MLB DFS Picks & Playbook For Friday’s Games: MLB Opening Weekend, 3/28

Happy Friday and welcome to the first weekend of the baseball season! 

We had an exciting opening day yesterday with a lot of incredible games. We had some big performances with three different 2 homer games to start the season from Cedric Mullins, Adley Rutschman, and Wilyer Abreu, a huge pitching performance from MacKenzie Gore racking up 13 strikeouts in 6 innings of 1 hit ball, and of course another opening day homer from Tyler O’Neill making it six straight. 

We have another great day in store for us to follow up opening day with an 8-game slate on both  DraftKings and FanDuel starting at 7:07 PM ET today after the Rockies and Rays play their first game of the season this afternoon. 

This season's MLB DFS picks and playbook will consist of a pitcher and hitter core players section with written analysis, player pool grid and core stacks section.

The core player section should be used as a starting point for all lineups, you may not be able to use all players in the same lineup, but those players should be the building blocks for you on a given night.

The player pool grid will feature both players from the core player section along with additional plays to help you build a complete lineup. The grid will be broken into top priced players, mid-priced players and value tier players.

The stacks section will bring you are favorite lineups stacks for the day and which players we would look to include in those stacks based on matchups and pricing.

There will also be a daily MLB DFS Show with a variety of hosts ranging from myself, Jon Impemba, Howard Bender, and James Grande. The MLB DFS Show will give you an initial outlook on the day's MLB DFS slate and should give you a good base for the start of your research each day! 

Make sure you subscribe to the Fantasy Alarm YouTube channel so you never miss a show! Also, join the Fantasy Alarm Discord to get your DFS lineup questions answered by our MLB DFS team! Plus, as always, be sure to check in with our MLB DFS Tools, with the Daily MLB Projections, MLB DFS Rostership Projections, and our MLB DFS Lineup Generator when building those lineups today to help you decide which players you should be targeting!

Opening Day DFS Picks & MLB Playbook

MLB Weather: Friday, 3/28

The weather doesn’t look to be an issue today.

Recommended MLB DFS Starting Pitchers

As we go through the rotation for the first time, I am more likely to lean towards cheaper pitchers rather than spending up. Even the top pitchers may not deliver great value with them still ramping up and hitters have the advantage at the start. 

We saw on opening day how top pitchers like Tarik Skubal and Blake Snell can go out and each only get 2 strikeouts while a MacKenzie Gore can go get you 12 strikeouts, so I am going to aim for the cheaper pitchers that I think have good upside. 

Core MLB DFS Pitchers

Jeffrey Springs, Athletics

I am a big fan of Jeffrey Springs. He lost most of the last two seasons to injury, only totaling 49 innings over the last two years, but even at age 32, he still has plenty of upside. He has shown excellent strikeout stuff, and he can easily beat the projections and push a 25% strikeout rate or higher. 

While Luis Severino was the opening day starter and the Athletics big free agent signing, I think that Jeffrey Springs is more likely to become their ace and be the best pitcher on the Athletics this season, and today he gets to start the season against a weaker offense in a great park to pitch in over in Seattle. 

Jack Leiter, Texas Rangers

Jack Leiter’s cup of coffee last season was pretty terrible, but I am not holding the 35.2 innings against him too much. He should stick as a solid starter with good strikeout potential. He struggles with the walks, which can hurt him on any given day, but he looked good this spring with a 3.48 ERA in 20.2 innings and a 24.1% strikeout rate. 

Boston is a tough matchu,p but Eovalid piled up 9 strikeouts in 6 innings against them yesterday, and I think Leiter has the potential to provide great value against them today with plenty of upside. 

Tylor Megill, New York Mets

I don’t really understand why Tylor Megill is the cheapest pitcher on today’s slate. He has pitched excellently this spring with a 27.3% strikeout rate and a 6.1% walk rate (the two main stats I actually care about in spring). He also went 5.1 innings in his last spring start, so I am not worried about him only throwing a couple of innings today.

The Houston Astros are not as scary as they were even a year ago. They are still a solid offense, but the losses of Kyle Tucker and Alex Bregman do make them a much more manageable team to face, and I trust that Tylor Megill will certainly not be the worst pitcher on the slate today and has the upside to be a difference maker in lineups.

Recommended MLB DFS Hitters

Today, I am looking at some stars that are undervalued at the start of the season to build my team around and try to stack well-rounded offenses. 

Some of my favorite lineups to target today include the Arizona Diamondbacks, Toronto Blue Jays, San Diego Padres, Chicago Cubs, Baltimore Orioles, and Los Angeles Dodgers.

