Welcome to our MLB DFS Building Blocks, DraftKings and FanDuel picks for 5/23/22! In this article, I’ll break down by top overall plays for today’s main slate. Last year was an extremely big year for the Karma team in MLB, and we are looking to continue that success in 2022. I will be providing Core Plays for every main slate (and day baseball) this season — you can gain access to that as well as our premium discord here. Let’s get to the plays…
Above is an example of the Core Plays given out to Subscribers on Friday May 13th
Pitcher
Gerrit Cole
Cole needs no introduction, especially on this slate. He has rebounded from early season concerns and once again been one of the most dominant pitchers in baseball. He has elite strikeout ability, and a fantastic match-up against the Baltimore Orioles. He will be massively-owned on Monday, but rightfully so and I can’t see fading him unless you are playing a lot of teams. As you know, I don’t like to cite BvP, but the history here is elite. We have a 119 PA sample of the Cole vs this current O’s lineup — resulting in a .267 wOBA allowed and a 27% strikeout rate.
Alex Cobb + Marco Gonzales
The way I see it, we have two options for our SP2 on DraftKings tonight — Alex Cobb in the mid-tier and all the way down to Marco Gonzales for value. Cobb has been very good for the Giants this season outside of his one start coming back from injury. He ranks top-25 in CSW%, and possesses the ability to get strikeouts and a high amount of ground balls as well. The Mets do not strike out a lot, but this is a much better pitcher than his price indicates and he will be throwing in one of the most pitcher-friendly environments on Monday night. Gonzales is the opposite of Cobb, he’s not a great pitcher, but is extremely cheap and gets the benefit of facing the Oakland A’s tonight. I do think he will become popular as the day goes on, which provides more reasons for me to fade him rather than play him. I try to avoid mediocre pitchers as chalk, especially when there are options to pivot too. I think Cobb is a very good pitcher, and he is cheap enough to fit in offense around him and Cole making him my preferred second SP.
Building Blocks
Freddie Freeman
I already posted a Freddie Freeman bet for today, and he is my favorite play in DFS as well. This is a fantastic spot for the Dodgers against Joan Adon who really struggles to get left-handed batters out. He allows an above-average wOBA in the split with low strikeouts, and no way to consistently get batters out. Freeman is the best hitter in this lineup against right-handed pitching the last few seasons, and he matches up extremely well with his pitch mix. Adon throws mostly fastballs, and Freeman is the best fastball hitter on this team. It’s no coincidence that LA has the highest team-total on the board tonight, and Freeman is the top spend-up in all formats.
Alec Bohm
We haven’t seen much of Tucker Davidson as a starter, but what we have seen has been pretty lackluster. Over his first 30 innings, he is striking out under 20% of batters faced with almost 13% walks! That lack of control does make it hard to one-off a batter against him, but I believe the spot to be pretty strong for Bohm. He hasn’t quite lived up to the hype post call-up, but Bohm’s 5-0% hard-hit rate against lefties over the last two seasons is second-best on this team. Davidson also throws a lot of fastballs, which is good news. In the split, Bohm owns a .377 wOBA and .279 ISO over the last three seasons. It might be better to mini-stack him with a few other Phillies bats, but I think he is one of the better value options on Monday.
Bold Call
Alex Cobb strikes out 8 Mets!
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
