Welcome to our MLB DFS Building Blocks, DraftKings and FanDuel picks for 5/31/22! In this article, I’ll break down by top overall plays for today’s main slate. Last year was an extremely big year for the Karma team in MLB, and we are looking to continue that success in 2022. I will be providing Core Plays for every main slate (and day baseball) this season — you can gain access to that as well as our premium discord here. Let’s get to the plays…
Above is an example of the Core Plays given out to Subscribers on Friday May 13th
Pitcher
Tarik Skubal + Nestor Cortes
There are three “stud-level” pitchers tonight — Nestor Cortes, Tarik Skubal and Robbie Ray. Ray is projected to be the highest-owned of the trio, due to his easier match-up against the Baltimore Orioles. I wrote up George Kirby yesterday and he absolutely dominated the O’s last night. That being said, he was significantly cheaper than Ray is on Wednesday. Ray just hasn’t looked right to me the majority of the season, and I cannot see playing him as chalk over two better pitchers. Cortes has probably the toughest match-up of the bunch against the Angels, while Skubal takes on the Twins. Skubal is someone I’ve been much higher on than the field this season, and he will once again be my top option tonight on both sites.
Jeffrey Springs
I’m struggling to figure out what DraftKings is doing with Springs price. Yes, he hasn’t topped 80+ pitches in an outing yet, but he has also averaged over 20 DK points per game through two starts. He has a very good change-up, and pitch that the Rangers are not great against — and he has strikeout ability. Even though he hasn’t gone super deep into any games, he is a better pitcher than his price indicates and that makes him a top option for me on Wednesday. I’m not sure where his OWN% will end up, but he is the top point per dollar play on DraftKings and he is viable in all formats there even if he ends up chalky.
Building Blocks
Rafael Devers
Devers is my top-overall bat on Wednesday night, matched up with Hunter Greene and the Reds bullpen. Greene is a promising young arm for the Reds, but has been prone to some blowup games early on in his career. He certainly has strikeout ability, but he walks a lot of batters and relies heavily on what has been a fast, but average fastball. He’s been better vs lefties than righties this season, but Devers is so good against fastballs I can’t overlook this spot. He’s throwing the pitch over 60% of the time to left-handed batters, which is great news for Raffy. Over the last few seasons, we are looking at a .407 wOBA and 56% hard-hit rate in the split. If you isolate that to upper-90’s fastballs, the numbers are just as strong. Boston has one of the biggest team totals on the board tonight, and I love Devers in all formats.
Jose Abreu
The White Sox are also in a great spot tonight, up against Hyun-Jin Ryu who has really struggled to get right-handed batters out this season. He’s allowing over a .350 wOBA in the split, while striking them out under 12% of the time. We know that Abreu is one of the best hitters in this lineup in recent years vs left-handed pitching — and he matches up well with Ryu’s pitch mix as well. He hasn’t been the Abreu of old this season, but he still owns a 46% hard-hit rate against southpaws and is a top option on both sites tonight.
Bold Call
Rafael Devers posts 5+ total bases!
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
