With production being highly variable on a night-to-night basis, daily fantasy baseball plays a bit differently than other sports.
As a result of this, the primary method of selecting hitters is to "stack" certain teams in good spots to produce. Most of the top stacks on a given day come with hefty salaries. In addition to that, a vast majority of pitchers with the upside to win tournaments are high-salaried hurlers.
Therefore, crushing your value plays can be the secret sauce to taking down a tournament. That could be a low-salaried pitcher piling up strikeouts, or it could be a low-salaried hitter swatting a long ball.
Which budget options stand out today on FanDuel?
Daulton Varsho, OF/C, Arizona Diamondbacks ($2,800)
Christian Walker, 1B, Arizona Diamondbacks ($2,800)
With just three main slate games, I could argue the top stack of the day is a value one.
The Diamondbacks are in Wrigley Field to take on the Cubs, and they'll draw Chicago's ace (at least in terms of salary) in Marcus Stroman.
Stroman has been a bit unlucky. His 3.82 SIERA isn't quite as bad as his 5.13 ERA would otherwise indicate. However, Stroman is also outperforming his 7.3% swinging-strike rate in terms of the number of punchouts (20.4% strikeout rate) he's earned, and his 53.2% hard-hit rate allowed is just plain ugly.
The bottom of Arizona's order is an eyesore, but they do have a few quality bats that can damage righties with the wind blowing out tonight.
Daulton Varsho likely leads off for the Snakes, and he's tagged righties for a 44.3% hard-hit rate and .235 ISO this season. Christian Walker has also swatted a .265 ISO against orthodox hurlers out of the cleanup spot.
It'd be nice if the D-Backs would add Cooper Hummel (118 wRC+ versus righties) to the lineup tonight for a third quality option as well.
Abraham Toro, 3B/2B, Seattle Mariners ($2,400)
The other best source of offense on the slate appears to be Fenway Park in Boston.
There's an 8.5-run total on deck between the Red Sox and Mariners, but I greatly prefer Seattle's bats in this one. The Red Sox will have to navigate stud prospect George Kirby, and they've struggled to a 94 wRC+ against right-handed pitching as a whole.
Seattle, though, draws 42-year-old Rich Hill. Hill's 2.89 ERA is hiding a significantly-worse 4.26 SIERA. With his lack of velocity, it's understandable he just can't get the ball past hitters anymore (18.8% strikeout rate). He's also ceded a 45.2% flyball rate that is absolutely playing with fire at Fenway.
The M's aren't a high-salaried stack, either. Abraham Toro feels like their best bargain out of the leadoff spot despite a slow start to 2022. He's got a .324 expected wOBA, but he's seen tough luck with just a .147 batting average on balls in play (BABIP).
If Zac Gallen is the cornerstone of your lineup at $10,600, the Mariners can go a long way in helping you build around him. Toro, J.P. Crawford, Jesse Winker, and Eugenio Suarez are all at or below $3,000 for supreme value options if Hill ends up showing his age on the bump tonight.