 We have got some good vibes heading into the weekend coming off of last night where Sean Maniah outscored the entire pitching slate by 17 points as our top pitcher last night. Dan B. Swanson went deep. The braze stack paid off. So hopefully a profitable night for you, which we can now roll over into what I think is a pretty fun slate once again for Friday. We got some good pitching available for us. We've got some stacks. I like quite a bit, both in the high salary range and the low salary range. So let's break it down and try to win some money once again for tonight. Welcome on into the solo shot. That's right here on the FanDuel Podcast Network and NumberFire.com. My name is Jim Sonnis. I am a senior writer and analyst for NumberFire.com here to break down Friday's 14 game main slate with lock set for 705 for tonight. And despite the fact there are 14 games, there's actually not a lot of bad weather in the forecast. So we're good to go. Again, the good vibes paying off, translating over into Friday should be a fun slate to dissect and discuss with so many options. A little punny to break down today on the 4 p.m. stream that's 4 p.m. Eastern on the FanDuel YouTube, Twitch, Facebook and Twitter pages. Hit us up there. Ask your questions and get set for tonight's slate of MLB DFS. Also right here on the NumberFire Daily Fantasy Podcast feed, Austin Swain broke down this weekend's UFC DFS card, gave his thoughts on the main event and his favorite fighters in each salary tier. So find Austin's analysis by going to the NumberFire Daily Fantasy Podcast feed and checking that out wherever you get your podcasts. Hey soccer fans, this season, Captain Morgan and FanDuel are teaming up to give you a one of a kind soccer contest. Introducing Captain Morgan's soccer pick-up, a weekly fantasy contest that is entirely free to play. The contest is simple. All you have to do is make quick predictions for Saturday games this soccer season. You'll earn points for each correct pick and compete for a chance to win up to $3,000 in prizes every single week. Head over to FanDuel and enter the Captain Morgan soccer pick-up today. Must be 21 plus to participate for more details at TheFanDuel.com or download the FanDuel Fantasy app, eligibility restrictions apply and don't forget to make your game day more delicious and sub in the captain pitching preview for this Friday's slate. Garrett Cole facing the Red Sox for roughly the 37th time in the past month is the highest salary pitcher on FanDuel at $10,500. We got Zach Wheeler facing the Braves at $10,000. Lucas G. Alito is facing the Brewers. He is $9,800. Zach Thompson pitching tonight as opposed to last night, which the Marlins refuse to confirm throughout the entire day. Either way, he is pitching for today. He's $9,400. Freddie Peralta, 93, facing off with Lucas G. Alito. Then we have Yusei Kikuchi, Alex Cobb, Frankie Montas, Eduardo Rodriguez and Max Fried and Patrick Corbin, actually, as the other pitchers, $8,000 or higher. I probably picked up on what I was talking about with Cole. I can't really feel super confident there today because there is a lot of familiarity between the Red Sox and Garrett Cole right now and also, you know, they're a good team. Not as concerned about Cole post sticky stuff discussion anymore, given how well he's pitched the past couple of games. But I think there are enough red flags there from a familiarity perspective to go with Zach Wheeler. Number one, I think that to me, it's by a decent margin. The Wheeler has had a couple of rough starts in a row. He's led up eight earned runs and 11 total runs in those two games. I still think he is the top guy for tonight. And part of it is because I think he just got him lucky in those two games. He still had really good peripheral stats. He had 13 strikeouts compared to three walks. The hard hit rate has been under 24 percent in both those starts, which likely means he just had some bad luck. So I'm willing to overlook the results in those two games. The most relevant sample on Wheeler is his past eight starts. He has been throwing more sinkers and fewer four steamers in that time. And generally, as you know, I hate sinkers. Sinkers suck. But it has worked out well for Wheeler. He has a 3.09 skill interactive ERA in that time. His strikeout rate is 29 percent and his bad at ball data has been phenomenal. If you can improve your bad at ball data while keeping your strikeout rate at 29 percent, sweet, I'm on board of the sinker. Just not guy. There aren't many that many guys who are of the Zach Wheeler mold. Wheeler is facing the brave today. And I have not used a pitcher against them since the Acunia injury. But it does make a big difference. Our active roster has a 97 WRC plus versus righties. That's slightly below average. Their strikeout rate is 25 percent. And now I think that we can view them at least from a DFS perspective, not a real world perspective, the DFS perspective. I think we can view them as being a plus matchup for a righty. It is still risky. Good hitters remain. I just, you know, just mentioned that I stacked them last night. But I am more willing to target them now than I was before. And