Daily Fantasy MLB Hitter Stacks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/5/17 Here's where you can find some recommendations for GPP stacks to target for FanDuel and DraftKings. Find our main set of cash game picks here. Now’s your chance to get DFSR PRO, which will give you access to our MLB optimizer, our NBA Optimizer, and our new player lab! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with MLB? Be sure to read our free MLB and NBA Ebooks on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered.   WASHINGTON NATIONALS The Nats could be showing up in this space pretty often this season, because unless you subscribe to the dubious notion(s) that Bryce Harper forgot how to hit, Trea Turner was a one-year wonder, and Daniel Murphy is doomed to regress to his pre-second half of 2015 norms, there's an awful lot to like in the top of half of this lineup. More specific to tonight's game, there's an awful lot to like about most lineups facing Dan Straily. The 28-year-old righty had a solid season last year based on the surface numbers. He went 14-8 with a 3.76 ERA, and the 1.42 HRs/9 can be excused to some degree by the fact that he had the misfortune of throwing his home games in the Great American Smallpark. That said, we're not really buying it. His career FIP and xFIP are dangerously close to the 5.00 mark, due to an average K rate, below average control, and extreme fly-ball tendencies that portend homers in just about any venue. Vegas is expecting the Nats to take advantage tonight, tagging Washington with one of the highest run totals on the board, and we tend to agree. The lefties (Adam Eaton, Harper and Murphy) are clear targets, but don't shy away from Turner or Anthony Rendon either, assuming the the latter makes it into the lineup after missing Opening Day.   COLORADO ROCKIES If you're a frequent reader here, you know we haven't been shy about picking on Wily Peralta over the last couple of seasons, as his homers allowed have climbed and his xFIP has hovered just shy of 5.00. He's not the league's worst gopher baller or anything, but combined with his average command and inability to make guys miss, it's just hard to resist stacking bats against him when he's in a hitter-friendly spot like Miller Park. Outside of Coors Field, you won't find many better places to hit when it comes to home run and basic park factors. Speaking of Coors Field, its regular inhabitants aren't always a shoo-in when they leave home, but we...

Daily Fantasy MLB Pitchers for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/5/17 Here's where you can find some recommendations for tournament pitchers target for FanDuel and DraftKings. Find our main set of cash game picks here. Now’s your chance to get DFSR PRO, which will give you access to our MLB optimizer, our NBA Optimizer, and our new player lab! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with MLB? Be sure to read our free MLB and NBA Ebooks on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered.   Pitchers Rich Hill FD 9600 DK 10800 Opponent - SD (Cahill) Park - @LAD FD - 42.99 DK - 28.26 It's our first truly full day of baseball, and 15 games (including 12 on the late slate) means plenty of options. Though you've got nice choices at various price points, we think it's borderline imperative that you get some exposure to Hill, and tourneys are the ideal place to do that. The late-blooming 37-year-old is harder to trust in cash games, because he's about as fragile as they come. The Dodgers rarely let him work deeper than the sixth, and this early in the season the hook is likely to be extra-quick. That limits his probability for earning a win and/or a quality start, but otherwise, the upside is virtually limitless. Since his Sept. 2015 re-birth, Hill is whiffing better than 10.5 per 9, and despite the odds that they sunk your Kenta Maeda lineups last night, the Padres remain a lineup we like to target. They've got the lowest implied run total on the board and if Hill's curveball is diving, expect a healthy number of swings and misses. Michael Pineda FD 8200 DK 8400 Opponent - TB (Cobb) Park - @TB FD - 34.85 DK - 22.96 Pineda is the prototypical tournament play, and it's never a bad idea to play both sides when he's on the hill. He's an elite strikeout guy and does a fine job of limiting walks. But control and command aren't quite the same thing, and Pineda is prone to leaving a few fat ones over the middle of the zone a few times per outing. When you throw as hard as he does and give up more than your share of fly balls, that's not a great combo. It's one of the primary reasons for the gross disparity between his actual results (4.82 ERA) and his underlying numbers (3.30 xFIP) last season. The strikeouts should be there in this one, as the Rays had the third-highest K% vs. RHP in baseball last season, and if Tropicana Field can help limit the damage of...

Daily Fantasy MLB Pitchers for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/4/16 Here's where you can find some recommendations for tournament pitchers target for FanDuel and DraftKings. Find our main set of cash game picks here. Now’s your chance to get DFSR PRO, which will give you access to our MLB optimizer, our NBA Optimizer, and our new player lab! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with MLB? Be sure to read our free MLB and NBA Ebooks on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered.   Pitchers Lance McCullers FD 8800 DK 9500 Opponent - SEA (Iwakuma) Park - @HOU FD - 33.47 DK - 22.11 It's an interesting eight-game slate tonight, with no shortage of pitching options across the spectrum. That makes it tough to gauge which way the market will turn in tourneys, especially this early in the season. But forced to guess, I think we'll be seeing high ownership percentages on McCullers tonight. If that emboldens you to play the fade, have at it. Just be aware of the upside you'll be passing up. We're only 36 starts into McCullers' career, and he's already shown stuff that surpasses anything in his prospect scouting reports. Through 200-plus innings, he's striking out better than 10 per 9, giving up just .65 HRs/9, and coaxing a 50 percent groundball rate. He checks just about every box you're looking for ... except one. Control. The 23-year-old has yet to master his command and averaged 5 BBs/9 in 14 starts last season. That's where the risk comes in, because if he can't find his spots, all that K upside is effectively neutered. But winning tournament lineups always include some level of risk, and considering the ceiling, McCullers is a fine place to take chance tonight. Sean Manaea FD 6800 DK 7400 Opponent - LAA (Shoemaker) Park - @OAK FD - 29.01 DK - 19.11 If you've got your eye on some high-priced bats that won't fit in easily with McCullers' salary, you could do a lot worse than Manaea when shopping in the bargain bins. The 25-year-old lefty has a solid prospect pedigree and held his own as a rookie last season, putting up a 3.96 xFIP in 25 games. He really started to find his stride after a tumultuous start, dropping the xFIP to 3.56 with 8Ks/9 in the second half. He stands a good chance to improve on those numbers this year, and he'll be at home in one of the majors' best parks for suppressing offense tonight. The Angels will probably be rolling out a bunch of righties against him, and their lineup isn't as bad as...