Core MLB DFS Hitters

Shohei Ohtani, 1B/OF Los Angeles Dodgers

Towards the end of last season, people were paying over $8,000 to put Shohei Ohtani into their lineups. While I wasn’t ever paying that much for him, getting at $6,300 is low enough for me to want to roster the best baseball player on the planet. He already has two homers in his first 3 games, and with the other good values you can get today, I don’t see a world where I am not fitting him into my lineup. 

Andres Gimenez, 2B Toronto Blue Jays

I love this price for Gimenez today. While he has always been more of a glove-first player, he is still a decent bat, and I think he could take a huge step forward this season. Playing in Toronto and batting 4th in what is still at least a very strong top half of a lineup for the Blue Jays, he is a great value. 

I am not expecting another homer from him today necessarily, but facing Charlie Morton and batting 4th, he should have plenty of RBI opportunities and has excellent speed potential even if he isn’t giving you power consistently. 

Manny Machado, 3B San Diego Padres

Third Base is a position that I don’t feel is very deep. I likely want to pay for one of the top handful of guys, and Machado is my favorite of them today. The Padres still have an incredible lineup, and I think Machado is in line for another big season. 

They face Reynaldo Lopez, who I am a big fan of, but there is no way he manages a sub-2 ERA again this season. Machado started strong on opening day with a 2-3 performance with a double, an RBI, 3 runs scored, and 2 stolen bases (he only stole 11 bases in 152 games last season). Machado clearly feels good, and I will bet on his bat today. 

Corbin Carroll, OF Arizona Diamondbacks

There are a lot of great outfielders to target today from the top to the bottom so it is hard to pick my favorite, but that spot has to go to Corbin Carroll. Carroll has been absolutely locked in this spring, batting .400 with 4 homers and 2 steals. We might see Carroll's first 30-30 season if that power carries into the regular season. 

The Diamondbacks get one of the easier matchups today facing Jameson Taillon, and they were also the highest scoring team in all of baseball last season and I expect them to be near the top once again this year, and it isn’t far fetched to think that Corbin Carroll could put together an MVP level season (even if he loses it to someone named Shohei). 

Player Pool

• FanDuel
• DraftKings

$ Tier	SP	C	1B	2B	3B	SS	OF
High	Yoshinobu Yamamoto $9,000	Adley Rutschman $4,500	Shohei Ohtani $6,300	Ketel Marte $5,500	Manny Machado $4,700	Francisco Lindor $5,400	Kyle Tucker $5,900
	Hunter Brown $8,800		Vladimir Guerrero $5,300		Austin Riley $4,900	Corey Seager $5,100	Corbin Carroll $5,800
							Fernando Tatis $5,400
							Jackson Merrill $5,200
Medium	Jeffrey Springs $7,500	Alejandro Kirk $3,200	Josh Naylor $4,700	Jordan Westburg $4,200	Jake Burger $4,300	Trevor Story $4,100	Anthony Santander $4,900
		Gabriel Moreno $2,900		Nico Hoerner $4,300	Isaac Paredes $4,100	Xavier Edwards $4,000	Marcell Ozuna $4,800
							Ian Happ $4,800
							Oneil Cruz $4,800
							Joc Pederson $4,200
Low	Jack Leiter $6,500	Kyle Higashioka $2,600	Triston Casas $3,800	Andrés Giménez $3,500	Eugenio Suárez $3,400	Jackson Holliday $3,700	Michael Conforto $3,800
	Tylor Megill $6,000	Miguel Amaya $2,200	Spencer Torkelson $3,500	Max Muncy $2,100	Ke'Bryan Hayes $3,200		Pete Crow-Armstrong $3,800
			Endy Rodríguez $2,000				Wilyer Abreu $3,500
							Cedric Mullins $3,200
							Pavin Smith $2,800

Stacks

Diamondbacks	Ketel Marte	Lourdes Gurriel	Eugenio Suárez	Corbin Carroll	Josh Naylor
DraftKings	5500	4000	3400	5800	4700
Fanduel	3800	2900	2900	3600	3100

Padres	Xander Bogaerts	Manny Machado	Jackson Merrill	Jake Cronenworth	Fernando Tatis
DraftKings	4300	4700	5200	3600	5400
Fanduel	2800	3500	3600	2900	4000

Blue Jays	Andrés Giménez	Alejandro Kirk	Bo Bichette	Anthony Santander	Vladimir Guerrero
DraftKings	3500	3200	4200	4900	5300
Fanduel	2600	2600	2800	3400	3900