Friday’s edition of Stack the Deck will focus on tonight’s 13-game “main” slate. The Diamondbacks and Rockies will face off at Coors field, so of course both of those teams are stackable, but we’ll spend our time here diving deeper into some other stack options for the slate.
Chicago White Sox
Tonight the White Sox will take on the left-handed Wade Miley and the Orioles in Baltimore. The White Sox can load their lineup with right-handed hitters, and the last two times they have faced a lefty starter just one left-handed hitter has made it into the lineup.
Since the start of last season, Miley has allowed a .349 wOBA to right-handed hitters, which is the third highest wOBA allowed in that span among pitchers in action tonight. In fact, it’s the highest wOBA allowed among pitchers in action tonight with more than 100 righties faced since the start of last season. His HR/9 vs. RHH in that time frame is 1.41, and he allows righties to pull the ball at a healthy rate of 43.7-percent.
Baltimore is an above average homer park for right-handed hitters with a HR park factor for RHH that was four percent above average in 2016 according to Baseball Prospectus (all park factors mentioned here come from BP). The forecast also calls for a 13-mph wind to be blowing out to left field, which means righties will have the aid of the wind on balls pulled.
The White Sox also have a nice track record against Miley as current White Sox have a combined .437 wOBA against Miley in a total of 79 PA. Chicago’s best hitters against lefties for their careers are Jose Abreu, Todd Frazier and Geovany Soto, though Frazier sat on Thursday with back stiffness and Soto may not start tonight if the Sox stick with their every-other-day rotation behind the plate. Avisail Garcia and Tim Anderson also have above average numbers against lefties for their career.
Boston Red Sox
Of the teams not playing in Coors tonight, the Red Sox have the highest expected total in Vegas. They’ll be in Minnesota taking on Phil Hughes. Of starters in action tonight, Hughes has the fifth highest wOBA allowed to right-handed hitters and the fourth highest wOBA allowed to left-handed hitters since the start of last season. Despite being right-handed, Hughes has really struggled to keep the ball in the park against righties. Hughes being vulnerable to hitters from both sides of the plate very much lends itself to stacking.
Minnesota is an above average ballpark for right-handed hitters with a HR park factor six percent higher than average last year and a runs factor four percent higher than average, though it played below average for left-handed hitters. It won’t be chilly in Minnesota tonight (cold hurts hitters), and there will be a 12-mph wind blowing out to right-center.
Active Red Sox have a combined 92 PA against Hughes in their careers and have a healthy .410 wOBA against them. Dustin Pedroia has done most of the damage against Hughes going 16-for-41 in his career against Hughes with five home runs and an OPS of 1.248.
Of the other non-Pedroia Red Sox, Mookie Betts has the best career numbers against right-handed hitters, so don’t shy away from him even though he does not have the platoon advantage. Hanley Ramirez also handles himself nicely without it with a 125 wRC+ in his career against righties. Mookie and Hanley typically hit 3-4 in the lineup, and Pedroia has been leading off the last two games. Andrew Benintendi has been hitting in the two-hole and has a .384 wOBA vs. RHO in his first 181 career PA against righties. The top of the Boston order makes for a very nice stack option, if an obvious one.
New York Mets
In the interest of keeping this article under (or at least close to) 1000 words, we’ll only dive into one more team. The Nationals got consideration for this final spot, but given that they lead the league in wOBA and have the fifth highest expected total in Vegas tonight, you could probably figure out their appeal on your own.
Instead, let’s talk about the Mets who face Tom Koehler and the Marlins in New York tonight. The Mets have a healthy expected total in Vegas themselves with the ninth highest expected total of the day.
Koehler really struggles with left-handed hitters with a .353 wOBA allowed to lefties since the start of last season. He has also been home-prone against lefties with a 1.5 HR/9 and 44.8 percent pull rate since the start of last season. Koehler isn’t exactly death on righties either with the third lowest strikeout rate against righties in that time frame among pitchers in action tonight.
Current Mets have a total of 169 career PA against Koehler and a very healthy .423 wOBA. Asdrubal Cabrera has probably fared best against Koehler going 6-for-13 against him lifetime with two home runs. Several other Met lefties have been running hot lately. Michael Conforto has a six-game hitting streak going in which he has a .558 wOBA. Jay Bruce has a four-game hit streak going in which he has homered three times. And Jose Reyes has a healthy .460 wOBA in the last week.
Conforto, Cabrera and Bruce have hit 1-2-3 in each of New York’s last four games, so they probably make for the best stack option. Reyes has been a bit removed from that trio typically hitting sixth. Neil Walker has usually been hitting fourth against righties and has a career .344 wOBA vs. RHP, so he’s also an option to be thrown into a Mets stack.
The one concern with a Mets stack is weather. The wind should be helping if they play with a 13-mph wind blowing out to left. But “if they play” is a pretty big caveat. From 5-10 PM local time there’s between a 25-40 percent chance of rain with chances increasing later in the evening. We’re a good way out from game time, so it’s certainly possible the rain could arrive earlier than forecasted and wash this one out. It’s also possible that rain chances will subside and this game will play with no problems. Just make sure to check the forecast much closer to lock.