4 Daily Fantasy Baseball Stacks for 7/28/20

In the world of daily baseball, stacks are often the backbone of the most successful -- and profitable -- lineups. Correlation is the key.

When an offense hangs runs in bunches, it means hitters are scoring runs and teammates hitting behind them are driving them in. By rostering stacks, you’re maximizing the fantasy scoring by essentially double-dipping on a run-scoring event.

This is your daily home for the top stacks on the daily fantasy baseball slate. Whether you’re looking to identify the projected highest-scoring stacks or contrarian stacks that can help you separate from the pack in GPPs when they explode, they’ll be thrown under the spotlight here.

Gamers who are numberFire premium members can throw these highlighted stacks into an optimized lineup using our DFS Sharpstack tool. The tool allows you to select the team and number of players from that team you’d like to include in your lineup. If you’re looking to identify other potentially high-scoring stacks beyond those featured in this space, check out our hitting heat map, a tool that provides valuable info such as implied total, park factor, and stats to identify the quality of the opposing pitcher.

Without further ado, let’s dive into today’s main slate’s featured stacks.

Milwaukee Brewers

Derek Holland's surprising resurgent season with the San Francisco Giants in 2018 feels like a mirage. After rebounding from a ghastly 6.20 ERA and 5.57 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA) in 2017 to cobble together a 3.57 ERA and 4.20 SIERA in 2018, he turned back into a pumpkin last year. He tallied a 6.08 ERA and 4.98 SIERA in 51 appearances split between the rotation -- eight starts -- and bullpen spanning 84.1 innings, according to FanGraphs. Simply put, he doesn't belong in a big-league rotation.

Arguably his biggest issue is his complete inability to tame right-handed hitters. The veteran southpaw was creamed for a .612 SLG and .406 weighted on-base average (wOBA) by the 262 right-handed batters who faced him last year. His shortcomings against righties should be exacerbated tonight against the Milwaukee Brewers.

With lefty Steven Brault starting last night, Milwaukee's lineup featured only one left-handed hitter, 2018 National League MVP Christian Yelich ($4,400). Yelich is usable in stacks given his excellence, but I'm more open to dropping him from a Brewers stack tonight than I was last night given Holland's continued success in lefty-lefty matchups, as evidenced by his .244 wOBA ceded to the 114 he faced last year.

Holland's ability to turn any right-handed hitter he faces into the equivalent of a superstar makes literally any righty in Milwaukee's lineup usable in a stack. My favorites are Lorenzo Cain ($2,700), Keston Hiura ($3,300), Ryan Braun ($2,900), and Avisail Garcia ($2,900). Cain is a nifty bargain sitting atop the lineup against lefties, and Hiura, Braun, and Garcia should have plenty of ducks on the pond to elevate their scoring ceilings.

Kansas City Royals

The Kansas City Royals could see a bit more love in the way of ownership tonight from point-chasing gamers after they pummeled the Detroit Tigers last night, but I still don't expect their ownership to be terribly chalky due to plenty of other higher-profile stacks with tons of upside tonight as well.

Dario Agrazal will be making his first start for the Tigers after reaching "The Show" with the Pittsburgh Pirates last year. In addition to underwhelming with the Bucs, recording a 4.91 ERA and 5.54 SIERA in 15 appearances (14 starts) over 73.1 innings, he also amassed a 4.78 ERA in a dozen starts spanning 64.0 innings at the Triple-A level.

The 25-year-old righty struck out a pathetic 12.8 percent of the batters he faced in the Majors, and he did a poor job of keeping the ball on the ground with only a 39.9 percent ground-ball rate. His pitch-to-contact style makes me bullish about both the righties and lefties in Kansas City's order. Whit Merrifield ($3,000) kicks things off with a well-rounded skillset featuring lots of contact, a dash of pop, and elite speed at the top of the order. He should be locked into stacks.