that's especially true when it is a pitcher as filthy as Zach Wheeler. So I want to put him at the top of my list for tonight. Zach Wheeler, number one pitcher in my mind, despite a couple of downstarts recently. Now, Lucas G Alito has had his movement dip over his past five starts. And the strikeout rate in that time is 25 percent. That is a decent decrease. And normally not one I'd feel super great about on this slate. But I do still like G Alito for tonight. He says in the Brewers, more on that matchup in a second. But as far as the strikeout rate, I think it's deceptive. He has five starts in this stretch. And in one of those starts, he had just one strikeout. But he's had five plus in the other four. He had seven plus three times. And that includes each of the past two starts. He's had seven plus strikeouts. He had nine against the oils at the start of the stretch and eight against the Astros last time out. That Astros game was a complete game three hitter. You got plenty of whiffs. If he can do that against the Astros, we know that he's not broken, despite the overall dip in strikeouts with the decreased movement. We should still trust the larger sample. And the larger sample on G Alito is one of a very good picture. His matchup is still a plus, despite the Brewers improvements, despite the fact that Liliadomas is disgusting. It's an 88 WRC plus for the Brewers versus righties. They have a 26 percent strikeout rate. Those do include it down. This is full season numbers. G Alito's strikeout rate has gone up on the road this year. It's very weird. Gets to face a pitcher for tonight. Those are all pluses, too. And I think that the facing a pitcher angle helps offset the fact that he could leave this game early for a pinch hitter with this game being in the National League. But we do have a sample on G Alito in the National League and they let him go 111 pitches in that game. So it's not a perfect situation. I think I'd probably prefer him to be in a situation where he's not going to leave for a pinch hitter, but especially I'd prefer him to not have the dip in strikeouts either. But it's still very obvious that G Alito has upside for tonight. And I like him a lot for tournaments here. So not a cash gameplay. That's Wheeler. Wheeler is the cash gameplay for tonight. But G Alito, to me, a solid tournament play who could push Wheeler from an upside perspective. As far as the top value play for today, I think you've got two options. Eduardo Rodriguez against the Yankees is in play. The one concern there is it's similar to Cole, where they've seen him a bunch recently. He's been good, but it gets concerning. I considered still going Rodriguez just because like the Yankees are down, so many impactful right-handed bats. So I considered it. But I think the other option here is a bit better. And that guy is Tyler Malley. I like him a smidge Morseman ride with Malley here at $7600. Facing the Cardinals, which is a plus matchup for a righty. They have an 86 WRC plus with just a 148 ISO. They don't strike out too much. Just a 22 percent strikeout rate. That's not a plus for Malley, but they also don't walk much, which is a plus for Malley. He has started to develop a bit of a walk problem recently, specifically in the past four starts with less movement on his forcing fastball. Malley's walk rate is 12 percent that drives a pitch count. It increases risk, puts guys on base, etc., etc. But against a more free swinging team, it's less of an issue than it is in a vacuum. And there have also still been plenty of strikeouts in that span. He has a 28 percent strikeout rate. His fly ball rate is just 31 percent. His hard hit rate allowed is 36 percent. There have been some dingers in that time, but the overall bad at ball data is very good. The lone bugaboo, to me at least in this time, has been the walks. The walks could get him in trouble again. There is a reason his salary is $7600, but he can post a big score. He had a 60 burger just a less than a month ago or a little bit over a month ago, I think. He's been around 50 a couple of other times, two in one of those was against St. Louis back on June 5th. He had eighth strikeouts over seven innings in that game. He scored 49 fan dual points. So, yes, there is risk, of course, with Mali, because the walks are scary. Walks will haunt. Shout out to the metrodome. So Mali is not for everyone, but he is for me. And I like the risk when it comes with upside. And I think that is the case here. So Tyler Mali for me, the top value play, but would put him decently behind Wheeler and behind Geolito as well. As far as the stacks for today, I think we got some pretty good ones starting off with the Dodgers facing Chichi Gonzalez, and this game is in LA, which means that Gonzalez is not a course field celebrate. That's awesome. But the numbers he has are ones we can stack against even when he goes on the rope. Gonzalez has been back in the rotation for seven starts now. His skill interactive era is 5.00. His strikeout rate is 15 percent. He's allowing hard contact 45 percent of the time with a 35 percent fly ball rate. I would like the fly ball rate to be a bit higher for a stack