RADIO
Welcome back RotoBallers! But I'm wondering if there are less of you here. Rotoballer numbers are growing. But it looks like both FanDuel and DraftKings believes there will be less customers playing KBO DFS tonight. There is a noticeable decline in the number of contests available, the size of those contests, and of course with those a smaller amount of prize money there for taking. I am not liking this! And it's a shame because the 6/28/20 KBO DFS slate is an extremely interesting one.
Last night's slate had a couple contrarian plays that I recommended but most of the industry was unified in recommending the chalk yesterday. And for the most part, the chalk hit. Tonight's slate however is a difficult slate. There are tons of great options tonight and a number of different ways you can assemble your lineup. But that might be what makes it so difficult. There are probably 300 lineups you could feel confident in for tonight, but obviously you can't enter 'em all! And given the dwindling of options the sites have tonight, it makes even less sense than usual to do that. And like last night, I'll be fast asleep when this slate locks at 4:00 AM on Sunday June 28, 2020.
However, with so many playable options, I'd keep your ear to the ground for any updates. I might not have any updates, but follow me @MarkStrausberg for my KBO and other picks on Twitter in case I post some changes. I am not expecting many news updates, but even as I write this, I keep changing my preferred selections. But here's who I like, at least at this very minute....
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KBO DFS Pitchers
Or at least we will start with whom I don't like. And let's be clear, I love finding those hidden gems, where a tiny blemish can cause it to be marked down. But the bottom four pitching options on DK might be priced like they are Nordstrom Rack level; but the quality is more like free-cycle at best. Their upsides are not even replacement level and their downsides are negative scores. I don't think you'll mind, but I'm moving on to the top six options.
Odrisimar Despaigne ($8100) is the cheapest of the six and his stats are kind of meh. He carries a 4.50 ERA and 1.35 WHIP, which is right around replacement level. However, he probably has the best matchup on the board of anyone starting tonight. Hanwha is the worst offense in the league and its not even close. If you love to play the match-ups, Despaigne is the guy for you. There are worse options than Despaigne, but there are certainly better ones too.
The inverse option to Despaigne is Drew Rucinski ($9300), who I've discussed before. Rucinski is extremely talented and his stats back it up. However, he has the toughest matchup of anyone on the slate, taking on the Doosan Bears and the league's number one offense. He did hold the Bears to just two runs in the six innings when he faced them earlier this year, but he also only has three strikeouts in that game. If there were limited options tonight, I'd play Ruckinski. He's that good. But with at least four other options I like on the board, I will have very little exposure to Rucinski, if any at all.
Chris Flexen ($8400) is the poor man's Rucinski tonight. The extra salary space alone makes Flexen worthy of consideration. His talent is just a touch below Rucinski's, and his matchup is a smidge easier than Rucinski's. Yet the fact that he is going head-t0-head with Rucinski's makes him less attractive. He's not SP1 worthy tonight, but he makes for a viable SP2 contrarian GPP pick. Want to feel better about picking Flexen? Flexen has yet to give up more than three earned runs in any start this season. Even Rucinski can't make that claim.
SP1 worthy options?
That leaves us with three options for an SP1: Chan Gyu Lim ($8200) , Aaron Brooks ($8500), and Won Tae Choi ($8700). Choi has five quality starts in his last six outings. The exception is the six-spot he gave up to the Samsung Lions ten days ago. He also failed to get out of the third inning against the SK Wyverns back on May 19. It's almost as if the worse the competition, the worse Choi pitches. The Tigers are his opponent tonight and they find themselves in the middle of the pack. I think Choi has a solid outing tonight and he's worth starting in FanDuel. But if you do start him, do so only after knowing the aforementioned risk.
So that leaves us with Chan Gyu Lim and Aaron Brooks. Brooks is absolutely the better pitcher, evinced in his 2.62 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, and 48 Ks. Lim can make hitters look foolish almost as easily a Brooks and actually has a better K-rate than Brooks. They have the same number of wins, but Lim's ratios are not quite as pristine. However, Lim is facing the SK Wyverns, who are the second worst team in the league. Furthermore, he brings some serious heat!
Check out this strikeout from Lim Chan-gyu coming in at 107*!!!!!!!
*kph pic.twitter.com/4XQ8453Get
— Alex Fast (@AlexFast8) June 17, 2020
If I had to decide between the two, I would go Brooks. But the better match-up and strikeout floor that Lim brings, I wouldn't fault you for selecting him either.
