MLB
MLB Daily Fantasy Helper: Friday 6/28/13
Bud Norris allows a .326 BABIP? Mike Trout and Howie Kendrick are already salivating.

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As always, the full tables for today's action are available at our Daily Fantasy Projections page. Make sure to check it out to see where the best values are for your team.

Our baseball projections are updated throughout the day, so make sure to come back to double-check your optimized rosters for any last-minute lineup changes. Since most action happens later in the day, we will be ignoring the early games (if there are any) and focusing solely on the late contests. That way, you can use and tinker with our optimized rosters throughout the day.

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The Three Top Pitchers

Shelby Miller - Choo choo! We're not off the Shelby Miller bandwagon quite yet, even against Bartolo Colon and his I-don't-know-how-that-happened 10-2 record. I don't know how it happened because he has somehow decreased his HR rate and BABIP for three straight seasons despite being roughly as old as Mick Jagger. We don't think it will last and will take Miller's 27.8 percent strikeout rate to Colon's 14.5 percent any day, even with the slightly more walks. That's how you get a second-best (behind Hector Santiago) 0.46 projected wins and third-best (behind Scherzer and Harvey) 5.34 projected strikeouts tonight.

Julio Teheran - There really aren't any top matchup plays today; pitchers like Scherzer and Harvey both play offenses that are too solid to bank on for their price. However, Teheran against the D'Backs may offer the best of both worlds. Arizona is slightly above average at OBP but slightly below average at slugging percentage. Their homerun rate is also the fifth-lowest in the majors at 2.2 percent of plate appearances. That's great for Teheran, whose main weakness is an above-average 3.0 percent homeruns allowed rate. I love his 1.55 projected walks (from a 4.3 percent walk rate) tonight.

Alex Colome - So, let's get this straight. Rookie pitcher. Against Miguel Cabrera and the Tigers. With Max Scherzer the opposite pitcher. And I'm suggesting him? For the low cost, you better believe it. Colome holds a bargain basement cost across the board ($3200 in FanDuel?!?), but he had 9.2 SO/9 in AAA and 9.0 SO/9 through one major league game so far. Even though the Tigers do have the lowest strikeout rate in the league, the ability to miss bats in general is a solid indicator of success. However, Colome also had seven walks in his first game, and although that's ultimately unsustainable, Detroit has the sixth-highest walk rate in the majors. Feeling lucky?

Top High-Priced Hitters

Mike Trout - Here's a dirty little secret I have: I will really excited about Bud Norris's potential entering the season. He had a solid strikeout rate and his line drive had never touched 20 percent, after all. But now... what happened? His strikeout rate is down to 16.3 percent, 24 percent of his allowed balls in play are line drives, and those two factors have contributed to a high 1.421 WHIP. Even though Norris's HR rate is down to 1.7 percent as well, I don't think I need to explain much further why I'm particularly excited for Mike "Makes contact with everything in sight" Trout tonight.

Buster Posey - This isn't such a surprise; this is more your weekly reminder that if the Giants aren't facing a particularly strong pitcher (and Chacin isn't, but more on that in a second), then Buster Posey will typically be your top catching option. A sustainable .327 batting average on balls in play (BABIP), 3.3 percent homerun rate, extraordinarily low 11.3 percent strikeout rate, and high 10.3 percent walk rate will do that for you. I still don't understand how his cost is as low as fourth-best among catchers in three of our five daily fantasy formats we produce rosters for, but hey, I'll take the inefficiencies that are served up on a platter.

Mid-Range Cost-Effective Hitters

Andres Torres - I do know that Torres hitting leadoff on Wednesday was a byproduct of Gregor Blanco's off day, so our projections system probably overrates his projected at-bat total by a tiny bit. Jhoulys Chacin's 77 percent of opposing plate appearances allowing a ball into play and 24 percent of those being line drives off the bat. For Torres, who holds a 26 percent line drive rate (MLB average is 20 percent) and a .333 BABIP himself, he couldn't ask for a better matchup.

Howie Kendrick - What was that? Bud Norris? Allows a 24 percent line drive rate, which contributes directly to a .326 BABIP allowed? Why, I would like to take advantage of that with Howie Kendrick's .364 BABIP and absurdly high 28 percent line drive rate, thanks for asking! It's so nice to be served up a Friday present like this, especially one that also holds 0.23 projected HR tonight as well (tied for the best among second basemen with Chase Utley).

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