I sit here pounding away at the keys doing a little day dreaming. Hawaii... Godzilla... X-Men... flamenco dancing... sunbathing... plasma television... Rihanna... what a stream of consciousness situation. Am I right? Oh, I still had time to look at matchups for Thursday. Don't worry, the Oracle is always there for you.

* NOTE: Players are listed in alphabetical order for the sake of making them easily sortable/findable. The matchups are also generated based on Batter vs. Pitcher data. Just because a player is not listed does not mean that he is a bad or good play. The players listed below are mentioned merely because of the BVP data for the matchup.

DISH DIAMONDS – The Best Hitting Matchups of the Day
 
Ian Desmond has a great slash line against Kyle Kendrick. In 37 plate appearances he's looked like Ted Williams: .405/.410/.676. He's gone deep twice with eight RBIs. Ryan Zimmerman is back from injury and he too has beat up the righty. His slash line is only .341/.423/.636 over 49 plate appearances. He's also gone deep twice. Wilson Ramos has gone deep twice and hit .545 over 11 at-bats.

J.J. Hardy has lost his power bat this year. He faces Colby Lewis Thursday, a man who he's hit .333 against with two homers in 12 at-bats.

Jonathan Lucroy is 5-for-12 with an RBI against Kevin Correia. Mark Reynolds has whiffed an amazing 18 times in 49 at-bats, but he's also hit a solid .286 with three homers.

Hunter Pence is 10-for-22 with a bomb against Mike Leake. Tyler Colvin has also had success, and then some. In 17 at-bats he's hit .353 with four homers and eight RBIs. Pablo Sandoval joins the hit party too with eight hits and a .571 batting average in 14 at-bats. He's also gone deep twice.

Ben Revere is 6-for-15 against Doug Fister. That's a .400 average. Revere also has hits in eight of his last nine games.

I still love this.

Troy Tulowitzki is 6-for-13 with two homers and five RBIs against Bronson Arroyo. He's also hitting .519 at Coors this year with a 1.570 OPS through 22 games. Wowzahs.


My mother's new puppy. Who doesn't love puppies?

DISH DISASTERS – Worst Hitting Matchups of the Day

Jay Bruce has a tough matchup facing Madison Bumgarner. He’s also batting .176 with no homers over his last nine games.

Melky Cabrera has a .182 batting average over 22 at-bats against the struggling Justin Verlander. Edwin Encarnacion has taken the righty deep twice, but he's also hit .167 over 18 at-bats.

Chris Davis has a homer but check out his pathetic slash line over his last 11 games: .163/.280/.279. He faces the immanently hittable Colby Lewis but those are some awful recent numbers.

Jason Kubel has no hits in his last seven games. He faces Wily Peralta.

Adam LaRoche has seven walks against Kyle Kendrick, but he's also hit .156 with one RBI in 32 at-bats. Danny Espinosa has also struggled in the matchups hitting a mere .158 over 19 at-bats. Denard Span also lags hitting .188 over 16 at-bats.

Ryan Ludwick has one hit in 16 at-bats against Madison Bumgarner.

Derek Norris has hit one homer an scored only three runs while batting .097 over his last 11 games. He faces the elite pitching star of the Yankees - Masahiro Tanaka.

Martin Prado has just two singles in 14 at-bats against Juan Nicasio.

Alfonso Soriano faces Drew Pomeranz. He's hitting .138 without a homer the past two weeks.

Jonathan Villar has no steals and is hitting .034 the past 10 games. He faces Tyler Skaggs.

Rickie Weeks has hit .231 with eight Ks in 26 at-bats against Kevin Correia.

Bookmark the following three sources to check daily after you read this piece.

Fantasy Alarm Lineups

Batter Versus Pitcher

Daily Projections – For every single day of the season.

MOUND MAVENS – Starting Pitchers to Target

Jacob deGrom struck out 11 batters in his last outing and now has 25 punchouts in 26 innings. He's also sporting a 2.42 ERA and 1.08 WHIP over four starts, even though he's yet to get into the win column. He faces the Cubs in Wrigley and the Cubs have the worst OPS in baseball against righties (.628).

Doug Fister is one of the better control artists in the game and he's walked two batters in five outings this season. He's also allowed a total of six earned runs over his last four starts, and he's won each of the last three games he's twirled. He pitches at home against the Phillies.

Was it an option before?

Jake Odorizzi starts at home against the Marlins. On the road this year the Marlins have a .678 OPS, that's only 19th in baseball. Odorizzi is a bit of a mystery with his up and down work, but he's still walked a mere two batters in his last two outings, has allowed one homer in five trips to the bump, and over his last five starts he's allowed just nine runners to cross the plate.

Travis Wood faces a less than imposing Mets club at home. In five home starts he's gone 3-1 with a 2.43 ERA and 0.93 WHIP. He's also posted a 2.92 ERA and 1.22 WHIP over the course of four starts against the Mets in his career.  

MOUND MESSES – Starting Pitchers to Avoid

Bronson Arroyo at Coors Field days after getting a cortisone shot in his elbow. LOL.

Wily Peralta allowed six runs in his last outing and he's lost his last three starts and four of five. Now, he pitches on the road against the Twins and he's got a 1.88 ERA in four road starts. Still, his WHIP on the road is 1.38 and the last time he had more than five strikeouts in a game was Mary 2nd. That was six starts ago.

Drew Pomeranz takes on the Yankees in New York. He has a 2.41 road ERA this year but the WHIP is high outside Oakland (1.50). He's also failed to go more than 5.1 innings an any of his starts this season. He's been taken deep three times while issuing seven walks and seven runs over his last 9.1 innings. Not exactly heart warming trends.

Yordano Ventura faces the Cardinals. On principle you should probably bench him, right? There's no way to know how his arm will fare, especially if he does try to follow the mandate of easing into games. I have to see him pitch before I can recommend him.

Tyler Skaggs faces the Astros who recently dusted lefty C.J. Wilson. The Astros have had success against lefties all year as their .269 batting average (7th in baseball), and .735 OPS (11th) suggest. Skaggs did hold the club to one run over seven innings on May 20th, but with seven walks over his last two starts and 4.14 ERA on the year he's not a great option.
 

Make sure you tune in to the Fantasy Alarm's Daily Game Show at 6 PM EDT, Monday through Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius210, XM87) as Jeff Mans and Ted Schuster will help you to set your daily lineups.