The Dongers Club - Mon, August 10th

SLATE INTRO

Tough way to end the week with the pitching debacles and injuries that we had yesterday and I take full blame for not rolling out a GIFtastic article last Friday like I should have. That’s on me.

One continuing piece of advice is to note how many teams are using DEEP bullpens right now and the hitters have no clue what these guys are throwing most of the time. The Indians/White Sox game is a great example and here’s a list of the White Sox bullpen arms who had pitched in the 5 days leading up to last nights game:

That’s a crap ton of arms. So this idea that you shouldn’t have looked at at 7 inning only game yesterday gets a little diminished when you consider how random the bullpen variance is right now, no? At any rate, it will settle out at some point but we gotta remain focused on two things.

Who is locked in right now and thus players we are seeing consistently get on base or have good At Bats.
Who has no clue right now, but when they might be showing signs of breaking out.

These are your daily hitting choices and you MUST be looking at things through the lens of an entire series. Honestly, that part is no different than any other season.

Worst bullpens on this slate as of right now:

Seattle
San Diego (strength is in the back end, this should change though)
SF Giants
Texas
NY Mets

Best bullpens on this slate as of right now:

Dodgers
Athletics … Dominant
Rockies
Tampa Bay
Milwaukee

WEATHER

Quiet and clear

This is a very mediocre pitching slate today. Nobody who pops out as a clear cut must own but lots of guys who are kind of right down the middle in terms of being able to offer some value. A good evening to take a risk or two for those of you on DraftKings with your SP2.

Kyle Gibson

After getting destroyed early in his last game against Oakland he settled down and got through 6 solid innings with 9 strikeouts mid last week before his bullpen blew the game late. The Seattle Mariners come to down and they are near the bottom statistically in most categories when we sum things up. It is only 91 today which makes me wonder if they’ll ever open the roof down there. I doubt it.

Well shit. They just opened the roof. All in fellas. All in. Let’s see how this plays out..

Dallas Keuchel

Maybe Keuchel is just an AL guy? He’ll be getting a Detroit team who had two magical days in Pittsburgh and then cooled off as expected yesterday. Keuchel is good at getting a ton of ground balls and the Tigers will gladly give him all of those today. Never a huge strikeout pitcher he is coming off an impressive 8K performance against the Brewers last week and that will give some folks hope. Don’t fall into that trap, if you get 5K from him you’ll be happy, but 7 Innings is a strong possibility and he’s a fantastic DK play today sitting at $7800.

Outside of the Box

Logan Webb

Houston obviously is struggling having just played the Athletics in Oakland, but with Springer banged up and still no Yordan Alvarez the luster that they have as an offense does have to settle in as losing a hit does it not? At only 6 foot tall, Logan Webb does a very good job of mixing up his pitches and that’s a major plus for the pitcher when the opponent doesn’t know you very well. I expect the Astros struggles to continue and will be playing the Giants to win this game as well. Really expect Logan Webb to have a nice sneaky performance and would look at him as a third option today.

Guys I am not using

Dustin May: Yeah, you go right ahead and use him against Tatis and company.
Randy Dobnak: Sorry but he feels like his first name should be Larry. Anywho, the Brewers look Verrrrry tempting to pick on every day but this is not a game I would touch Dobnak in.

The bats… The bats are waking up. We have two PRIME hitting spots tonight, mostly Coors Field but a couple others which leap out.

These four teams are not ranked necessarily in order and I continue to promote spreading out ownership across 3 to 4 teams ( not 8 one offs) but each lineup should be about 3 teams as the core. Trust the rankings by position at the bottom for my preference at each spot.

L.A. Dodgers

Justin Turner, Joc Pederson, Cody Bellinger

Mookie is feeling it quite well right now and it’s only a matter of time until Bellinger had a stud game. But when we see Luis Perdomo on the slate the players I love to use are RH bats who are sitting between two lefties. What would be an ideal lineup to me today is some form of L-R-L-R-L-R, but good ole Dave Roberts probably doesn’t do that. The reason for this with Perdomo is everyone see’s he struggles with getting hammered by LH bats, but after he gives up a double to one and has another on deck, he’ll be shitting his pants having flashbacks of Nolan Arenado beating the shit out of him while Justin Turner steps in and hammers a 2-0 slider out into the parking lot.

Worth noting: The Padres bullpen is very good on paper but carries a high 5+ ERA coming into this game. Most of their strength is on the backend, so if it gets out of hand early they could punt it.

Arizona Diamondbacks

Starling Marte, Ketel Marte, Eduardo Escobar

The rule I have the most success when it comes to Coors Field is play 0 to 4 batters there and not more when we have a normal weeknight slate. The thought process on Coors Field match-ups is to evaluate them just like any other game first and remove the stadium factor from your mind. #1: The temperature here is in the mid to upper 80’s (Good for hitting). #2: The wind is blowing 11 mph out to left center field (Good for hitting). #3: The pitchers are Robbie Ray (gives up a shit ton of hard contact, but has a decent bullpen behind him) and Jon Gray (A Guy the opponent knows extremely well and has a mediocre at best pen behind him). So this game could be played in say (*** thinks of a random middle of the road stadium ***) … oh I dunno – Seattle – and I would think you should definitely consider it. Throw in Coors and it’s a game we’re jumping on. But we have other hitting spots so we don’t need 8 Coors players in our lineups.

