Dongers Club 2019 Preview: Cash Game Thoughts (GIFTastic)

Batting 5th … Cash Game Thoughts (GIFtastic)!

Just your normal Dongers Club GIFtastic article focused on helping with cash games.

Hello, my name is Domingo Santana, you throw me a fastball, now prepare to die.

Ah yes… CASH Game Thoughts … Let me be real fucking clear here on this. I didn’t play as much cash in 2018 as I had in prior years when I was constantly rolling out double-ups, 50/50’s, head to heads and three mans. One of the main reasons for this quite frankly was that we had some better single entry and 3-entry max tournaments open up over time and I was just going there more than normal. But I will be going back into the cash realm again in 2019 and doing such despite a few things that really irk me when it comes to cash games.

First off … The love affair with using an optimizer in cash. My honest issue here is that everyone is essentially using the same projections models to determine players on a given slate and thus we all wind up with Matt Adams at 70% ownership on a 15 game slate because he is $2300, batting fourth and facing Ivan Nova. I don’t mind losing to Matt Adams, but when I do, I don’t want to lose to 70% Matt Adams on a 15 game fucking slate at home when he double dongs. Total horse shit. Matt “******” Adams people.

The other thing that really drives me nuts (and this is honestly more than the Matt Adams shit, that was just a bad day in life) is when I click on one persons lineup and then I click on another persons lineup and …. how do I put this without offending anyone………………………… ok, I can’t.

It’s called fake ass touts who share their lineup with others in the same 11 man double-up. Guys. If we wanted to play each of you head to head then lets just do that and move on. Instead it becomes really fricken annoying sitting around and schlepping my schlong of a lineup around while jumping through hoops 24 times a month just to avoid it becoming a 10 person tournament where I gotta finish third to offset the lineup train… But yes, please go on your tout website webcast on a Saturday night and preach to us about how great a new website is for the “Players” first in the industry while you collect a check under the table from them for everyone who signs up using your promo code Pissa… or was it Shetta? Or Fetta? Ah f it… Everyone’s confused now, I’ll just stay in my lane.

Oh. Hey. Cash games. OK. Back to cash games. All my thoughts here really apply to the normal sized slates, and by normal I mean anything that is above a 6 tiny games or less… Basically a slate that has some meat on the bones. This isn’t like that crappy NBA sport where even a 5 is considered average. Nah. Size matters here. Chicks dig the long ball… 7 is nice, 8 is nicer…. But a real man is all about the 14 and 15 gamers.

PITCHING IS KING

Yes. Pitching is KING in cash games. This is where you get burned more than anywhere else and it’s the most important decision you can make every day in cash. Your hitters can all honestly be un-owned by anyone other than you in cash. The reason for this is that we can afford to lose on hitters at various positions where the range of scores isn’t as large as it is with pitching. But not with pitchers.

If your opponents are all getting a 25 from their pitchers and you wind up with a 5, you’re toast. It’s gonna be pretty rare that hitters will consistently come out and put up scores of 25’s, but for pitchers it will happen often in cash games and thus we need to be smart about our selection on pitching.

Should you chase a win? No. You want a good pitcher no matter what. If a pitcher is consistently not throwing past the 5th inning then I do not want any part of them on most situations. I don’t care if your Uncle is facing the Miami Marlins, I’m not gonna roster him until he can prove that he will throw 90+ pitches and can manage to pitch into the 6th inning even if he is only 5k.

This is honestly the hardest rule to follow in cash though. It doesn’t mean that you should always spend up for pitching. NOT-AT-ALL! It means that you need to be getting a reliable arm here and usually this means we are shopping in the B tier level of arms for pitchers that will have an increased % of strikeouts and are facing a weaker opponent. On FanDuel, it’s so soft in pricing that fading someone like Chris Sale or Max Scherzer in cash is usually a nightmare, but sometimes its your only way to get different if you have a solid B option like Robbie Ray who can atleast keep things close. But on DraftKings where we pick two guys, it’s a field wide open to get the two best arms PT/$ possible.

“Hitter X is GPP Only”

Turn on some bad MLB DFS advice or sign up for a shady DM/WebEx/Google Hangouts tout service and you are surely bound to hear this phrase at some point. It’s simply retarded.

Did you know that even Mike Trout can go 0-4? Yes. (It’s an inside running joke here at Scout). Someone once said that and we just laugh at it. No shit. Hitters are often going to post zero’s and even in the most optimal situations.

There’s a very specific criteria I have for optimal plays in cash.

Batting Order: Someone who is batting at the top of the order, preferably 1-3, but ok to be 4th or 5th if they’re a legit power bat in a great spot.

Batting on the road: I want the extra at bat. Shocking I know. But I want a team who I know is batting in the 9th inning

Good ballpark in good hitting conditions: This isn’t that hard folks.

Someone who is … wait for it … A GOOD FRICKEN HITTER: Newsflash. Brett Gardner isn’t that good of a hitter anymore. The guy hit .236 last year with 12 HR in 609 PA… You think I want to play him just because he is at home against the Texas Rangers and he is leading off on a 74 degree day? Meanwhile I can have David Peralta in Arizona against the San Diego Padres??? What world are we living in. No. I’m not gonna force myself into Brett Gardner because an opto is spitting him out and he is going to be 70% owned and “OH MY GOD THE WORLD IS CRASHING BRETT GARDNER GOT A 7 AND I DIDNT PLAY HIM”.

I want my cash line-up to place in a tournament … Yep. The lineup I build for cash should be suitable for a single entry contest as well. Simply put, I am going above and beyond that 50% placing threshold that so many say you should be targeting. The entire world is playing lineups that are going for that range and you’ll find that one mistake is gonna put you behind it. But the point difference between a 50/50 and a Double-Up is marginal. So put me in that tier where I’m gonna have to be in the top 40-45% to double my money, but let’s get aggressive and not lazy and lets aim for the top 20% if things are all going right. This means I’m getting homers from my bats and yes, I’ll even play multiple guys from the same team in my cash lineup.

Here are the MISTAKES made in cash.

A complete punt on a pitcher who is going to throw 3 innings but he is min price. Yeah, so you paired Max + Dippity Dip-Schmidt arm over there and he got you a 6 with Max’s 25. Wonderful, I can find bats at different prices to offset your “GOTTA HAVE COORS GUYS IN CASH” mentality and pay up for that second SP.

You dont gotta play COORS in cash. You just dont.

Playing 80% of your bankroll in cash and 20% of it in GPP. Honestly… Why? If you want to really win money in cash then play 200% of your bankroll in cash and whatever amount you want in tournaments. Play the amount you want to win in a tournament in cash otherwise you are just doing it for fun.

Playing Matt Adams

Building one position at a time starting with P, P then C, then 1B, etc….

Simply put, you should be locking in your top 3 plays of the day first. The guys who are clear above everyone else at their position where you gotta lock them in and then go from there. If a position is pretty thin then don’t over think it and just take the best mid range player there.