against a stack against Gonzalez, but it hasn't mattered too much because he still has a 7.47 era in that time. And that's not all due to course field. He led up eight runs in Miami against the Marlins, which was his worst outing in this stretch. So we don't care about era for a guy of course field, but it is reassuring that he did struggle when he was on the road against Miami, much weaker offense. The Dodgers, he just faced the Dodgers last week at Coors Field. They scored seven runs across four innings. You know, the results there do not matter because they were at Coors Field, totally different environment. But the fact that they just saw him does, they know it's coming. That's a good thing for us for DFS. So I think they are the top stack of the night. Hopefully, Mookie Betts able to get back in there for today. I think the Dodgers have enough depth to make it work regardless. Wanted to a check in here on Cody Bellinger. The hits have not been there. He went over for again last night and that's concerning. But results can be deceiving that bad at ball numbers for Bellinger are not nearly as bad from July 1 through Wednesday night. So before last night's game, Bellinger had five hits. That's compared to four barrels. That's not a ratio you get very often. He's not striking out very much. He's made hard contact recently at three balls with an exit velocity of 95 plus miles per hour last night. So I don't think this rut for Bellinger is going to keep up forever. His salary is down to thirty four hundred dollars. There's probably a lot of negative sentiments around him. So might not work. He might actually I mean, they could give him a day off too. So like, you know, keep that in mind. But I'm down to take some swipes here while others are avoiding Bellinger on this slate. I'd also mentioned that Billy McKinney is in play if he starts again in the outfield at minimum salary. So McKinney an option for sure. But I am in on Cody Bellinger, despite the really wretched numbers he has had across the past month. The other Los Angeles team is pretty fun for tonight, too. The angels face in J-Hap and this game is in Minneapolis, which is a good park for hitting this time of year. And Hap is letting up the kind of contact that can take advantage of that warmer weather. That's credit. He has been throwing harder recently. The velocity of his forcing basketball has been up over his past eight starts. But it hasn't led to many strides in that time. He's letting up a forty four percent hard hit rate with a forty four percent fly ball rate, which is perfect from a dinger hitting perspective. His strikeout rate is 18 percent, so a lot of balls in play and the dingers have flown. He's let up two home runs per game, on average, in this time. That's despite plenty of low level competition in this stretch. And the angels, even with all the injuries, are not that. So I'm on board at them here from a stacking perspective. And I think the angels do great out pretty well. One thing to check out here with Hap is what he does versus lefties. Not just for Shohei Otani. I mean, I'd use Otani against somebody through with both arms for funsies. But I also want to check in because I like Jared Walsh a lot. Brandon Marsh is a lefty, too. Hap has faced his sixty seven lefties so far this year, which tells you that teams tend to just use their best lefties against him. The strikeout rate is 19 percent. He does a much better job of suppressing hard contact against them, though. So what I would say is we can use lefties like Otani, but we need to be selective. If you look at their their power numbers versus lefties this year, Jared Walsh is their third best power hitter against lefties. So Tani, Justin Upton, it just came off the aisle and then Walsh, third. So I would say both Otani and Walsh are in play. Despite the fact that Hap is a lefty, Marsh not quite as much because I'm not as confident in his abilities versus lefties. So Otani, Upton, Walsh, all guys we can go to here. And then check out some of the lower solid righties. Preferably not David Fletcher, but I do think that they all work. And I would say Justin Upton is in play despite just coming off the injured list. Finally, for our third stack, the Tigers offense has been much better recently. They have been beating up on rough pitching and some mid-level pitchers. And they get Chris Bubich tonight. And he spent in the other rotation. The results have been rough. So I'm back on the Tigers once again for tonight. It's hard to get a read on Bubich in terms of his most relevant sample for my sheet because I always want to look at guys as starters because they throw differently. You don't throw as hard when you're starting versus being the bullpen. And that's tough for him because he's been in and out of the bullpen. But the one thing we can see is that the foreseeing fastball for Bubich has had less movement the past seven overall outings, whether it be in the bullpen or as a reliever or as a starter. That includes three outings, short and three innings. So basically, you want to take these numbers and adjust them up. You don't need to adjust them up to justify stacking against