From Arizona (the side I lean heavily on), we do however want Starling Marte, all the Starling Marte who comes in on a good streak and even on DK is affordable (Everyone on FD is affordable). Kole Calhoun and the extremely underpriced Eduardo Escobar/David Peralta

I honestly didn’t have much desire for Colorado, but the whole world is going to look here and try to squeeze in the cheaper D’Backs with guys like Hampson and Kemp while Story and Arenado at 6k+ on DK come in farther lower than we expect. Just saying.

Spots I really like…

If not for Coors and the change to Perdomo for the Padres pitching, these two spots would be #1 and #2

Oakland Athletics

Marcus Semien, Matt Olson, Matt Chapman, Mark Canha, Robbie Grossman

Julio Teheran will try again to make his American League debut. There’s long been a theory that a pitcher who was always an NL guy that flips to the AL will struggle early and well Julio Teheran is no stranger to struggling period. Not as warm as I was hoping in Anaheim/LA area today — but the Athletics come in white hot and should be your low owned play today. Sorry to list so many, but I really like Oakland to put up a 7 spot in Anaheim.

Tampa Bay Rays

Austin Meadows, ~~Willy Adames,~~ Hunter Renfroe, Yandy Diaz

Hello Austin Meadows week 2020! We’re back to chasing these damn Rays as they go on the road and get a fairly good park shift. Tampa over the past few years has gone into Boston and absolutely murdered Boston pitching. Given the staff Boston has this year, it should continue.

CATCHER

I have long believed that Monday’s, Tuesday’s and Friday’s are the three days you see catchers do well and it’s entirely tied to the fact that most of the time they’re coming in after an off day. Catchers obviously take more wear and tear and getting a day off helps them tremendously. The history has proved this to be accurate and today is a Monday and what do you know, Mr. Monday fanboy himself pops off today. We have the ole catcher trifecta. a) It’s Monday, b) Ramos is facing his former team and c) …. oh boy. It’s his BIRTHDAY!??!!??!?! Next. Question.

Wilson Ramos – $2800 on DK, it’s a no brainer.

FIRST BASE

Matt Olson
Jose Abreu … Abreu is always a streaky guy and comes in with just his 2nd HR of the season last night. Abreu has been a Tiger murderer and Comerica Park destroyer. I likely will not have him today but I most certainly will this week as they visit the Tigers.
Brandon Belt

SECOND BASE

Garrett Hampson … Cant wait for him to be leadoff at $4300 on DK today. Sigh…
Keston Hiura
Luis Arraez … Value pivot

THIRD BASE

Because it’s deep and good today there’s no reason for me to spend up for Arenado.

Matt Chapman
Eduardo Escobar
Yandy Diaz
Justin Turner

SHORTSTOP

With Story and Tatis being guys you might think about here first, I’d rather spend up at 3B and 2B than here at SS tonight.

Marcus Semien
Leury Garcia
Nick Ahmed
Trea Turner … Probably the coldest player in the universe…. Gut feeling he turns it around this week starting today against Matz.

OUTFIELD – Mt. Rushmore

Starling Marte
Austin Meadows
Cody Bellinger
Mike Yastzemski … You may have noticed I made zero reference to Lance McCullers. It’s because I really like Giants to upset the Astros tonight.

Outfield – Tier 2

Max Kepler
Michael Conforto
Mookie Betts
Joc Jamz

Outfield – Value

Mark Canha
Alex Dickerson
David Peralta / Kole Calhoun

BEST CONTEST REFRESHER

These are the things I look for the most and encourage you to do it as well. We are all going to chase big $ contests w/ multiple lineups and that is fine, but you need balance in your MLB portfolio, so add the Dongers Club Growth Funds:

10x to first: This one is going to be hard for many of you but it’s the #1 golden rule to staying profitable during the MLB grind. You need these contests mixed in more than you realize. What is 10x to first? It means that the prize for 1st Place which everyone obsesses with is 10x the entry fee. So yeah, that means a $10 contest pays out $100 to first. Or my favorite $100 pays out $1000. You are thinking what’s the point? These type of contests usually aren’t as common and they’re a waste of time, I want my 50x to first!! Well, guess what. You will find that you win these 10x to first contests far often and that type of boost is way better than any other you will find. They’re smaller and usually have folks who are late registering their contests in them. Find these. Play these.
Less than 1,000 Users: Very simple rule. Avoid contests that have too many users. A big misconception is that MME is hard to beat and you cant beat someone with a single lineup if they have maxed out the limits on a contest. Not true. The more lineups they are putting in the chances are more bad lineups as well. It comes down to the TOTAL number of users you have to beat. Fewer is better.
Get out of the $1 and $3 and $5 contests: If you are living here, you aren’t about making money. Sorry.
Play a 3-man to bust a slump: Yes, they are full of what folks call Sharks. No, they are not invincible. When you’re in a slump, play one of these.

Austin Meadows – OF – Rays – Chairman of the Dongers Club
Wilson Ramos – C – Mets
Trea Turner – SS – Nationals
Jose Abreu – 1B – White Sox
Matt Chapman – 3B – Athletics
Keston Hiura – 2B – Brewers
Mike Yazstremski – OF – Giants
Starling Marte – OF – Diamondbacks
BONUS ……….. Justin Turner – 3B – Dodgers

BETS

White Sox / Tigers UNDER 9
San Francisco Giants ML
Oakland A’s 1st 5 Innings