 In what should not be a surprise, given there are 14 games on tonight's slate, there are a lot of really fun options, both at pitcher and for stacking tonight in MLB DFS. And that means we gotta kind of dig on through and be a bit picky with these options. I think we can do that pretty successfully and feel pretty good about the options we have, but a lot to sift through for sure, some uncertainty with starting pitchers, stuff like that. So we're gonna break down tonight's 14 game slate, get you ready for tonight and hopefully win you some money over on fandual.com. Welcome on into the solo shot. That's right here on the Fandual Podcast Network and numberfire.com. My name is Jim Sotis. I am a senior writer and analyst for Number Fire, here to break down this 14 game main slate with lockset for 7.05 PM Eastern for today. Couple weather notes on this slate. First one is out in New York for the Mets and the Cardinals. Doesn't seem super heavy, but it does seem like there is a good chance that rain does interrupt this game one way or another. So Mets and Cardinals definitely up in the air for tonight. Same thing in Atlanta for the Braves and Rockies. They're lower rain odds, so they should be good to go, but potentially some murkiness there. Check back on that one later. And finally, there is a chance of thunderstorms in Kansas City for the Royals and Angels. They should be okay, but check back on the timing of that rain later on as well. We'll dig into the pitching options, outline where I'm going on a pretty full slate and then get you talking about some stacks later on. The first day reminder to make sure you're subscribed to the Number Fire Daily Fantasy podcast feed wherever you get your podcasts. You can find this wherever you get your podcasts and also over up on the FanDuel YouTube page. If you like what you hear, leave us a thumbs up on YouTube or a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify. Baseball season is in full swing and there's no better place to get in on the MLB action than FanDuel America's number one sports book because right now, new customers get a no sweat first bet up to $2,500. That's at $2,500 back in bonus bets if your first bet doesn't win. So don't miss your chance to get a snag a no sweat first bet up to $2,500 when you join FanDuel today. FanDuel official partner of Major League Baseball. Major League Baseball's trademarks used with permission must be 21 plus and president select states, first online real money wager only $10 deposit required, refund issued is not with trouble bonus bets that expire in 14 days. Restricted supply seafold terms at fanduel.com slash sports book. FanDuel is offering online sports waging in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino LLC. Gambling problem called 1-800 Gammler or visit fanduel.com slash RG in Arizona. 1-800 next step or text next step to 533-42 in Connecticut 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Indiana 1-800-9 with it in Wyoming and Kansas 1-800-522-4700 or in Kansas ksgamblinghealth.com. Louisiana is 1-800-777-770 stop in Massachusetts gamblinghelplinema.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24 seven support in Maryland MD gamblinghealth.org in a New York 1-877-8 Hope and Wire text Hope and Wire and in West Virginia go to 1-800-gambler.net. Pitching preview for this Friday main slate Joe Ryan checks in with the highest salary on FanDuel his salary is $11,000, $400 all by Kevin Galsman at 11-2. We got Shane McClanahan at 11 flat fall by Zach Gallin at 10-8. Tristan McKenzie is facing Zach Gallin. His salary is 10-5. Followed by Michael Kopeck at 98. Julio Tehran is 97. What a world, love that. Andrew Abbott facing the Astros 95. You Darvish get the tough test of the Rays at 93. Domingo Ehrman 92 at JP France at 9,000. Sandiel Contra, Taiwan Walker, Martin Perez, JP Sears, Trevor Williams, Patrick Sandoval, Rich Hill and Tanner Hauke are the others that $8,000 are higher. My goodness, that is a list. A lot of names in that list and a lot of names to sift through for today. After sifting through all of those names, I wanted settling on Joe Ryan as being the top guy for tonight. And entering last night's game, I was skeptical of Sonny Gray against the Tigers. Didn't think he would leave after four innings, but I wasn't as confident in Gray as I am in Ryan for tonight. So Sonny Gray flopping last night to me does not impact my handicap of Joe Ryan for today. Just much better form for Ryan right now and happy to be here for this time. The matchup obviously is a big part of that because the Tigers have a 122 ISO against righties with a 77 WRC plus and they are more than willing to strike out. But Ryan overall is just pitching really well this year. In 13 starts, he has a 3.49 skill interactive ERA with a 27% strikeout rate. His expected ERA is even better at 2.45. I think that number, the expected ERA at 2.45 is overselling it a bit, but he's obviously pitching great. Now Ryan doesn't always get a ton of leash. That's kind of the twins, the way they work with the pitching and the starting rotation. So Ryan can have outings where he has just four strikeouts. And