MLB

KBO Daily Fantasy Baseball Helper: Saturday 6/27/20

Eric Jokisch has had a phenomenal start to the season, and his peripherals indicate he should be able to keep it up. Which other players stand out for Saturday's KBO DFS slate?

Saturday's slate for KBO DFS involves a handful of pitchers who have gotten off to rough starts this year. We just have to decide whether those outings will persist or if they're the result of a small sample.

Of the 10 starters scheduled to toe the rubber, only three have a season-long ERA better than 4.26. Half of them have ERAs of 5.00 or higher.

We could take that to mean it's a bad slate for pitching. But ERA can be a fluky stat for a full season, much less a sample of nine or fewer starts. As such, we'll have to dig in a bit deeper and decide who is bound to progress and who could continue to lag.

To aid in that quest, here are the starters on the slate sorted by the FanDuel salary of their team's starting pitching slot. Opposing runs per game totals can be found at My KBO Stats with the strikeout rates at Baseball Reference. The park factor is a multi-year run factor via STATIZ with 1000 being neutral and a higher number favoring hitters.

PitcherSalaryL/ROpp.ERAWHIPK%BB%HR%Opp. R/GOpp. K%Park Factor
Eric Jokisch
(Kiwoom)
$28LKIA1.630.9418.5%4.2%0.9%5.0716.9%979
Chan-heon Jung
(SK)
$28R@SK3.341.1824.4%5.9%2.5%3.9319.2%1038
William Cuevas
(KT)
$27R@HAN5.051.2118.2%5.2%2.6%3.5720.0%978
Raul Alcantara
(Doosan)
$27RNC3.701.3019.7%4.6%2.1%6.5917.3%959
Jung-hyun Baek
(Samsung)
$25L@LOT5.341.4716.9%4.9%4.9%4.6316.3%1022
Ricardo Pinto
(SK)
$24RLG4.261.7012.9%11.3%0.4%5.5816.4%1038
Hyun-jong Yang
(Kia)
$22L@KIW4.881.2718.6%6.4%2.9%5.8319.0%979
Adrian Sampson
(Lotte)
$22RSAM5.961.6417.4%7.0%0.9%5.0918.4%1022
Min-woo Kim
(Hanwha)
$21RKT5.361.3922.2%8.3%5.0%5.7118.3%978
Sung-young Choi
(NC)
$21L@DOO6.751.885.7%7.5%5.7%6.2415.1%959


At least one of the pitchers positioned to improve finds himself in a plus matchup for Saturday's slate. So let's dig into these options and see who stands out.

Pitchers

Even with all of the rough starters on the slate, it's not totally devoid of good pitching. The shining star there seems to be Eric Jokisch (Kiwoom Starting P; $28).

Jokisch has been lights out this year with a 1.63 ERA, 4.2% walk rate, and 0.9% home-run rate. That gives him a lofty floor, especially in a park that's good for pitching. You'll happily pay $28 for that when the other options are shaky.

The one downside with Jokisch is the ceiling. The opposing Kia Tigers don't strike out often, and Jokisch, himself, has just a decent strikeout rate at 18.5%. This is what keeps Jokisch from being a plug-and-play type of arm, but he's still the best option at our disposal.

The other guy on the slate who has truly impressed in 2020 -- albeit in a small sample -- is Chan-heon Jung (LG Starting P; $28). Jung is transitioning into the rotation this year, and the LG Twins have been limiting his workload as a result. But when he does pitch, they allow him to go deep into games, and he has been effective.

Jung has a 24.4% strikeout rate through five starts, helping validate his 3.34 ERA. He'll be putting that up against the SK Wyverns, who rank ninth in the league in both runs per game and strikeout rate. Jung has the higher ceiling than Jokisch, so he's a great alternative. The only thing keeping him from supplanting Jokisch at the top entirely is that Jung is in the best park for offense on the slate.

If you're hunting for a player who could snap out of his early-season struggles, you want William Cuevas (KT Starting P; $27). Cuevas' ERA this year is lofty at 5.05. However, he's grading out well in the other departments -- where numbers can stabilize more quickly -- and he's in a plus park.

That's not the main draw of Cuevas, though. Instead, that stems from his matchup with the Hanwha Eagles. Hanwha has made big strides of late, but they still seem to be a team we can target with opposing pitchers. The matchup alone doesn't put Cuevas on the same level as Jokisch and Jung, but he is a sturdy third option if you choose to differentiate.

Stacks

The issue with a thin pitching slate is that we find ourselves spending a bunch at the position. Even if we use Cuevas, we still have an average of just over $12 per hitter. This means we have to search for some value plays.

Thankfully, the Lotte Giants can lend a hand. They're facing Jung-hyun Baek, who projects to allow a bunch of balls in play thanks to his 16.9% strikeout rate and 4.9% walk rate. The contact rate goes up given that Lotte has the second-best strikeout rate for any offense in the league. Baek has struggled when hitters have made contact, too, allowing homers to 4.9% of the batters he has faced. Lotte isn't an elite offense, but they should put up some volume here.

Even when you use Jokisch or Jung, you should still be able to afford Jun-Woo Jeon ($12) and Dae-Ho Lee ($10), both of whom gain the platoon advantage against the left-handed Baek. Jeon has eight homers this year, is slugging over .500, and has also swiped a pair of bags. Lee doesn't have the speed, but he is slashing .301/.394/.481 through 182 plate appearances. They should be the starting points if you decide to stack Lotte.

The KT Wiz have tempting studs in Mel Rojas Jr. ($17) and Baek-Ho Kang ($16), players you might not be able to afford when paying up at pitcher. They're still worth a look, though, against Min-woo Kim.

Kim has gotten plenty of strikeouts this year with a mark of 22.2%. However, when he hasn't gotten that third strike, things have gone poorly, as evidenced by his 5.0% homer rate and 5.36 ERA. KT has shown the ability to score runs in bunches this year, so Kim's struggles could persist.

Outside of Rojas and Kang, double machine Jeong-Dae Bae ($9) is a standout on KT. Bae's 16 doubles rank third in the league and have pushed his slugging percentage up to .530. Using Bae along with the aforementioned Jeon and Lee may even give you the flexibility to get up to Rojas or Kang, which would be a massive win for this stack.

If you find yourself with extra salary on the table, that's when you can turn to the Doosan Bears. They're facing Sung-young Choi, who is set to make his third start and fourth appearance of the season. The first couple outings have been rough with a 6.75 ERA and 5.7% strikeout rate, and a date with Doosan isn't likely to help.

One bat you could target even if you can't afford the studs is Kyoung-Min Hur ($8). Hur is hitting leadoff for Doosan and has been absolutely raking of late. He went yard twice in the first game of their double-header on Thursday, pushing his slugging percentage up to .480. As with Bae before, we should use Hur in order to give ourselves the ability to check out the higher-salaried hitters in the lineup.