The MLB Breakdown offers data-driven analysis using the FantasyLabs Tools and predictive metrics to highlight notable players within our MLB Player Models.
MLB DFS Pitching Picks
MLB DFS Stud Pick
Bryan Woo (R) $9,000 Seattle Mariners (-185) vs. Los Angeles Angels
For the second straight day, we have a Mariners starter as the top play on the board, as they continue their home series in the best pitcher’s park against the highest-strikeout team in baseball against right-handed pitching. Seattle seemingly has an endless supply of right-handed pitching with similar stats and profiles, including Woo.
What’s interesting about his numbers this season is that his ERA of 4.26 is about a run higher than his ERA predictors, where we’d expect the opposite given his home ballpark. Where that effect shows up is in his splits: his ERA at home this year is 2.00, and on the road it’s above 6.00. While I don’t expect that degree of variability to continue, it’s directionally correct.
The Seattle pitcher archetype I spoke about above includes a moderate strikeout rate in the mid-20s, which is where Woo finds himself at 24.6%. That’s what makes this matchup with the Angels so appealing, since they typically boost right-handed pitchers’ strikeouts considerably.
Woo is underpriced here thanks to his road stats dragging his overall numbers down and has a considerable ceiling thanks to the matchup. It’s hard to ask for much more at $9,000. He leads all pitchers in median, ceiling, and Pts/Sal projection and is the clear best option on the board – which explains his 50%+ ownership projection even on a strong slate for pitching.
MLB DFS Value Pick
Brandon Sproat (R) $6,500 Milwaukee Brewers (-173) vs. Cincinnati Reds
The second-best Pts/Sal option on the board comes in the form of a much cheaper option, Milwaukee righty Brandon Sproat. The 25-year-old rookie doesn’t have great numbers overall this season with a 5.43 ERA. However, he seems to have hit his stride in June.
He’s gotten consistently better each month this season, with his ERA in June at 3.48 with just over 20 innings pitched. In some cases I’d dismiss that as noise, but for a player with less than 100 MLB innings under his belt, it’s entirely possible that he’s starting to get a feel for pitching at the big-league level.
His improvements culminated in a dominant performance his last time out against these same Cincinnati Reds. He struck out ten over six innings of one-hit ball last week, finishing with a massive 36.30 score on DraftKings.
This game is in Milwaukee, whereas last week was in Cincinnati, which is a considerable park factor upgrade, making this an even better spot in theory. On the other hand, my pet theory is that starters struggle when facing a team consecutively, as the opponents are more familiar with their stuff. I don’t have any data to support it, but anecdotally I’ve seen it a few times this season.
With all that said, even if Sproat put up half the DK points as he did last time out, he’d still probably be in the tournament-winning lineup, so the risk is fairly limited against an opponent who ranks 29th in both wRC+ and strikeouts against right-handed pitching.
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MLB DFS Tournament Picks
Tarik Skubal (L) $10,000 Detroit Tigers (+115) at New York Yankees
Skubal has now made three starts since returning from the injured list, with largely better results each time. His most recent outing was a six-inning performance against these Yankees in which he struck out nine but also allowed four runs on three home runs. The homers have been the issue since he returned, with six of them given up in the 16 innings since coming back, compared to just two in his previous 40+ IP this season. Obviously the upside is there via his strikeouts, so if he can keep the ball in the yard, he could break the slate – though that’s a tougher task in New York, between the park factor and the matchup. On the plus side, this is one of the few games without a huge bump to home runs due to the weather.
Cam Schlittler (L) $10,500 New York Yankees (-125) vs. Detroit Tigers
It’s notable that Schlittler is favored over Skubal in this matchup, though that has plenty to do with the offenses behind them. Still, his 1.62 ERA and 29.9% strikeout rate this season are Skubal-esque, and Detroit is a slightly below-average team against southpaws. The weather factor obviously applies to Schlittler as well, and he’s projecting for very low ownership. That makes him an excellent pay-up to be a contrarian tournament pivot from the extremely chalky Woo.
