Daily Fantasy Baseball Stacks for Thursday 5/20/21

Stacks are the backbone of cashing daily fantasy baseball lineups. Correlation drives upside, creating the potential to place high or even win GPPs when your selected stacks explode offensively.

This column will do the digging and the dirty work to determine which stacks are worth rostering each day. Scoring upside will fuel the stacks that get the nod. Sometimes that will lead to chalky selections, but contrarian stacks will get their fair share of love too.

In addition to utilizing the touted daily stacks in handbuilt lineups, numberFire premium members can throw these highlighted stacks into an optimized lineup using our DFS Sharpstack tool. Our hitting heat map tool is also available to premium members looking for more stacking options. It provides valuable info such as implied total, park factors, and stats for identifying the quality of the opposing pitcher.

Let's take a look at the top stacks on today's main slate.

Miami Marlins

The Miami Marlins probably aren't the most apparent offense to stack, and that could be favorable from a contrarian vantage point on this small slate. Vincent Velasquez has pitched to a 2.84 ERA in five starts over the last 30 days, per FanGraphs. However, his 4.06 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA) is less threatening to stack against. Further, he's walked 10.4 percent of the batters he's faced while yielding 2.49 homers per nine innings.

Expanding on Velasquez's homer woes, he's allowed at least one in five straight starts. He also lucked out a bit in his last start. I watched that start against the Toronto Blue Jays in Dunedin, Florida, and as the broadcast team noted, the wind knocked down a couple of well-struck balls off the bats of Bo Bichette and Teoscar Hernandez on the warning track.

Velasquez's home park will do him no favors tonight. According to the ballpark factors at FantasyPros, Citizens Bank Park has the third-highest park factor for homers at 1.202.

The right-handed pitcher is a favorable matchup for the Miami Marlins' lefties and righties. He's coughed up a .352 weighted on-base average (wOBA) to lefties since last year, and righties have posted a .333 wOBA against him.

My favorite stacking options from the Marlins are Jazz Chisholm ($3,500), Jesus Aguilar ($3,100), and Adam Duvall ($3,300). Chisholm's breaking out this year, posting a .365 on-base percentage, .259 isolated power (ISO), and 148 weighted runs created plus (wRC+) against righties this year.

Aguilar and Duvall offer more power to exploit Velasquez's shortcoming of coughing up taters. Aguilar has a .220 ISO against righties since 2018 and a .250 ISO against them this year. Duvall's produced a .216 ISO against right-handed pitchers since 2018 and a .200 ISO this year.

Others who should be on gamers' radar include Miguel Rojas ($3,000), Corey Dickerson ($2,300), and Brian Anderson ($2,600). All three options have merit as the fourth option with Chisolm, Aguilar, and Duvall in a four-person stack.

Boston Red Sox

The Boston Red Sox are wrapping up a three-game road series with the Toronto Blue Jays tonight. That means another opportunity to hit at TD Ballpark in Dunedin, Florida after an excellent showing at the dish last night. The Blue Jays' temporary home this year, thus far, has played like Coors Field east. It leads the way in park factor for runs (1.315), ranks fourth for homers (1.306), and it increases hits (1.206), doubles (1.280), triples (1.667), and walks (1.326), per ESPN's park factors.

In the admittedly small sample of 14 and 2/3 innings, opposing starter Steven Matz hasn't enjoyed home cooking this season, allowing a .359 wOBA. The lefty's been shaky of late, too. Over the last 30 days, he's recorded a 6.46 ERA and allowed 1.90 homers per nine innings in five starts totaling 23 and 2/3 innings.

My top stacking options from the Red Sox are the number-three hitter and cleanup duo of J.D. Martinez ($4,300) and Xander Bogaerts ($3,600). Martinez has been a thorn in the side of lefties, pummeling them to the tune of a .408 on-base percentage, .317 ISO, and 173 wRC+ since 2018.

Bogaerts has a .387 on-base percentage, .218 ISO, and 139 wRC+ against them since 2018. He's been incredibly dominant with the platoon advantage this season, hammering lefties for a .407 on-base percentage, .245 ISO, and 167 wRC+.

Enrique Hernandez ($2,700) warrants consideration from the leadoff spot. However, the other hitter I'll draw your attention to is Bobby Dalbec ($2,500). The all-or-nothing slugging first baseman has made his 73 plate appearances against lefties in the Majors count, blasting a .357 ISO and 170 wRC+.

Neither Alex Verdugo ($3,100) nor Rafael Devers ($4,100) has the platoon advantage or numbers against lefties that make them clear-cut stacking options, but if the Red Sox chase Matz quickly, they could see a right-handed reliever. Further, they have proximity to the duo of Martinez and Bogaerts working in their favor.

Joshua Shepardson is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Joshua Shepardson also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username bchad50. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.