Daily Fantasy MLB Hitter Stacks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/4/16 Here's where you can find some recommendations for GPP stacks to target for FanDuel and DraftKings. Find our main set of cash game picks here. Now’s your chance to get DFSR PRO, which will give you access to our MLB optimizer, our NBA Optimizer, and our new player lab! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with MLB? Be sure to read our free MLB and NBA Ebooks on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered.   HOUSTON ASTROS You wouldn't know it from glancing at the W/L record (because wins and losses are really bad stats for measuring starting pitcher effectiveness), but Hisashi Iwakuma took a big step back last year. He hit career highs in FIP, xFIP, ERA, BB/9 and HR/9, and a career low in K/9. Sure, he could bounce back, but now at 36 years old, we have to ask ourselves what's more likely: a return to 2014's heights or a gradual slide into oblivion? Look, I'm not saying the guy is done, but even if he turns it around in 2017, I'd say the odds are against the comeback starting tonight in Houston. The top half of the Astros' lineup is loaded (and the back half isn't bad, either), and while their big guns won't have the platoon advantage, Iwakuma has actually struggled more against righties in his career (1.42 HR/9, 4.53 xFIP). Assuming they go with something similar to their Opening Day lineup, every Houston hitter outside of Nori Aoki is in play tonight, at least to some degree. But obviously we're going to want to focus on the guys occupying the top four spots: George Springer, Alex Bregman, Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa. They're not the cheapest stack on the board, but pricing is still pretty soft right now, especially on FanDuel, and fitting them in shouldn't require too many salary cap gymnastics. SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS Patrick Corbin barely eeked his way into the Diamondbacks rotation this spring, and if Vegas is right, his grip on the fifth spot might be a tenuous one. The Giants have the highest implied run total on tonight's slate at just under 5, and though the lineup isn't loaded with the kind of firepower Houston presents, there's enough thump here to compile some nice numbers when they're in a hitter's haven like Chase Field. Because while Corbin is certainly worth picking on, the effect of the Diamondbacks' home park shouldn't be understated here. It's consistently among the best non-Coors venues for hitters, and the Giants will be in good position to take advantage tonight...

Daily Fantasy Baseball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings NLDS and ALCS - 10/13/16 Postseason DFS is not for the timid, especially when it comes to baseball. This slate, starting with today's NLDS finale between the Dodgers and Nats and wrapping up with the ALCS opener on Friday won't come with any soft matchups or obvious plays. But if you've stuck around this long, you're probably used to that. Let's get to it. In case you didn’t notice, we just released our brand new NFL DFS suite of tools including full projections, optimal NFL lineups and our Player Lab, which includes filters to help you create NFL lineups for FanDuel and DraftKings for any format. It’s a set of tools well beyond anything we’ve ever had, and something we feel will help our users *ahem* tackle the NFL season. SIGN UP NOW!   We're proud to introduce a brand new partner (and player in this space), Fantasy Factor! DFSR readers can get a bunch of sweet freebies (including a $5, no strings, no drip bonus) by signing up now! Los Angeles Dodgers at Washington Nationals Pitchers Matchup - TBD vs. Max Scherzer Oh brother. TBD, scourge of DFS postseason baseball, rears its head. The good news is that this one comes on Day 1 of the two-day slate, so we should get some advance warning ahead of first pitch and be able to adjust accordingly. Unfortunately, that does no good for your humble correspondent tasked with breaking this sucker down. Here goes: The Dodgers are mulling Julio Urias and Rich Hill with their postseason lives on the line. Whoever it is, they'll be overmatched by their counterpart from D.C. Scherzer will be our top pick for pitching on this slate due partly to the fact that he'll be twirling in a better pitcher's park than Corey Kluber, and partly due to the fact that he's awesome. The Dodgers got to him with a pair of homers in Game 1, and that's always at least a mild risk with Scherzer, who's a pretty extreme fly-ball pitcher. The Dodgers were also pretty nasty against RHP this season (2nd in MLB in wRC+), but at this point in the year, you're not getting many soft offenses, so we're riding with Scherzer's 31.5% K upside. On the Dodgers' side of the equation, FanDuel and DraftKings are both assuming it'll be Rich Hill who gets the call, so that's who we're focusing on. The 36-year-old lefty followed up on last year's September breakout with a solid, if injury-riddled 2016. He fanned more than 10 per 9 and finished with a 2.39 FIP and 3.36 xFIP. The disparity between the two numbers has to do with his minuscule HR:BB ratio, as he allowed...