him. In that time, in those seven outings, he has a 5.31 skill interactive ERA with an 18 percent strikeout rate. He is allowing a 42 percent hard hit rate with a 38 percent fly ball rate. That is good, bad at ball data for us from a stacking perspective. The Tigers WRC plus versus lefties is up to 108. They should give us some value here. So it's it's hard not to like what they have been doing. So I like the Tigers when looking for wiggle room when trying to stack the two Los Angeles teams. The must target guy here for the Tigers is Eric Haas. He only has 66 blade appearances versus lefties, but he has a 453 ISO. That is a small sample, but oh, my gosh, is it good? Tons of power there. He's a catcher, so he doesn't always play. So hopefully he does for tonight, but I love him if he does. I'm also down for Zach Short at twenty three hundred dollars. He gets the Patune advantage for tonight. He had a Dinger yesterday and then Robbie Grossman and Jonathan Scope are the priorities among the upper tier guys. So they're not a bad team to stack in a spot like this. And the Tigers, a team I do like quite a bit for tonight. Let's move now to things to watch. I talked about things that went well last night. One thing that did not go well, as I said, not to use Blake Stel despite a plus matchup because his form was so bad. He did get outscored, I will say, by two of the three pitchers we recommended. But he was still really solid in that game. Despite that, I'm going to do it again here with Joe Musgrove. The velocity has been down as past six starts. His strikeout rate is 16 percent. His skill interactory skill interactive you are raised five point one five. So it's a great match up. But those numbers are really concerning. So like now last night, I am fine missing out on Musgrove. If he does pop off, I'm generally a Joe Musgrove guy. I am not that right now. I will hold off until we see things start to improve for him. The Reds are pretty rough against lefties, so I couldn't really put them in stacks. But I am down for some one-offs here, especially the value guys. The basing Wade LeBlanc, who has a super low strikeout rate. He's letting up a 42 percent flight ball rate. Not a ton of hard contact, which does limit the appeal a bit as well. But I think we should be able to get a full game here out of RACD's Aquino with Nick Castellanos out. So Aquino in play, Tyler Stevenson. Another good value option. I think the Reds very much more so for one-offs versus stacks. I can get a full stack between India, Suarez, Aquino and Stevenson. But I think I prefer them more for one-offs for tonight. Finally, for your Mali lineups, where you have a lot of salary to burn, I would check out the Astros and I will say the Astros in play for more than just high salary stacks. They're facing Colby Allard, who hasn't been bad in the rotation, but he also hasn't been elite. He kind of got to be elite to take down this team if you're a lefty. And honestly, like I said, the Astros are not that bad. From a salary perspective, Carlos Correa is $3,000. Yuli-Guriel is $2,700. Itch has McCormick plays. He's $2,500. So if you talk to me during my Q&A later on today, it's very possible I will be higher on the Astros then than I am now. I like them a lot now, but I could want to pushing them up the stacking list if we talk later on. So keeping my eyes open for the Astros for today. All right, let's finish up here with the Dinger calls. We had Swanson last night and Nakeel Baidu the night before. So trying to keep the good vibes going. The boring options have not necessarily come through. But let's go with Max Muncie for tonight facing Chichi Gonzalez. Going to let up a lot of balls in play, letting him have a hard contact. So I think that Max Muncie, given the power that he has, worth a look for tonight. As far as the fun calls, the non-elite guys who could go deep. I think it's between two guys. Maybe we'll just go with both. I would say I'm deciding between Eric Haas and Justin Upton. Upton, we know he has power when he's just coming off the aisle. So I think he counts as a more of a fun one. Haas hitting a lot of homers, but not generally viewed as being like this massive power hitter. So I'm just going to go three tonight because why not? My podcast, My Rules. So we're going to go Max Muncie, Justin Upton and Eric Haas as the homerun calls for tonight. Be sure to get your homerun calls in today later on during the Q&A session. That's at 4 p.m. on the Fando YouTube, Twitch, Facebook and Twitter pages. Swing by there. Give me your Dinger calls and ask your questions about tonight's slate. Also, once again, check out Austin's USC DFS podcast up on the Number Fire Daily Fantasy podcast feed. And if you like what you hear, leave us a rating and review as well. If you have questions for me, I am on Twitter at Jim Sonnis. J-I-M-S-A-N-N-E-S. You can also follow the FanDuel Podcast Network at FanDuel Podcast. Big thank you to everyone for tuning in for today. Let's go into the weekend on a high note and go win some money. Once again, for tonight, we'll talk to you once again on Monday. This has been the solo shot right here on the FanDuel Podcast Network.