3 Daily Fantasy Baseball Stacks for Wednesday 9/15/21
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.
Houston Astros
I was burned by touting and stacking the Houston Astros yesterday. I'm not going to make the mistake of being salty and passing up another favorable matchup, though. According to FanGraphs, opposing starter Kohei Arihara has a 5.89 ERA, 5.37 expected fielding independent pitching (xFIP), 5.35 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA), paltry 14.6 percent strikeout rate, underwhelming 8.6 percent walk rate, and coughed up 2.21 homers per nine innings in nine starts.
In addition, he's underwhelmed against lefties while getting smashed by righties. Lefties have a .309 weighted on-base average (wOBA) and struck out in only 11.6 percent of their plate appearances against Arihara. Meanwhile, righties have teed off for a .671 slugging percentage and .426 wOBA.
You can defensibly stack anyone in this lineup. However, when factoring in Arihara's low strikeout rate against lefties, I'm honed in on a pair of left-handed-hitting sluggers, Yordan Alvarez ($3,600) and Kyle Tucker ($3,400). Alvarez owns a .379 on-base percentage, .286 isolated power (ISO), and 156 weighted runs created plus (wRC+) against righties since debuting in 2019. Tucker debuted the season before Alvarez. However, he's flourishing at a whole new level against righties this year, hammering them for a .252 ISO and 151 wRC+.
New York Mets
I haven't been giving the New York Mets much love in this space throughout the year. But, of course, why should I? They rank tied for 18th in wRC+ (96) against lefties this year and 20th in wRC+ (96) since the trade deadline. However, the bats have come alive this month, tallying a blistering 119 wRC+ and .201 ISO.
They should continue their heater tonight against Jon Lester. The veteran lefty relies on pitching to contact, striking out only 13.6 percent o the batters he's faced this year. Further, he backs his lackluster strikeout rate with a below-average nine percent walk rate. Finally, he's yielded a .510 slugging percentage and .376 wOBA to right-handed batters.
Predictably, my favorite options from the Mets are righties. I'm most interested in Pete Alonso ($3,800) and Javier Baez ($3,800). The two boast light-tower power, especially against southpaws. Alonso has a .322 ISO against them since reaching The Show in 2019. Meanwhile, Baez has a .276 ISO against lefties since 2018. In addition, they've both bested their career marks with a .342 ISO and .297 ISO, respectively, this year.
Los Angeles Dodgers
The Los Angeles Dodgers' opposing pitcher isn't announced as I write. However, it appears Merrill Kelly is a potential candidate to get the ball. Even if the Arizona Diamondbacks are forced to turn elsewhere, they don't have an internal option to start who would dissuade me from stacking the Dodgers. However, the handedness of the opposing hurler would impact who my favorite options are.
Nonetheless, let's proceed as if Kelly will be the starter. He's fine. Still, fine isn't likely good enough to suppress the offense of a team tied for sixth in wRC+ (107) against righties this year. Oddly, Kelly has a reverse-platoon split this year and for his career, yielding a .327 wOBA to righties in his career and a .350 wOBA this year.
Do you know who else has a reverse-platoon split? Will Smith ($3,600) has demolished righties for a .395 on-base percentage, .316 ISO, and 162 wRC+ in his career. Thus, he's my favorite stacking option from the Dodgers. Justin Turner ($3,700) also isn't a slouch in same-handed matchups, recording a .382 on-base percentage and 134 wRC+ since 2018. Beyond these two, anyone else in the Dodgers' deep lineup merits stacking consideration.
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.
