MLB Daily Fantasy Baseball Lineup Stacks for August 29, 2017

*Austyn Varney*

MLB Daily Fantasy Baseball Lineup Stacks – Tuesday, August 29, 2017

*STARTING PITCHERS*

Chris Sale @ Toronto Blue Jays
Park – Rogers Centre
Opp implied total – 3.29

On the high-end, you have Chris Sale and Jake Arrieta. While Arrieta is great and he can throw a CGSO at any point, he’s no Chris Sale. Sale is one of the 3 best pitchers in baseball and should have no problem bouncing back after struggling last week against the Indians. They’ve owned him in his career and he didn’t show any signs of injury or fatigue. They were just hitting balls that most teams whiff on. When looking at the numbers, you’d think Sale is one of the best arms to walk this planet. He’s allowed just a .247 combined wOBA while striking out 12.77 batters per 9 innings. Sale and the Sox now move into The Rogers Centre to face off with the lowly Blue Jays. While they are better against lefties, a .321 wOBA and 22$ strikeout rate is nothing to be afraid of. Expect Sale to have another one of his typical starts where he goes 7+ innings, strikes out 9+, and gets the W. There is no pitcher on the slate that compares to Sale in safety, at least in my opinion.

Luke Weaver @ Milwaukee Brewers
Park – Miller Park
Vegas O/U – X

Even though we have a lot of games on this slate, pitching isn’t pretty in the slightest. Fortunately, we do have a couple options that stand out. On the lower end, it’s Luke Weaver. Weaver is a 1st round pick just a couple years back out of FSU. He hasn’t stopped dominating since and it looks like he doesn’t have any plans of slowing down. Albeit a very small sample size, Weaver has dominated at the pro level so far. He’s striking guys out at a 27% clip while holding both lefties and righties to a sub .310 wOBA. He’ll likely run into a few road blocks like most young arms do, but I don’t think it comes in the form of the Milwaukee Brewers. The Brewers aren’t a “bad” offense, but they have a lot of holes. They strikeout 25.6% of the time and have trouble putting together big innings. I don’t think Weaver leaves with a clean slate here, but he should get 6 or 7 solid innings. At his price, you can’t ask for more.

*OFFENSIVE STACKS*

Minnesota Twins Vs James Shields (White Sox)
Park – Progressive Field
Implied Total – 5.82

The Twins and James Shields just faced off in Shields’ last start, so it’ll be interesting to see how the Twins respond to a walking pitching machine they saw under a week ago. Typically, hitters gain the edge in this spot. With that being said, there’s no real merit in that. The real merit comes in James Shields being horrible. He’s a bottom 5 pitcher in the entire league and I’m not sure he’s mentally or physically capable of having a good start. At 35 years old, Shields has given up a .422 wOBA to lefties and a .300 to righties. You can definitely target the filler righties like Dozier or Buxton, but the real value comes in the left-handers. You then get to the White Sox bullpen, which is undoubtedly one of the worst. The Twins are an extremely safe offense and you can pencil in at least 4 or 5 runs here. The prices are solid and you should be able to fit 4 of them while also fitting Sale as an SP1.

Main Stack – Jorge Polanco, Max Kepler, Brian Dozier, Eddie Rosario
Sneaky Stack – Eddie Rosario, Byron Buxton, Max Kepler, Eduardo Escobar

Houston Astros @ Martin Perez (Rangers)
Park – Minute Maid Park
Implied Total – X

There are some very nice offenses on this slate, but not many that you want to stack fully. The Astros are a team that can put up 10+ runs on any given night and the HR upside they possess in this match-up is hard to find. They will host the Rangers and Martin Perez, who is bad against righties. He has a huge HR problem and has had it for about 10 years. It’s going nowhere. Through 114 innings, Perez has allowed a .364 wOBA and 17 home runs. He is great against lefties, so I don’t see a reason to target those guys. With that being said, the combo of Altuve+Springer+Bregman is extremely dangerous and can bring you to the top of a tournament. I also don’t think the ‘Stros will be too highly owned. There are a lot of different options and I would think these guys come in around 15-20% owned.

Main Stack – Jose Altuve, George Springer, Alex Bregman, Yuli Gurriel
Sneaky Stack – Jose Altuve, George Springer, Alex Bregman, Marwin Gonzalez