MLB DFS Hitters and Stacks
Notable Stack
With the Lineup Builder, it’s easy to incorporate stacks into DFS rosters.
Also, don’t forget that for large-field tournaments, you can utilize our Lineup Optimizer to effortlessly create up to 300 lineups.
The top DraftKings stack in the FantasyLabs MLB Player Model when generated by rating using our tournament model belongs to the Miami Marlins:
The Marlins delivered as promised in the first game of their series at Coors Field yesterday, beating the Rockies 10–7 in what looked like a Dolphins-Broncos score more than a Marlins-Rockies score.
The setup is virtually identical today, with unusually hot temperatures and winds blowing out adding to the typical Coors Field park factors. While the 7% or so boost to home runs from the weather isn’t huge, that’s relative to the typical game at Coors, not the league average, so it’s a pretty significant bump.
They also have another extremely winnable matchup, this time against Tanner Gordon ($6,000). His 2026 ERA is 6.37 through 25 innings and was also in the 6.3 range last season. With a 50%-plus fly-ball rate and relatively low strikeout rate, he has a terrible profile for a starter in Colorado.
Miami isn’t exactly cheap, but they aren’t prohibitively expensive either, making them a pretty obvious top option today.
Not interested in messing around with optimizer settings? No worries, you can use our MLB DFS Simulations and let it find the best way to control your stacks, exposure, correlations, and more!
Other MLB DFS Hitter Picks
One of the great features of being a FantasyLabs Pro member is the option to purchase additional items in the FantasyLabs Marketplace.
In addition to our in-house MLB projections, THE BAT X from Derek Carty of RotoGrinders is available in our marketplace. With this purchase, you can use his projections alone or create aggregate projections within our Player Models.
For this example, we created a 50/50 blend with THE BAT X and the FantasyLabs projections to pinpoint some hitters that stand out.
Shea Langeliers C ($5,800) Athletics vs. Los Angeles Dodgers (Justin Wrobleski)
Langeliers let me down yesterday in what was a good on-paper matchup, but I’m going back to the well on him specifically, the Athletics, and even this game in general. We’ve got two top-ten teams against left-handed pitching squaring off in an elite hitter’s park with the temperature approaching 90 degrees.
It’s hard to go wrong with nearly any hitter in this game, but Langeliers remains the top choice from the A’s. Here are his numbers against lefties via PlateIQ:
For some context, his ISO and wOBA are both 50+ points higher than Dodgers stars Shohei Ohtani ($6,600) and Andy Pages ($5,300) — and those guys are also great plays.
TJ Rumfield 1B ($4,800) Colorado Rockies vs. Miami Marlins (Eury Perez)
Between the salary (depending on construction) and ownership discounts, I think I actually prefer stacking the home Rockies rather than the visiting Marlins, even with the lack of a guaranteed ninth inning of at-bats. They’ve played their way into a roughly average wRC+ against righties this season, with the rookie first baseman Rumfield and his .860 OPS a big part of that.
Miami starter Eury Perez ($7,000) also has a tough profile for Coors Field, with a 48% fly ball rate this season that’s about 10% above the league average. Given the park and weather, that could be painful for him, so I want as much Colorado exposure as I can get.
Miguel Andujar 3B/OF $2,800 San Diego Padres at Chicago Cubs (Matthew Boyd)
With so many elite hitting spots on this slate, it’s possible that the game at Wrigley Field goes overlooked, but we’ve got another wild weather game there. Temps in the 90s and winds blowing out to dead center should provide a massive boost to scoring, with the visiting Padres implied for 5.3 runs.
What’s nice for DFS is that they’re extremely cheap and would allow you to roster two expensive pitchers – a luxury that’s out of reach when stacking Colorado, Miami, the Athletics, or the Dodgers. Andujar is the most indicative of that, with a sub-$3,000 price tag despite a projected cleanup spot in the lineup.
There are better hitters on the Padres who I’m also interested in playing, but the value on Andujar is elite. He leads all players today in Pts/Sal projection.
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Pictured: Bryan Woo
Photo Credit: Imagn
