Welcome everyone to Ben’s Pitching Preview! This season I will be getting back to my roots and focusing on my top SP options for each slate. After all, a SP breakdown was my first ever regular article on this site when I started providing content many years ago.
Our Core Plays have been great to start the season, you can pick up a package here.
Let’s get into it!
Corbin Burnes
Burnes needs no introduction, as he was a regular feature in this article last season. People have finally caught on to how good he really is, but it’s remarkable that just two seasons ago he was essentially the worst starting pitcher in baseball. Since the start of the shortened season last summer, his strikeout rate sits at just under 40%. As of right now, this is a top-five pitcher in baseball in my mind. Despite that, he is only $10,400 in salary on DraftKings! To top it all off, he matches up with the Marlins who have a combined strikeout rate of 25% as a team over the last two season. I won’t get cute on Monday, and will be building around Cy Burnes in all formats.
Trevor Rogers
We have an absolutely loaded mid-tier tonight, with tons of above-average pitchers. The one that sticks out to me most is Rogers, who is someone I have rostered for all but one start of his this season. If you are someone that plays DFS but doesn’t watch a ton of baseball, I encourage you to turn this game on tonight and watch Burnes and Rogers duel it out. He’s young, only 23, but is one of the collection of promising young pitchers on this Marlins team. Since his debut, he owns a rock-solid 3.63 xFIP with over 30% strikeouts and 15% swinging strikes. He does give up hard-contact to both sides of the plate, but is a really good young pitcher. What’s working for him even more tonight, is the match-up with Milwaukee. Christian Yelich is still on the injured list, and there’s just nobody to fear in this lineup right now. Since the start of last season, the projected lineup has a low n extremely-low .125 combined ISO vs LHP. They also strike out a ton, and don’t draw a lot of walks. I’m expecting a pitchers duel at American Family Field tonight. Side note, bring back Miller Park, that was a much better name!
Shohei Ohtani
Ohtani is underpriced on DK, and is worth a look in tournament formats on Monday night. I’m the biggest fan of him you’ll find, but still not at the place where I could roster him in cash games. If anything, that will keep his ownership low which is what we want in GPPs, especially with all these guys priced similarly to him. This is the first time in nearly a century the leagues HR leader will make a start, and it’s in a great match-up vs the Rangers. Since the start of 2020, the Rangers projected lineup strikes out 23% of the time vs left-handed pitching with a combined wOBA below .300. The nearly 16% walks is the only concern with Ohtani, but he has big-time K upside and if we catch him on the night he has control he is going to post a monster DFS score.
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