he saw that each has passed two games and three of us passed four. But we've also seen Ryan get double digit strikeouts three times. I've got Ryan projected for 6.7 strikeouts. That's not like a massive number by any means, but I think for tonight, given the fact that he probably is not gonna allow a ton of earned runs and that number is number three for me tonight, the strikeout projection, that's high enough where I feel good about him. So Joe Ryan to me is going to be the top pitcher for tonight. I think there are plenty of guys you could list for the second slot behind Joe Ryan at pitcher. And you can justify all of them. My personal preference is going to Michael Kopeck at $9,800 and this feels odd because I was stacking against Kopeck about a month ago. And obviously that didn't go well. I think that was against Houston when I did that. And he did walk six guys there, but didn't let up many runs. And that game is also when Kopeck started to change the way he was approaching his pitch mix. In that game, Kopeck basically ditched his curve ball entirely. Now the curve has never been a massive factor for Kopeck, but it was his lowest whiff pitch. According to baseball Savant, Kopeck had just a 15.4% whiff rate on that pitch. His other three pitches are all at 27.9% or higher. So in getting rid of the curve ball, Kopeck basically became a three-pitch pitcher. And at least for right now until teams catch on to him, that is working very well. Across six starts without that curve ball, Kopeck has a 2.99 skill-interactive ERA. His strikeout rate is 35%. Those numbers are great. But when Kopeck was a guy we were targeting with hitters earlier on, it was because he was also struggling with hard contact. But that number has gone down too, because in the six-start sample, the hard hit rate allowed for Kopeck is 30%. That has all helped him to rack up a 2.00 ERA in this time. And this is obviously a very small sample. He was at home for five of those six starts and he had plus matchups. This time, he's on the road and taken on the Mariners. That's a good offense, but they will strike out. 25% strikeout rate against righties in the current active roster. And that's a number we can use pitches against as long as we're okay with the risk of facing a team that does have some good bats. So there is risk here because A, it's the Mariners. B, Kopeck could revert back to his old form. But for the upside, I'm willing to take that risk. I like Kopeck enough to rank him second behind Ryan, even on a slate with a lot of names on it. So to me, the studs for tonight are gonna be Joe Ryan, one, Michael Kopeck, two, and I feel pretty good in putting those two guys that high on my list. We'll talk about some other pitchers you can consider and things to watch for tonight. Top value of the slate has to be, I think Sandy Alcantra, I know he struggled this year. And he hasn't shown a ton recently to inspire confidence of a turnaround, but his salary is 88. And that seems absurdly low in a plus matchup. So I am gonna make Alcantra the top value for tonight. He's facing the Nationals here, obviously not a ton of strikeouts in that matchup, but also not much else to fear. They have an 83 WRC plus against righties with a 124 ISO and a 32% fly ball rates. They're not a team we need to fear with opposing pitchers. Alcantra is definitely still struggling. He went seven innings with just one and run allowed last week, but just four strikeouts there. And also he let him five runs to the A's to start before that. So this is not, I'm not on Alcantra because I think he's trending up. He's been kind of the same. In fact, if I look at like my most relevant sample for Alcantra, it's the full season in 2023. In that time, his ERA is 4.75. His expected ERA is better at 4.11. And he's still got a 13% swing in strike, which is actually higher than where it was that last year. So he hasn't been great. And I haven't seen a lot to make me think that that will turn around suddenly, but there are still reasons to believe he's not fully broken. And if he's not broken, I can't not use him here at 88 in this matchup. So if you get the VOD that Alcantra will be very popular, fine, pivot, you know, because he hasn't proven to us this year that he deserves to be a heavily rostered pitcher. But to me, the discount and salary and the matchup help offset the performance. So Sandy Alcantra, I think deserves to be our top value. I know it's not a massively hot take by any means, but given the way he's pitched, I think that you could question that for sure. So as long as Alcantra is not too popular, he'll be the top value for today behind the top studs of Joe Ryan and Michael Kopeck. Let's go down to stacks. I think the stacking slate is super, super fun personally. First one is in Atlanta for the Braves. D'Nelson LaMette has not been a disaster as he transitioned to being a starter for the Rockies. The skill interactive ERA across three starts is actually in the low fours. He's getting some strikeouts. Walk rate's not too bad, but LaMette's letting up a lot of hard contact and that has bit him in the results column so far. So I think we should stack