FanDuel Daily Fantasy Baseball Helper: Monday 5/29/23

The Memorial Day slate starts early this year, but there are some interesting decisions we'll need to make among the pitching options.

Our daily helper is available every day to analyze FanDuel's main slate and help give you a starting point when you're building lineups. Be sure to also incorporate our great tools into your research process. Whether you're looking for daily projections, the latest starting lineups and weather, or batting and pitching heat maps to find the best matchups -- we've got you covered!

Let's check out the top options on today's main slate.

Pitching Breakdown

Of the 12 pitchers in action on the main slate, none are particularly, overwhelmingly elite.

Pretty obviously, the most appealing option is Nathan Eovaldi ($11,200), who also is the highest-salaried option.

Eovaldi gets the Detroit Tigers, who hold an active-roster wRC+ of 87 against righties (25th in the Majors) and who are a netural-strikeout matchup against righties (23.0%). Eovaldi ranks second on slate in xFIP (3.28) and SIERA (3.40). Even with some expected regression in the ERA department (2.60 ERA but a 2.87 expected ERA), Eovaldi is in a position to produce on Memorial Day.

Sonny Gray ($10,200) is also overperforming (1.82 ERA; 3.19 expected ERA), but that expected ERA is still pretty nice. Gray is second on the slate in strikeout rate (29.2%) with his opponent, the Houston Astros, ranked 20th in strikeout rate versus righties (21.9%). numberFire's model projects him (28.9) a bit better than the third five-figure option, Marcus Stroman ($10,000; 27.3).

Third for me on the board is Taj Bradley ($9,900) even though he won't come with big salary savings from Gray or Stroman (but will help if you're not rostering Eovaldi). Bradley has a 33.7% strikeout rate across his 101 batters faced, and the Chicago Cubs have a 24.1% strikeout rate against righties. The ERA (4.44) looks a lot worse than the expected ERA (3.10), too.

It gets really flat from there.

J.P. France ($8,200) leads the slate in called-strike-plus-whiff rate (30.5%) over 89 batters faced, so his strikeout rate (20.2%) should increase as the sample grows. Paired with a matchup with the high-strikeout Minnesota Twins (28.3% active-roster strikeout rate), and we at least have a clear path to uspide with the strikeouts.

If dipping below $8,000, we can take a look at Ryne Nelson ($6,900). Nelson is projected for a top-three value return, via numberFire's model. Nelson's getting the Colorado Rockies, who are 28th in wRC+ (89) overall but are better (yet still weak) against righties (95) specifically. There's not a lot of strikeout potential in this matchup, but it's a pretty safe matchup for the salary.

Hitting Breakdown

Arizona Diamondbacks

The Arizona Diamondbacks are squaring up with Karl Kauffmann at home. Among the main slate starters, Kauffmann ranks 11th in strikeout rate and walk rate, 10th in called-strike-plus-whiff rate, and 12th in ERA and xFIP. The xFIP for Kauffmann is a hefty 6.00, and the SIERA isn't much better at 5.79.

Arizona has some value at the top of the lineup with lefty Pavin Smith ($2,500) and the switch-hitting Ketel Marte ($3,000). Corbin Carroll ($3,500) gives them three straight lefties against the righty, Kauffman. Christian Walker ($3,300) and Lourdes Gurriel ($3,500) also rate out well in this matchup. Marte is numberFire's top-projected batter.

St. Louis Cardinals

The St. Louis Cardinals are getting Josh Staumont as the opener, and they hold the highest implied run total of the main slate (5.80).

As a team, the Cardinals are fourth in expected wOBA (xwOBA) at .344, better than their actual output of .332. The Cardinals are also going to see some slugging regression come their way, too (.434 slugging versus .450 expected slugging).

The top of the lineup is a bit spendy to roster: Lars Nootbaar ($3,400), Paul Goldschmidt ($3,900), Nolan Gorman ($3,800), and Nolan Arenado ($3,400). But if we don't roster Eovaldi, there's a good case to build around the Cardinals' bats. Brendan Donovan ($2,700) and Willson Contreras ($2,900) can help save salary here.

Kansas City Royals

As a value stack, the Kansas City Royals can work in that game opposite the Cardinals. They're facing Adam Wainwright, who has just a 10.2% strikeout rate against 98 batters faced thsi season, and that's tied to an underwhelming called-strike-plus-whiff rate of 23.6%, also worst on the slate.

Despite sitting 27th in wOBA (.295), the Royals are 16th in expected wOBA (.321), and nobody in the expected top six has a salary higher than $3,300.

Nick Pratto ($2,900), Vinnie Pasquantino ($3,100), Salvador Perez ($3,200), Bobby Witt Jr. ($3,300), MJ Melendez ($2,800), and Michael Massey ($2,500) give us various routes to a value stack.