3 MLB FanDuel Studs to Target on Opening Day

Corey Kluber, P, Cleveland Indians

Price: $11,400

With everyone rolling out their top pitchers on opening day, we have our pick among the league's aces in fantasy tonight. If you ask numberFire's projections who the day's top arm is, they'll tell you it's Corey Kluber, and I'm inclined to agree.

The Cleveland Indians' -156 moneyline gives them the day's sixth-highest implied chance of victory, but the gap between them and the third-highest (the Boston Red Sox at -161) is so small that it represents only a 0.8 percentage point difference in win probability. For all intents and purposes, Cleveland might as well be in a four-way tie for third in that area. Their opponents, the Seattle Mariners, also have the day's fourth-lowest implied total at 3.37 runs.

Kluber is coming off an absolutely nasty 2017 campaign that saw him finish second among qualifying pitchers with a 2.68 SIERA, third with a 34.1% strikeout rate and first with a 15.6% swinging strike rate. He notched double-digit strikeouts in 15 of his 29 starts with fewer than 8 strikeouts in only seven games. A big part of that consistency came from the fact that he is deadly against guys on both sides of the plate with a strong 31.3% strikeout rate against left-handed hitters and a 36.6% against righties.

numberFire's models have Kluber tied with Chris Sale for the highest strikeout projection on the slate, and with a recent hip injury raising some question marks around Sale, Kluber gets the edge here, particularly in cash games.