the Braves against him tonight. It's a very warm game, 86 degrees in Atlanta and that does bump up bats. And it also makes hard contact more dangerous. That's an issue for LaMette because across the three starts, his hard hit rate allowed is 53%. His fly ball rate is 37%, which is not low enough to make that a non-factor. LaMette let up five runs to the Diamondbacks, three to the Giants, two to the Padres. Now he has to go on the road to face the Braves. They have a 109 WRC plus against righties with a 194 ISO. That's a very tough task. I think we should take advantage of the park factor, take advantage of the weather and stack Atlanta against LaMette for tonight. Now against LaMette, I do wanna favor lefties because he hasn't had to face a ton of them being a reliever but he has struggled against lefties the past few years. So the big impact for me of that is that I'll favor Matt Olson over Sean Murphy. Both these guys are awesome. They both had fantastic years but I will sometimes consider going Murphy above Olson just because I think Olson tends to be more popular. Sauer is super, super close. I mean, you can use both obviously as well but I think that it does give Olson a pretty legitimate edge. So Eddie Rosario gets bumped up against lefty, Ozzy Albee's prefer him against lefties or Rosario gets bumped up against a righty and Albee's gets bumped up despite the fact I prefer him against lefties in general but I do think that Olson is kind of the big benefactor specifically where I view him relative to Sean Murphy within these stacks. The other hot game on this slate is the Royals and the Angels and the temperature here is actually higher than Atlanta 88 degrees versus 86 in Atlanta. As mentioned, check the weather here just to make sure this game will be good to go but if we get the green light I think we should stack the Angels. They're facing Brady Singer and I still like Singer long-term. Showed a lot to me last year. I traded for him in Dynasty this off season so it's been rough and he hasn't had it this year. The big issue for Singer has been hard contact and he's been trying to work his way around this trying to get more strikeouts to make the hard contact less of an issue. In order to do that he has gone back to leaning heavily on his slider as past six starts. That has not helped the hard hit rates. It's at 52% in that time. That's despite having matchups in that sample with the Tigers, Nationals and Rockies. Last time out, Singer had to face the Orioles much better offense and he let him four runs in four and a third innings. Now he's facing the Angels. The Angels have a 111 WRC plus with a 40% fly ball rate. So I want Singer to turn it around selfishly for my Dynasty teams. But I think for tonight we should stack against him until we actually see that turnaround happen for Singer. Now within this Angels stack I'm not sure if Mickey Moniac will play. He's been pretty spotty with the playing time but I really want him to. The sample on Moniac in the major series expanding and he's up to 70 played appearances against Reides. His ISO is still 388 which is absurd. He has a 61% fly ball rate. He is striking out too much which may be why he winds up on the bench but overall he looks awesome. He was playing great in triple A. His salary is 29. So if Moniac plays I will definitely be there for today. The salary has been kept down primarily because of playing time but I think that if he's in there he's a really fun place. Mickey Moniac to me, the key focal point within the Angels stack was saying a lot. Give me the other guys but according to accounting for salary he's a thought option for sure. Now for the third stack looking at the Blue Jays current roster you would think they'd be awesome against lefties but they have not been at least in terms of hitting for power and that may continue but I'm okay betting against that continuing and I do think they're a fine stack tonight. Facing Martin Perez who was fantastic last year and looking at Perez's numbers I don't think what he did was a fluke by any means but he hasn't been able to duplicate that this year. We have a nine star sample on Perez with his velocity stabilized and his skill interactive ERA is 5.26. It is up there primarily because he doesn't get many strikeouts but he's also letting up a 38% hard hit rates with a 39% fly ball rate. Across the full season Perez has a 5.14 expected ERA. That's up from 3.59 last year. So again, it wasn't really fluke but like it hasn't carried over to this year and it's also not trending the right way. If you look more recently he let up a seven earned runs last time out. He let up six earned against the Tigers two starts before that. So if the Jays actually do have juice in their bats against lefties they probably could show it here. So I feel inclined to give the Jays a swing and see what happens for tonight. The big catalyst of this turnaround against lefties from a power perspective would be Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Against lefties this year his ISO is 027. That's not gonna stick. That's very flukey. That's very much not gonna stay but George Springer has room