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The value of starting pitching varies from site to site in the daily fantasy world. On Draft Kings, two pitchers will usually will cost you on average $16K from your budget depending on the night. That equates to nearly 30 percent of your entire $50K salary allowance. Almost a third of your team performance is tied into your pitching staff. On FanDuel, owners tend to spend in the neighborhood of $9K on average for this one-pitcher site. That’s roughly 25 percent of your total $35K budget there. Not quite as high as DK in terms of importance, especially now that offensive outs are no longer penalized with negative points.
However, the value of pitchers on a given night can vary site to site. This is obviously due to the scoring and site-specific algorithm pricing. Using Relative Position Value per Dollar (RPVPD), we can analyze the same slate of arms or two different sites. We can see which pitchers are wise starts on both sites, where anomalies lie and whose value changes drastically form one format to the other.
Here’s the Wednesday night pitching slate ranking based on RPVPD on Draft Kings:
Player | FPPG | Raw RPV | Salary | Pts per $ | RPV Per Dollar |
23.7 | 0.634 | $ 8,900 | $376 | 0.357 | |
14.0 | -0.035 | $ 5,700 | $407 | 0.303 | |
15.6 | 0.076 | $ 6,400 | $410 | 0.297 | |
17.3 | 0.193 | $ 7,100 | $410 | 0.297 | |
17.0 | 0.172 | $ 7,300 | $429 | 0.265 | |
15.3 | 0.055 | $ 6,800 | $444 | 0.239 | |
14.7 | 0.013 | $ 6,600 | $449 | 0.231 | |
19.6 | 0.351 | $ 9,700 | $495 | 0.152 | |
21.7 | 0.496 | $ 10,900 | $502 | 0.140 | |
18.0 | 0.241 | $ 9,300 | $517 | 0.115 | |
22.7 | 0.565 | $ 11,900 | $524 | 0.102 | |
15.9 | 0.096 | $ 8,400 | $528 | 0.095 | |
11.4 | -0.214 | $ 6,100 | $535 | 0.084 | |
19.2 | 0.324 | $ 10,600 | $552 | 0.054 | |
9.5 | -0.345 | $ 5,400 | $568 | 0.027 | |
12.1 | -0.166 | $ 7,000 | $579 | 0.009 | |
10.0 | -0.311 | $ 5,900 | $590 | -0.010 | |
7.5 | -0.483 | $ 4,600 | $613 | -0.050 | |
12.7 | -0.124 | $ 7,900 | $622 | -0.065 | |
11.1 | -0.235 | $ 8,200 | $739 | -0.265 | |
13.9 | -0.042 | $ 10,400 | $748 | -0.281 | |
6.7 | -0.538 | $ 5,800 | $866 | -0.483 | |
4.0 | -0.724 | $ 6,100 | $1,525 | -1.612 |
It’s no surprise to see Drew Pomeranz at the top of the cost efficiency board. Despite pitching for a bad San Diego Padres team, he’s been lights out (1.80 ERA/1.08WHIP/51 K’s). Ironically, the poor play by his teammates has actually kept his salary quite reasonable. Turns out there’s silver lining to that cloud after all! Nick Tropeano is cost efficient, but too inconsistent to warrant attention. Edinson Volquez was one of the best values in DFS all of last season and he’s carried that over into 2016. Unfortunately, no pitcher can be recommended against Boston in Fenway Park right now. Taijuan Walker has dropped some big strikeout games this year and is a sneaky good selection Wednesday night at that rate.
As far as the big names on this list, Francisco Liriano has a very tasty matchup against a bad Braves team that just fired their skipper. However, from a points per game standpoint, his $10.4K salary is actually one of the least efficient in terms of maximizing your budget. David Price and Johnny Cueto are middling options leaving John Lackey as the best of the big ticket pitchers.
Now, here’s the same slate of arms on FanDuel using RPVPD. Let’s see what changes!
Player | FPPG | Raw RPV | Salary | Pts per $ | RPV Per Dollar |
15.0 | -0.466 | $ 3,000 | $200 | 0.308 | |
37.3 | 0.328 | $ 7,900 | $212 | 0.267 | |
42.4 | 0.510 | $ 9,000 | $212 | 0.265 | |
33.1 | 0.179 | $ 7,300 | $221 | 0.237 | |
26.8 | -0.046 | $ 6,000 | $224 | 0.225 | |
27.7 | -0.014 | $ 6,400 | $231 | 0.200 | |
39.6 | 0.410 | $ 9,600 | $242 | 0.161 | |
31.4 | 0.118 | $ 8,100 | $258 | 0.107 | |
27.9 | -0.007 | $ 7,200 | $258 | 0.107 | |
41.9 | 0.492 | $ 10,900 | $260 | 0.099 | |
32.6 | 0.161 | $ 8,600 | $264 | 0.087 | |
28.3 | 0.008 | $ 7,700 | $272 | 0.058 | |
31.1 | 0.107 | $ 8,500 | $273 | 0.054 | |
27.3 | -0.028 | $ 7,500 | $275 | 0.049 | |
37.9 | 0.350 | $ 10,500 | $277 | 0.041 | |
30.7 | 0.093 | $ 8,700 | $283 | 0.019 | |
24.3 | -0.135 | $ 7,300 | $300 | -0.040 | |
19.3 | -0.313 | $ 5,900 | $306 | -0.058 | |
22.3 | -0.206 | $ 7,000 | $314 | -0.087 | |
23.1 | -0.177 | $ 7,700 | $333 | -0.154 | |
28.4 | 0.011 | $ 10,000 | $352 | -0.219 | |
15.9 | -0.434 | $ 5,800 | $365 | -0.263 | |
18.4 | -0.345 | $ 7,500 | $408 | -0.411 | |
11.3 | -0.598 | $ 6,700 | $593 | -1.052 |
Now as we went to press, Mike Clevinger of the Indians was not an option on DK. He also has no average on FanDuel as he makes his debut Wednesday. Therefore, I assigned him a low end base of 15 points. Even with that low number, his insane $3K salary shoots him to the top of the board. Of course he’s a risk, but he certainly allows for an impressive list of offensive players. If this was a night with games in Colorado, he may have been even more viable.
Leaving that anomaly aside, Chris Tillman jumps to the top of the leader board on FanDuel. His RPVPD on Draft Kings made him a good play, but that same value system too makes him arguably the best option on FanDuel. Drew Pomeranz once again is highly rated and John Lackey is still the best big arm cash game play. Francisco Liriano remains equally inefficient here as well.
The biggest difference is Taijuan Walker, whose stock drops significantly as we change hot sites (from +30% RPVPD on DK to just +6% on FanDuel). Edinson Volquez also loses some luster, as he should under his circumstances. It’s nice to see that no matter what site you play, they all agree that Shelby Miller is the worst option available.
The moral of the story here, as always, is that value is relative!
Joe Pisapia (@JoePisapia17) is the seven-time best-selling author of the Fantasy Black Book Series for baseball and football. He hosts Fantasy Sports Tonight on Sirius/XM Fantasy Sports Radio and the Dear Mr. Fantasy Podcast.
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