Below we’ve got a discussion of the starting pitching situation as well as the best teams to use for stacks for Tuesday’s fifteen game slate on DraftKings. We’ve also got projections derived from Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections, and we have rankings of the top plays at each position.

Forecast

Three games have rain concerns tonight. First up is Houston at Baltimore where there’s a chance of thunderstorms for the back half of that game. That makes pitchers in that game a bit dicey, though I’m not a big fan of either starter in that game tonight anyway. Bats from both teams will likely be options, and the forecast as of now doesn’t scare me off them. That’s especially true given there’s a nice wind blowing out to left in that one.

Another game with a chance of rain and a hitter-friendly wind is Washington at the Cubs. The wind is also blowing out to left there, but the rain concern comes toward the front end of the game. For that reason, my guess is both hitters and pitchers will be in play with a delayed start possible, but they should be clear once the game gets started.

Finally, we’ve got persistent rain chances throughout the evening in the Colorado at Cincinnati game. The pitchers in that one aren’t options given that delays are certainly possible, but that’s likely a hitter-friendly game, so they weren’t in play to begin with. As for the hitters, they’re options if it looks they’ll be able to get the game in, but that looks dubious as of this writing.

Make sure to check DailyBaseballData.com and @KevinRothWx for updates tomorrow afternoon.

Pitching Perspective

Starting as always with the expensive pitching options of the day, Madison Bumgarner ($9,600) is my favorite pricey option of the day. That’s mainly because he’s not nearly as pricey as he should be. In fact, his price tag is somewhat baffling. For his last start his price tag was $10,500 against the Dodgers. He went out and threw 6 1/3 scoreless innings, so the price drop doesn’t have anything to do with recent performance. And it shouldn’t have dropped because of his matchup today as his oppoenent, Milwaukee, has the second worst strikeout rate and second worst wRC+ against left-handers this year. I’m not sure how you keep Bumgarner out of your lineups today.

As for the other expensive pitchers, Clayton Kershaw ($12,200) easily has the top projection of the day, but his price is a little prohibitive for me. And I’m certainly not paying up for him when there’s such a good option available in Bumgarner. I also like Danny Salazar ($9,100) a bit in GPPs. I always love his upside, and I think his ownership percentage might not be too high with other good options available and people trying to avoid his hot-hitting opponent, the Texas Rangers. Rounding out the expensive guys, I have no interest in David Price ($10,600) and Jacob deGrom ($10,000) with five digit price tags, and I don’t trust Julio Teheran ($9,300) as far as I can throw him.

Among the mid-price options ($7,000-$9,000), Jordan Zimmermann ($8,600) is my preferred play. Zimmermann has had any interesting relationship with the strikeout in his career, as he has publicly stated at times that racking up strikeouts is not always his focus. That’s certainly been the case this season as his strikeout rate is a career low 16.1 percent. But I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t improve on that number tonight with a matchup against the Cubs who continue to lead the league in strikeout rate against right-handed pitching. I won’t force both Zimm and Bumgarner into my lineups, but I will be on the lookout for hitter bargains to make that a possibility.

A cheaper option in that price range is Matt Shoemaker ($7,300). It’s been a rough year for Shoemaker as clearly indicated by his 6.29 ERA. But his skills are excellent and portend much better results coming along very soon. His strikeout and walk rates are both comfortably better than league average, and his SIERA is 3.61 as result. Keeping the ball in the park has been the problem. His home run rate is an unbelievable 2.64 home runs per nine innings. That’s absurd. Shoemaker is partially to blame in that he’s been a fly ball heavy pitcher this year with a 47.3 percent fly ball rate. But an incredble 21 percent of his fly balls have left the yard so far. That absurd bad luck simply can’t hold.

If you’re looking for bargains, Jesse Chavez ($6,800) continues to be underpriced. He has a tough matchup against the Tigers, but he has safely above average skills and continues to have a below average price. Going even cheaper, Odrisamer Despaigne ($5,300) is a nice value, though he’s extremely hard to trust. He’s taken three consectuive turns in the rotation, and he was absoultely brutal in two of those starts. He did manage a decent outing against the Cubs last time out, but that’s a pretty damn good matchup given their strikeout proclivities. But his matchup today also isn’t bad against the Angels who have been 20 percent worse than average against right-handed pitching.