to grow as well. So I'd expect those guys to tread up in terms of their numbers against lefties. I would not expect that for Alejandro Kirk. He's not a guy who's hit for power really in general but even to get last year against lefties didn't do a whole bunch. So between Springer, Vlad, Matt Chapman, Boba Shet Danny Janssen if he gets in there. I think these guys do have some power and the Jays salaries are all pretty low too. I think they're highest salary guys $3,500. So you can definitely stack them while using Joe Ryan pretty easily for tonight. Let's dig in now to things to watch. I did wanna touch briefly on some of the other stud pitchers why people need to take a risk on Kopeck as opposed to going to some of the others. Kevin Gosman facing the Rangers. It's a really tough offense. It doesn't strike out a ton. So that's why I couldn't get to him. Zach Gallin strikeouts have been down recently also facing a low strikeout team. You Darvish gets a raise. I'm not opposed because the salary is low but it's a really tough matchup. Shane McClanahan on the other side of that game is on the road facing the Padres. Tristan McKenzie was a consideration for me especially with the roof closed in Arizona. So I would say if you wanna take a swing at someone else McKenzie at 10.5 not a discount by any means but 10 thing for sure. I just preferred Kopeck over those guys. So they're all at least somewhat in play if you have a strong inclination towards someone like that totally fine. I think you can easily justify any of them but for me it was Ryan one Kopeck two with a contra being the top value. I think you could look at one offs on the Rockies if you wanted. The reason Jared Schuster who is still trying to find his groove but they're just such a terrible offense that you can't stack them. So for one offs the Rockies are okay. As far as other stacks you could go to three teams are going with like bullpenish games tonight. And I think we can stack against any of them honestly. Tiger is going with a full bullpen game which makes the twins pretty stackable that bullpen not a shut down unit. So twins would work out pretty well. The Giants facing Matt Andres I think will be the starter for the Dodgers. So the Giants good offense Andres has been fine in triple A this year. So the Giants in play for stacking. And on the other side Sean Mania likely to be the bulk reliever for the Giants again. He's pitched a lot better recently. Their bullpen overall has been very good too. But the Dodgers can crush lefties. There's a path of them being very good here. I'd rank those options the twins first followed by the Giants than the Dodgers but all three teams very much worth a look. I'd probably put them below the other stacks. Again the top stacks are tonight being the Braves, the Angels and the Blue Jays but all three of them at least were a consideration for me within the top three. So again twins, Giants, Dodgers, the teams that I'd also consider in addition to the top three stacks. Let's finish up here with the Dinger calls for today. I was tilting yesterday because I have Dalton Varshow in the same Dynasty League as Brady Singer and Dalton Varshow had another barrel that led to an out. So I was researching to see which batters have the most barrels that have led to outs this year. And the answer is Ronald Lacunia Jr. Despite the fact he is sixth in WRC plus this year. He actually has the most barrels that have resulted in outs in the entirety of Major League Baseball, 15. So you could argue he's been unlucky and he's been absurd without accounting for luck. So I'm gonna go Ronald Lacunia Jr. as my boring home run call for today. This is a really long way to get there. Being mad about Dalton Varshow stuff led me to wanting to use Ronald Lacunia Jr. as my boring home run call but here we are, Ronald Lacunia Jr. is a boring home run call for Friday night. The fun one, I will go Mickey Moniac if he plays because I just love what he's done. His triple A numbers are pretty good too. I think he's a beast, I wish they play him more. I have him in the same Dynasty League. I should stop talking about Dynasty but we'll go Moniac if he plays. If Moniac does not play, Eddie Rosario is the backup for the Braves. Good iso against Raidi, it's not great, it's good but hits it a good spot in the order. Gets a bump up against Lumet. So boring home run call, Ronald Lacunia Jr. Fun home run call Mickey Moniac and it's Eddie Rosario if Moniac can't go. That is all that we have here for today on the solo shot and for this week. As for next week, I am off Monday because of Juneteenth. Enjoy the holiday weekend, everybody. Back with you on Tuesday. So no show Monday, back with you Tuesday to give you more solo shot then. If you got any questions for me, I'm on Twitter at JimsonusJIMSNES, do not forget to subscribe to the Number Fire Daily Fantasy podcast where ever you get your podcasts and also check us out over on the FanDuel YouTube page. Want to thank you all for tuning in, having fantastic and safe weekend. We'll talk to you once again next week on Tuesday. This has been the solo shot right here on the FanDuel podcast network.