KBO Top Hitter Stacks
Just as we used deductive reasoning to select our pitchers for tonight, let's use the same logic for finding out hitting stacks. If Brooks and Lim are our two favorite starters, we obviously won't be stacking the Wyverns or the Warriors tonight. I didn't push you toward Despaigne. Yet there is no way you can convince me that Hanwha is worth stacking tonight either. I also will likely have a few one-offs from the Bears or Dinos, but both teams opposing pitching talent is enough to eliminate those two teams for stacking options.
We have now eliminated the half options, leaving us with KIA, KT, Samsung, LG, and Lotte. Samsung and Lotte Giants square off against one another in the night's highest projected total. But both offenses are also in the bottom half of the league. Some nice one-offs on both teams, but neither make for a great stack. Furthermore, I'd prefer to stack a team that is more heavily favored and that's why I will start with the Twins, currently listed as a -167 favorite.
LG Twins
The Twins got the W last night and put three runs across last night. Not worth getting excited about, but their opposing pitcher tonight is more of a gas can than last night. Joo Han Kim has a 10.80 ERA and a 2.60 WHIP. He's not that bad, but even if we cut his ratios in half, that's still an attractive matchup.
Roberto Ramos ($5300, $17) has not been quite the player he was before his short stint on the injured list. And he had another 0-fer last night. But I think the left-handed Ramos takes advantage of the right-handed Kim and makes sure Mel Rojas Jr. doesn't open up too much of HR lead. Fellow southpaw Hyun Soo Kim ($5100, $15) should join Ramos in a power explosion. Shortstop Ji Hwan Oh ($3100, $9) is also left handed and despite only hitting .260 on the season is hitting .324 in his last ten games. Since you need a catcher if you are playing DraftKings and Kang Nam Yoo is one of my favorite options behind the plate tonight.
The Twins however might be a pretty popular stack tonight. They will likely be joined by the...
KT Wiz
The Wiz are the heaviest favored team on the slate tonight. The Wiz are third in the league in both batting average and dingers. There a number of sneaky plays throughout the line-up like Jeong Dae Bae ($3000, $9) who is hitting .3333. And then there is not so sneaky, like Baek Ho Kang ($6100,$16) is averaging just a hair under a dozen DKFP per game. Unfortunately for Kang, he is being overshadowed by Mel Rojas Jr. ($5900, $17), who should be the centerpiece of any KTW stack. There is a mountain of stats to support the use of Rojas. There's the simple league-leading 17 HRs including four HRs in his last give games. Or even the statheads might be surprised to see he has a continually rising, eye-popping .350 ISO. Either way, get Rojas into your lineup.
But if you are looking for a less popular stack, consider the...
KIA Tigers
Preston Tucker ($5600, $17) is finally returning to our stratosphere, with just one hit this week so far. He's very pricey for that kind of production, but we all know a rebound is coming. And it wasn't that long ago that he did this:
Preston Tucker was a triple shy of the cycle today:
4-4, 2 2B, 1 HR, 2 R, 3 RBI.
He extends his hitting streak to 9 games. pic.twitter.com/q2IBsa6JE5
— Alex Fast (@AlexFast8) June 19, 2020
Tucker or no Tucker, I like the production per dollar of Hyung Woo Choi ($4500, $13) more. In his last ten games, Choi has a slash line of .382/.432/.618. Sun Bin Kim ($4000, $8) returned from his injured list stint earlier this week and is currently hitting .333 on the year. He will likely be hitting out of the 2-hole in the lineup tonight and should see plenty of good pitches. A combination of some sort of Tucker and Choi will follow him in the lineup, likely followed by Jin Wa Na ($3500, $9). Na's salary seems to barely move, but he is a wonderfully affordable option hitting .288 on the season with six homeruns.
Other hitters to consider:
- Doosan OF Kun Woo Park ($3400) is suddenly quite hot, hitting .410 over his last ten games and putting up double digit DKFPs his last three games in a row. An additional Doosan one-off tonight is Joo Hwan Choi, who has a .985 OPS over his last ten games.
- Think I overhyped Flexen? You have to like the lefty-righty matchup of Sung Bum Na ($5800, $18), especially given he has 13 round-trippers under his belt already.
Good luck in your KBO DFS lineups tonight!
More Fantasy Baseball Analysis
