3 MLB FanDuel Value Plays to Target on Tuesday 9/27/22
With production being highly variable on a night-to-night basis, daily fantasy baseball plays a bit differently than other sports.
As a result of this, the primary method of selecting hitters is to "stack" certain teams in good spots to produce. Most of the top stacks on a given day come with hefty salaries. In addition to that, a vast majority of pitchers with the upside to win tournaments are high-salaried hurlers.
Therefore, crushing your value plays -- whether it be a pitcher unexpectedly piling up strikeouts or a low-salaried batter racking up points -- can be the secret sauce to taking down a tournament.
Which budget options stand out today on FanDuel?
Kyle Muller, P, Braves ($6,000)
There will always be gobs of risk in rostering any pitcher who is salaried at $6,000. I don't mind taking on that risk tonight to use Kyle Muller against the Washington Nationals.
Muller, a rookie, has been excellent this season in Triple-A. Over 134 2/3 innings there, he's recorded a 29.3% strikeout rate and 14.0% swinging-strike rate. In the last month, he's had separate outings of six and seven innings down on the farm, so workload shouldn't be an issue.
The biggest red flag with Muller is that he hasn't been all that good in his first 44 2/3 MLB innings, owning a 5.00 SIERA. But only 7 2/3 of those innings came in 2022, and even in the midst of his MLB struggles, he's still missed bats, racking up a 13.2% swinging-strike rate in those 44 2/3 frames.
Washington is a fairly soft matchup, and their 3.55 implied total is a number we can feel good about.
We have Muller projected for 22.9 FanDuel points and rate him as the best point-per-dollar pitcher. I think we might be underselling him a bit, so there could be room for more.
If Muller isn't your cup of tea, you can turn to Patrick Sandoval ($8,900), who is a solid value play in a date with the Oakland Athletics.
Mike Ford, 1B, Angels ($2,100)
The Los Angeles Angels' offense is showing a 4.60 implied total against James Kaprielian.
A righty, Kaprielian is the kind of pitcher we want to stack against. He doesn't get many strikeouts (16.3% rate) and gives up a lot of fly-balls (44.6% rate).
Mike Ford is a low-salary way to get a piece of the Halos, and his salary makes it a lot easier to jam in Mike Trout ($4,400) and Shohei Ohtani ($4,100). Ford might hit right behind those two, so while Ford's 2022 numbers aren't pretty, he's undoubtedly in a nice spot tonight.
Eddie Rosario, OF, Braves ($2,100)
I plugged Eddie Rosario yesterday, and he mustered just 6.2 FanDuel points. But he's awfully appealing once more with the Atlanta Braves in another smash spot.
Atlanta holds the night's top implied total (4.92) for a matchup with Paolo Espino. The Washington Nationals' righty has a 19.0% strikeout rate -- including a 16.5% clip against lefties -- and 40.9% fly-ball rate. He's giving up 1.58 homers per nine.
Rosario is an economical way to get exposure to Atlanta, and he boasts a 43.5% fly-ball rate this year with the platoon advantage.