Here are our projections for today’s starters. You’ll see each starter’s salary, the average number of fantasy points the starter is projected to score per game and how far above or below average his projection is compared to his salary in the value column. You’ll also see adjustments being made for matchup and ballpark. As for the colors, they rank as follows from good to bad: purple, blue, green, yellow, orange, red, burgundy.

Stack Options

The teams that have at least five hitters with a projection for the day (according to my model) that is at least one standard deviation above the mean are Boston, Toronto and Colorado. I mentioned the concern about the rain in Colorado, so if I’m going with a five or six man stack from one team, I’ll be going with Boston and Toronto. Though Colorado and Cincinnati would probably be my third and fourth choices, respectively, if I were to have no concerns about a rainout.

For Boston I’d be focusing on David Ortiz ($4,600, 1B), Mookie Betts ($4,400, OF), Hanley Ramirez ($4,900, OF/SS), Pablo Sandoval ($4,700, 3B) and Dustin Pedroia ($4,100, 2B). Brock Holt ($3,300, 3B/OF) is also a value option if he plays. For Toronto, I’d be focusing on the five players you’d be expecting me to focus on.

As mentioned the Houston and Baltimore game should be an offense-friendly affair, but I don’t see anything there for a team-heavy stack. Instead, the studs from those teams just warrant consideration. For a potentially lightly-owned stack, Pittsburgh could be an option against Jose Urena, who will be making his first major league start.

You can view and download our hitter projections here. These projections are an average of what each hitter is projected to do on a per game basis according to the ZiPS rest-of-season projections. The projections have then been adjusted for splits, quality of the opposing starting pitcher and ballpark.

Player Rankings

Catcher

1. Carlos Santana – $4,300 – Cleveland Indians
2. Russell Martin – $4,300 – Toronto Blue Jays
3. Wilin Rosario – $4,200 – Colorado Rockies
4. Blake Swihart – $3,300 – Boston Red Sox

First Base

1. Paul Goldschmidt – $5,300 – Arizona Diamondbacks
2. David Ortiz – $4,600 – Boston Red Sox
3. Edwin Encarnacion – $5,300 – Toronto Blue Jays
4. Adrian Gonzalez – $3,900 – Los Angeles Dodgers

Second Base

1. Jose Altuve – $4,500 – Houston Astros
2. Dustin Pedroia – $4,100 – Boston Red Sox
3. Brandon Phillips – $3,900 – Cincinnati Reds
4. Ian Kinsler – $4,300 – Detroit Tigers

Third Base

1. Josh Donaldson – $4,600 – Toronto Blue Jays
2. Adrian Beltre – $4,200 – Texas Rangers
3. Manny Machado – $4,400 – Baltimore Orioles
4. Brock Holt – $3,300 – Boston Red Sox

Shortstop

1. Jose Reyes – $4,200 – Toronto Blue Jays
2. Hanley Ramirez – $4,900 – Boston Red Sox
3. Jimmy Rollins – $3,400 – Los Angeles Dodgers

Outfield

1. Jose Bautista – $4,900 – Toronto Blue Jays
2. Ryan Braun – $4,600 – Milwaukee Brewers
3. Mookie Betts – $4,400 – Boston Red Sox
4. Carlos Gonzalez – $4,200 – Colorado Rockies
5. Giancarlo Stanton  – $4,900 – Miami Marlins
6. George Springer – $4,700 – Houston Astros
7. Mark Trumbo – $3,800 – Arizona Diamondbacks
8. Marlon Byrd – $3,800 – Cincinnati Reds

Starting Pitcher

1. Madison Bumgarner – $9,600 – San Francisco Giants
2. Jordan Zimmermannn – $8,600 – Washington Nationals
3. Matt Shoemaker – $7,300 – Los Angeles Angels
4. Clayton Kershaw – $12,200 – Los Angeles Dodgers
5. Danny Salazar – $9,100 – Cleveland Indians
6. Jesse Chavez – $6,800 – Oakland Athletics
7. Odrisamer Despaigne – $5,300 – San Diego Padres

*Rankings are price sensitive