Hit it out of the park with these 10 tips.
Picking a winning roster in daily fantasy baseball requires more than just looking at which players are in form and adding them to your squad – over a week this may work, but on a day to day basis you can delve a little deeper to give you that edge.
Ballparks
Pick the right ballpark.
Some ballparks are generally considered better for batters – Citizens Bank Park, Camden Yards and Coors Field are good examples of these. Others are preferable for Pitchers – PNC Park, Marlins Park and Target Field are good examples of these. Consider this in selecting your daily line-up, and avoid playing players in the wrong type of setting.
On Base Percentage
This is a stat that will be particularly useful when selecting players with lower salaries, especially on sites that offer points for walks. Some of these players will not be particularly eye catching, however these players will gain you solid points – especially useful in 50/50 games.
The Odds
Use sportsbooks in formulating your picks – they are the best in the business in predicting outcomes because they’d go bust if they weren’t. If one team is heavily favored, then be more likely to use players from that team. If the totals line is particularly high, use batters from the game, or if particularly low, consider pitchers – you won’t go too far wrong using this tactic.
Poor Pitching
You should seriously consider picking batters who are playing against the weakest pitchers in a rotation. If that pitcher has a high ERA, or is struggling on recent outings, even more reason to go after him. Picking on pitchers who give up a lot of walks is good especially on sites that offer points for walks, but is also a decent option anyway as it shows that the pitcher is struggling with control.
Good Pitching
Pick Pitchers who are playing against teams who are having a bad time offensively – you want that Win, you want those strikeouts and you want that pitcher to play as many innings as possible. A bad pitcher in daily fantasy baseball is a disaster, so get this player right.
Social Media
For all the projections that you can find online, nothing beats that late snippet of information where you find out that a player has been scratched – you can change him, or it might mean that a player you like will be playing. Many players will submit their team, and not check again – you’ll have an edge here.
Left/Right Split
You want to be playing left handed hitters against right handed pitchers, and right handed hitters against left handed pitchers. On a weekly contest this will even out somewhat, but on a daily basis this can make a huge difference. Check out players stats against each hand – some will be hitting much higher against one or the other – and use this in formulating your line-up.
Batter v Pitcher
This can be an important stat, but only if the sample size is large enough. If the two players have faced each other on many occasions, then you might be able to make an assumption that one of the players has a real edge. However the stat isn’t anywhere near as useful when they’ve only clashed on a handful of occasions – don’t use this stat in this scenario.
Look for Improvements
You’ve submitted your line up and are happy with it. Why not go through each position again, and see if you can make small improvements – maybe you missed a player the first time around that will save you some dollars so you can indeed add that higher salaried player that you had to dismiss. When you’re done, do it again. Spending a bit more time than the average player will give you a small edge.
Use Advice Wisely
There are many sites out there offering advice, and filtering some of this advice will pay dividends. If a site backs up advice with hard stats then you should heed this advice more than when a site offers advice based upon feel. If you’ve found a site particularly useful in the past, use them again, and put more weight on their advice than others, and the same goes for individual tipsters.