3 Daily Fantasy Baseball Players to Avoid on 5/14/19
Baseball is here, and there are plenty of DFS contests to choose from on FanDuel's main slate. While we have plenty of pieces geared towards guys you should target in your DFS contests, it's also important to avoid sub-optimal options who are overpriced and/or in tough spots.
Let's check out three players to consider fading on FanDuel's main slate for May 14.
Charlie Blackmon, Colorado Rockies (OF)
at Boston Red Sox
FanDuel Price: $4,000
One of baseball's hottest hitters meets one of baseball's hottest pitchers. So how do we break this one down?
Let's start with Charlie Blackmon of the Colorado Rockies and his absurd explosion at the plate. Spanning the outfielder's last eight games, he has torched opposing pitching for an average of 22.5 FanDuel points per game, a 1.474 OPS, and five homers.
Mr. Blackmon, meet Chris Sale, who's been equally ridiculous. Over his last four starts, Sale owns double-digit strikeouts in three of those contests, peaking at 14 in a brilliant eight-inning performance against the Baltimore Orioles. He's also allowed only five earned runs in his last 26 innings.
Sale has been dominant against same-sided bats, too. Last season, he limited them to a .196 wOBA, 38.4% strikeout rate, and only three extra-base hits.
Blackmon has been on fire at the dish, but this isn't a good matchup for him or any of the Rockies left-handed bats.
Josh Bell, Pittsburgh Pirates (1B)
at Arizona Diamondbacks
FanDuel Price: $4,100
A breakout player so far in 2019, Josh Bell of the Pittsburgh Pirates is possibly fantasy's top first baseman. He has slugged 10 home runs in 2019, and he's paired with a juicy .324 batting average and 1.050 OPS.
Tonight, he gets to take aim at Luke Weaver, who struggled over 136 1/3 innings with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2018 to the tune of a 4.95 ERA, 4.53 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA), and lowly 19.9% strikeout rate.
But Weaver has been far better this year, especially against lefties, which is where the switch-hitting Bell will attack from. In 2019, Weaver has allowed a microscopic .260 wOBA over 98 batters faced, and for his career, he's given up solid .334 wOBA in the split, including a 32.1% fly-ball rate and 32.9% hard-hit rate.
Weaver looks a lot like the 2017 Weaver, and that's not a good thing for Bell and the Pirates.
Shin-Soo Choo, Texas Rangers (OF)
at Kansas City Royals
FanDuel Price: $3,600
Veteran Shin-Soo Choo of the Texas Rangers continues to defy Father Time, and in his age-36 season, he has remained very productive with the bat, posting an .880 OPS so far.
Fellow lefty Danny Duffy of the Kansas City Royals could prove to be a thorn in Choo's side, however. Duffy more than held his own in this split a season ago, limiting left-handed hitters to a 33.7% fly-ball rate, .284 wOBA and 4.9% walk rate.
Choo has shown to be a consistently poor performer in this split, too. This season, he owns only a .637 OPS against lefties, and he posted a very similar .638 OPS against them in 2018.
Despite his strong start to the year, Choo isn't a guy you want to look to in this spot.
Matt Kupferle is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Matt Kupferle also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username MKupferle. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in his articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.
