With the All-Star break in our review mirror it's time to refocus ourselves to begin the second half of the major league baseball season. Ray Flowers is here to help you get back into the swing of things by going over the batter versus pitcher data for Friday, July 18th. 

* 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.

* NOTE II: I will be away next week with the family in Hawaii. It will be my first true family vacation in, jeez, I'm gonna say 17 years. As a result, the Daily Trends piece will not be available from July 21-July 28th. I will pick things right back up on the 29th. Therefore, make sure to visit the DFS PLAYBOOK each day. 

DISH DIAMONDS – The Best Hitting Matchups of the Day
 
Miguel Montero has five hits in 12 at-bats against Edwin Jackson

David Ortiz has hit .316 with a 1.032 OPS against James Shields. He also has three homers, nine doubles an a whopping 16 RBIs over 65 plate appearances. Makes the .291-2-5 line of Dustin Pedroia look weak (55 ABs).

Pablo Sandoval has six RBIs and six hits in eight at-bats against Nathan Eovaldi. That's a .750 average. Poor Hunter Pence is only at .500-1-5 in his 10 at-bats. 

Babe Ruth contract went up at auction... it sold for more than a million dollars.

Justin Smoak has three homers and eight RBIs over 31 at-bats against Jered Weaver. He's also batting .290 with a 1.017 OPS. Robinson Cano has nary a homer but he is batting .361 over 36 at-bats. 

Holy cow Batman. Giancarlo Stanton has five doubles in 11 at-bats against Madison Bumgarner. He's also hit a couple of singles giving him a .636 batting average over 11 at-bats. 

Jayson Werth has three bombs, six RBIs an a 1.157 OPS over 28 plate appearances against Kyle Lohse.

David Wright has hit two homers with five RBIs an a .333 batting average against Ian Kennedy (15 ABs).

DISH DISASTERS – Worst Hitting Matchups of the Day

Jose Bautista has one hit in 15 at-bats against Yu Darvish. That's not good. He's also struck out seven times as he's been, face it, dominated. 

Marlon Byrd has 34 at-bats against Ervin Santana. Not only has Byrd struck out 11 times but check out this slash line: .176/.200/.294. Chase Utley and Jimmy Rollins have combined to go 2-for-17. 

Starlin Castro has one hit in 11 at-bats. Nate Schierholtz has no hits in 10 at-bats. Luis Valbuena has one hit in eight at-bats. Anthony Rizzo has one hit in six at-bats. Justin Ruggiano has one hit in five at-bats. All of that comes against returning to the big leagues Trevor Cahill

Adam Dunn hast two hits in 17 at-bats against Scott Feldman. Alejandro De Aza has two hits in 15 at-bats. Dayan Viciedo has two hits in 16 at-bats. That's a trio of terror to avoid. 

Aaron Hill has 41 at-bats against Edwin Jackson. He has two homers and four RBIs. Doesn't matter at all when you note he's hit 1.95 with a .580 OPS. Martin Prado is 3-for-15 (.200) with no runs batted in.

Jason Kipnis has three hits in 19 at-bats against Anibal Sanchez. He's also whiffed six times. Asdrubal Cabrera is no better with a .250 average over 20 at-bats (he does have a homer). Finally, Nick Swisher has a hit and one RBI over 11 at-bats. 

Adam LaRoche has a homer and five RBIs against Kyle Lohse, but he's also hitting .242 with a mere .718 OPS over 37 plate appearances. Ian Desmond is even worse at .238 without an RBI over 21 at-bats. 

Russell Martin had a solid first half. He faces Jorge De La Rosa Friday with a .533 OPS over 18 plate appearances. 

Brad Miller is 0-for-10 against Jered Weaver

Mike Napoli versus James Shields certainly doesn't favor the hitter. James has hit .182 over 22 at-bats. He's not putting good swings on the ball either with 10 punchouts as well. 

Albert Pujols has two hits in 19 at-bats against Hisashi Iwakuma. He also has no runs batted in. Mike Trout also struggles with but a .158 average and six strikeouts over 19 at-bats. 

B.J. Upton has two homers and eight steals against A.J. Burnett. Unfortunately he's also hit .204 and has struck out 17 times in 49 at-bats. Yikes.

Eric Young Jr has two hits in 14 at-bats against Ian Kennedy. He's also been caught on his only stolen base attempt.


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

DFS PLAYBOOK

Fantasy Alarm Lineups

Batter Versus Pitcher

Daily Projections – For every single day of the season.

MOUND MAVENS – Starting Pitchers to Target

Alex Cobb has made six road starts this season. He's struck out 36 batters in 34.1 innings and has a 5.14 K/BB ratio to augment a 1.19 WHIP. Cobb has also allowed three or fewer earned runs in five of his last six outings overall. He takes on the Twins in Minnesota, and the Twinkies don't have their best hitter in the lineup (Joe Mauer). Sorry Brian Dozier.

Bartolo Colon has lost his last three outings. He's also permitted 25 hits and three homers over 21 innings. Oh yeah, there's also the matter of 13 runs allowed. The last time he faced the Padres though he allowed two runs over 7.1 innings, and the Padres are simply dreadful on offense.

Ian Kennedy faces the Mets. He's allowed two runs over his last three starts. The last time he faced the Mets, on June 25th, he allowed three runs over 5.1 innings. 

I know that this no longer applies with the world cup, but I still though it was worth pointing out. What do you think – do women weaken legs?

Chris Tillman faces the potentially dangerous Athletics lineup in Oakland. Going for him is the fact that the last time he faced the A's he allowed one runs and just three hits over eight innings. Over his last five starts he's allowed a total of nine earned runs as his ERA has gone from 4.82 to 4.11. 

Jered Weaver has a 2.67 ERA and 1.03 WHIP over 11 starts at home. Over his last five starts this season he's allowed two or fewer earned runs four times. The last time he faced the Mariners, May 27th, he held the club to three runs over seven innings. Oh yeah, Weaver also has at least eight strikeouts in each of his last four starts. 

MOUND MESSES – Starting Pitchers to Avoid

Trevor Cahill will face the Cubs in Arizona. This will be Cahill's first big league appearance since June 6th. Cahill has made 19 outings in the big leagues this season, only four have been starts, and his work in the minors wasn't exactly impressive (2-2 3.49 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, 1.35 K/BB in six starts at Triple-A).

Nathan Eovaldi faces the Giants in Miami Friday. Nathan, who has a 4.04 ERA in 10 home start this season, has been lit up without mercy by the Giants. It's been scary awful for Eovaldi. I mean, about as bad as I've ever seen. And then some. Over 18.1 innings in four starts Eovaldi has a 12.27 ERA, 2.24 WHIP an a .389 BAA. Truly shocking.

Kyle Gibson the last five starts: 7, 2, 5, and 0 earned runs. How can you trust him? I can't. At all. He pitches at home where he has a 2.51 ERA and 1.23 WHIP against the Rays. Still cannot trust him. 

Dan Haren is nothing more than league average. He's lost his last two outings allowing a whopping 12 runs over 9.1 innings. He's also allowed 14 homers in his last 10 starts. He pitches in St. Louis against the Cardinals. 

Edwin Jackson allowed nine runs in his last outing and 13 runs over his last 9.2 innings. He's also in possession of a 6.05 ERA and 1.58 WHIP in 10 road starts. Please stop. Don't touch EJax in his start in Arizona. 


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.