Agrazal's struggles with missing bats enhances the value of the hitters with some swing-and-miss issues such as Adalberto Mondesi ($2,800), Jorge Soler ($3,600), and, if he is back in the lineup again tonight, Franchy Cordero ($2,000). The latter duo are nothing short of Statcast darlings. Among hitters with the qualified number of batted ball events in 2019, Soler ranked tied for seventh in barrels per plate appearance (10.3 percent) and fly-ball and line-drive exit velocity (97.2 miles per hour), according to Baseball Savant.

Cordero missed almost all of last year, but out of hitters who had at least 50 batted ball events in 2018, Cordero ranked 23rd in fly-ball and line-drive exit velocity (97.0 miles per hour) while flashing top-shelf exit velocity on his hardest hit ball with the 13th-highest max exit velocity at 116.9 mph. Cordero's strikeout woes prevent him from consistently tapping into his power, but a matchup with Agrazal could lead to another highlight reel blast like this tonight.

New York Mets

The Boston Red Sox were a tough cut from this piece for me, but the New York Mets get the nod after beating up on Boston's below-average pitching last night.

Tonight, the hits should keep on coming against lefty Matt Hall. After getting crushed for a 7.71 ERA and 4.74 SIERA in 23.1 innings of relief for the Detroit Tigers, he's somehow in Boston's rotation. Getting knocked around in Detroit's bullpen last year came on the heels of posting a 5.30 ERA in 86.2 innings split between starting and relieving at the Triple-A level. Again, how's he in a big-league rotation?

The Mets have faced three lefties -- albeit last night's lefty they faced was opener Josh Osich -- and trotted out three different lineups. Their batting order is a mystery. However, what's soon to no longer be a mystery is which of their hitters I'm most enamored with tonight.

Unsurprisingly, last year's home run champ Pete Alonso ($3,600) tops the list. He ripped a homer last night, and in 182 plate appearances against lefties in his young career, he's mashed 14 homers with a .340 isolated power (ISO) and 138 weighted runs created plus (wRC+).

Yoenis Cespedes ($2,600) missed all of last season after playing in only 38 games in 2018. He's struck out in 45.5 percent of his plate appearances so far and was off last night, so he might still have some rust to shake off, but his power's still legit. He hit this no-doubt homer in the opener.

J.D. Davis ($2,200) is the other member of the Mets I'm most interested in using in a stack. He broke out with the Mets last year, and he was a thorn in the side of southpaws. In 155 plate appearances against lefties last year, Davis ripped off a .374 OBP, .227 ISO, 139 wRC+, and 47.8 percent hard-hit percentage. Out of qualified hitters, Davis cracked the top 50 in barrel per plate appearance and fly-ball and line-drive exit velocity, tied for 41st and tied for 48th, respectively.

Los Angeles Angels

The Los Angeles Angels could be a lower-owned stack tonight. One reason for that is Mike Trout ($4,500) and Anthony Rendon ($4,000) being expensive. Gamers -- understandably -- aren't shy about ponying up for Trout, but I suspect they will shy away from Rendon in what projects to be his first game of the regular season.

Is expecting Rendon to immediately rake optimistic? Sure, but the dude was born to rip the cover off of the ball. After eliminating the four qualified hitters with under 10 plate appearances against lefties last year, Rendon owns the ninth-best wRC+ (159) against left-handed pitchers since 2017. Coincidentally, he's one spot ahead of Trout's 158 wRC+.

In order to afford Trout and Rendon, finding value is important, and David Fletcher ($2,800) and Justin Upton ($2,900) can help in that regard. Fletcher's nothing special against lefties, but he gets a value bump from likely remaining atop the batting order. Upton, however, is pretty darn good against lefties. Since 2017, he owns a .326 OBP, .237 ISO, and 115 wRC+. All of the right-handed hitters mentioned should get a lift from facing youngster Justus Sheffield.

Sheffield has lots of long-term upside, but he didn't translate that to success out of the chute last year with a 5.50 ERA and 4.77 SIERA in 36.0 innings. Righties walloped him by recording a .500 SLG and .380 wOBA. Maybe Sheffield will be sharper this year, but the Angels are a high-upside GPP stack option if he's still rough around the edges.

Joshua Shepardson is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Joshua Shepardson also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username bchad50. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.