last two nights, I just don't have the fortitude to the recommend stacking the Tigers again, even though the matchup isn't bad. That said, ignoring the value on a moderately priced Miggy would be a less-than-optimal approach, so here we are. On the day slate, the projection system likes nobody better than Cabrera, slotting him at 1B in virtually all optimal lineups on FanDuel and DraftKings. Part of that is his pricing. On FanDuel, for example, 10 first basemen are more expensive, including Marwin Gonzalez. He's similarly priced on DraftKings, and that's simply too cheap for a guy with 18 HRs, a .207 ISO and a .361 wOBA this season. Those numbers are somewhat less than peak-Miggy, but they're still pretty good (say it with me), especially for the price.  Ervin Santana isn't terrible, but he actually surrenders more hard contact, fewer ground balls (just 33%) and more homers against righties this season, so he's a fine guy to target today. So if you've got the steady hand required, we think Cabrera's your choice for cash games on the day slate.

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!