Kmarko's DraftKings Picks - August 11
Welcome back to the daily DraftKings picks where we try to get super rich playing daily fantasy baseball. As usual I’ll do a brief recap of my lineups from the night before then throw out some picks that I’m brainstorming for tonight, and hopefully get some good feedback/tips/picks from you guys either in the comment section or on Twitter @kmarkobarstool.
Ran out two lineups last night:
Fairly good scores, but weren’t good enough to compete with the big money. Ended up basically breaking even. Still looking for the elusive big money win where they send me one of those gigantic checks that you can’t fit through the door and the local newspaper comes and take a picture of you holding it above your head. Maybe tonight’s the night.
The blog picks weren’t anything special – David Peralta the only one that paid off nicely for us. Nelson Cruz was a total let down, Rendon at least wasn’t a dud for the value price. I couldn’t end up fitting Machado’s salary but he was blah also.
Let’s shake it off and get rich tonight.
PITCHER NOTES
-Greinke is your top dog tonight and unanimous expert’s consensus pick. He’s obviously one of the best pitchers in the game right now, and he dominated right handed hitting. I would just say to use a little caution spending this much on a guy who just got roughed up by the Phillies and is now facing a desperate team.
-I like Harvey as the #2 ranked guy tonight – sure some Rockiest hitters have been hot (more on that in the picks section), but their offense has been known to falter on the road, and Harvey looks like he has his swagger back.
-MadBum and Carlos Martinez are high upside options but their matchups scare me.
-Some good mid-tier and value options worth pursuing tonight…Hutchinson, Jungmann, Severino, Santiago…high risk but solid upside if they come out strong.
HITTERS
3B Josh Donaldson $5.6K
Sorry to get chalky here with the most expensive player on the board, but sometimes it’s just not worth it to try and switch it up and be contrarian. Fact is Donaldson is my top play of the day, and since I’m going the value route at pitcher, I can afford to squeeze him in. If you’re going Greinke, Bumgarner, Harvey and those other big guns, you’ll struggle to spend 5.6K on a third basemen – but if not, I think Donaldson keeps his MASSIVE hot streak going tonight. Blue Jays are the top offense to target, and check out Donaldson’s game log – 17,7, 16, 23, 20, 14, 21. That’s crazy.
Also I kind of like when the guys I’m zeroed in on are super expensive – that will hopefully keep them lower owned by people scared to spend up. I’ll make up for it with some cheaper plays below-
OF AJ Pollock $4.7K
Won’t go Goldschmidt here because of the promise I just made to go cheaper, so up steps AJ Pollock. The DBacks are right behind the Jays for teams I want to target, and Pollock has been on quite the hot streak of his own. He’s a great hitter who doesn’t get a lot of attention, and 4.7K is a great price point for his upside. I also like Peralta again, same as last night, if you feel like stacking.
VALUE PLAYS
OF CarGo $3.8K
Listen I love Harvey tonight. He’s got his mojo back, the Mets are hot, and the Rockies just aren’t great on the road. Having said that CarGo in value play territory is bananaland, I don’t care who he is facing. He’s hit about a billion home runs this month, and just took Niese (a lefty!) deep last night. The price is just far far too low. So like I said I’ll be targeting Harvey for an overall good game and a bunch of Ks but that doesn’t mean I won’t also be taking a long hard look at CarGo with a shot at breaking up the perfect game with a homer.
2B/SS Cesar Hernandez $3.4K
I’ve only ever featured him here once, but if you check my lineup recaps I post daily, you’ll see Hernandez in 60-70% of them. Just love the guy. He almost ALWAYS produces and they NEVER raise his price. Been hovering between 2.8K-3.5K off and on all season, despite the fact he consistently puts up numbers worthy of a 4.2-4.5K salary. Of course, talking him up like this pretty much guarantees one of his random duds tonight, but whatever. I’ll still be trotting him out there as usual, especially with a great matchup in a great hitter’s park.
Hernandez is out. If using at 2B, Herrera and Utley are both good pivots. If using at SS…in that price range, you’re pretty much screwed (I’m one of those people).
…
That’s it for me, good luck out there tonight, hit me up @kmarkobarstool and if you feel like depositing and playing some tourneys tonight, use this link please