3 Daily Fantasy Baseball Stacks for Wednesday 8/4/21
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.
New York Yankees
The New York Yankees hung 13 runs on the Baltimore Orioles last night, making up for a lackluster effort in a plus matchup the night before. Tonight, they should keep rolling against Matt Harvey.
Harvey's cruised to a 3.09 ERA in his last six starts spanning 32 innings, per FanGraphs. However, his 4.59 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA) is more indicative of the quality of his work. Additionally, among pitchers who've tossed at least 160 innings since 2019, Harvey's 6.90 ERA is the highest, and his 5.15 SIERA is the ninth-highest.
Further, the righty's been no great shakes against lefties in 2021 and downright awful against righties. Harvey's allowed a .311 weighted on-base average (wOBA) to the former and a .376 wOBA to the latter.
I'll gleefully stack New York's lefties and righties alike against Harvey. My favorite four-person stack features their probable two through five hitters, Anthony Rizzo ($4,000), Aaron Judge ($3,800), Joey Gallo ($3,500), and Giancarlo Stanton ($3,400).
Colorado Rockies
The Colorado Rockies don't have the most fearsome offense on paper. Nonetheless, they know how to hit at Major League Baseball's hitting paradise, Coors Field. The Rockies are tied for the second-highest wOBA (.342) at home this year. Additionally, they offered a perfect example of their upside last night, scoring 13 runs.
Alec Mills is an adequate starter. Regardless, even the elite pitchers in the game are prone to meltdowns at Coors Field, and Mills isn't elite. So, I'll take the Rockies' offense getting the better of this matchup.
Brendan Rodgers ($3,300) is in a groove since the all-star break and is a fine option. Trevor Story ($4,200) has a track record of raking at home, so he's a defensible option, too. However, my favorite options are C.J. Cron ($3,800), Ryan McMahon ($3,900), and Sam Hilliard ($2,600). Cron's amassed a massive .312 isolated power (ISO) at home this year. McMahon's tallied a .225 ISO at Coors Field in 2021.
Meanwhile, Hilliard stands out as a steal at his modest salary. The powerful outfielder has homered in back-to-back games. Also, he's thrived with the platoon advantage at home in his young career. The left-handed-hitting outfielder has a .315 ISO and .370 wOBA in 96 plate appearances against righties at home in his career.
Atlanta Braves
The Atlanta Braves rocked underwhelming lefty Jon Lester last night. Tonight, their hitters have a mouthwatering matchup against a lesser lefty, J.A. Happ. The veteran lefty appears to be toast.
In 19 starts lasting 98 and 1/3 innings, hitters have teed off on him for a 6.77 ERA, 4.95 SIERA, and 1.92 homers per nine innings. Remarkably, his numbers in recent starts are more ghastly. Happ has a 7.82 ERA, 4.74 SIERA, and 2.37 homers per nine innings in his last seven starts.
Happ's been at his worst against righties, completely unable to keep them in check. He's faced 368 of them, allowing a .582 slugging percentage and .397 wOBA. Predictably, I'm most interested in using right-handed power against him.
My favorite options include recently acquired sluggers Adam Duvall ($3,200) and Jorge Soler ($3,300). Third baseman Austin Riley ($3,500) isn't having a banner year with the platoon advantage. Still, he's having an excellent year at the dish with a track record of better results against southpaws, putting him in the stacking mix.
However, my two favorite options are switch-hitter Ozzie Albies ($3,600) and Dansby Swanson ($3,200). Albies has raked against lefties this year to the tune of a .275 ISO and 150 weighted runs created plus (wRC+). Swanson's been below average against lefties this year, with a 91 wRC+. That's okay, though, as his .250 ISO is tailor-made to exploit Happ's shortcomings against right-handed hitters.
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.
