Welcome to Fantasy Alarm’s MLB DFS Playbook for Sunday, May 25th, covering the DraftKings and FanDuel main slates! 

Our team of experts has poured over the matchups, stats, and trends to bring you a curated selection of top plays and value picks to help you build winning lineups. 

Whether you’re chasing big GPP prizes or looking to cash in head-to-heads, we’ve got you covered with insights designed to give you an edge. Let’s dive into today’s slate and get ready to crush it!

 

 

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 our 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.

 

MLB DFS Picks & MLB Playbook

MLB Weather: Sunday, 5/25

Toronto Blue Jays vs Tampa Bay Rays

  • 90 degrees, wind blowing out. Some potential for rain in the later innings.

Arizona Diamondbacks vs St. Louis Cardinals

  • Rain showers are in the area. Could cause a late start but nothing that should result in a long PPD

New York Yankees vs Colorado Rockies

  • Rain in the area that could be heavy at times and cause long delays. Seeing as New York doesn't go back to Colorado this season I assume they figure out a way to finish this game even with multiple delays.
 

 

Recommended MLB DFS Starting Pitchers

Pitching depth is interesting as they have some good names in tough matchups. We are also looking at a slightly smaller slate than usual for this Sunday with only 9 games on the DraftKings main slate and 10 games on FanDuel.

Robbie Ray is the top pitcher in both price and likely matchup so he should draw ownership on both sites. On DraftKings, deciding on your SP2 is going to be where you can get different.

Core MLB DFS Pitchers

Robbie Ray, San Francisco Giants

As I mentioned, Ray is the top pitcher of the slate. He was once again dominant in his last outing, tossing seven shutout innings while striking out seven. He lowered his ERA to 2.67 on the season and is now 6-0 with 62 strikeouts over 57.1 innings. The Nationals have a young, at times pesky lineup but their big hitters are from the left side of the plate which should give Ray the advantage here today.

Kris Bubic, Kansas City Royals

Not to be over shadowed but Royals southpaw Kris Bubic is also having a terrific season. He is slightly cheaper than Ray and is drawing a matchup against the Minnesota Twins. Bubic is also coming off seven shutout innings in his last outing and lowered his ERA to a pristine 1.61 while having struck out 61 over 61.1 innings. Minnesota has a 25.5% strikeout rate this season against left-handed pitching with just a .117 team ISO which is 23rd in baseball.

Logan Henderson, Milwaukee Brewers

This dude has been nails since getting called up this season, going 3-0 with a 1.69 ERA and 0.81 WHIP. He's totaled 23 strikeouts over 16 innings and is coming off five shutout innings against the Orioles. His matchup today against the Pirates pits him against an offense that ranks 29th in wOBA, 30th in ISO and 29th in batting average against right-handed pitching.

Walker Buehler, Boston Red Sox

Buehler is back on the mound after being ejected for arguing balls and strikes after just two innings in his most recent outing. Today he faces an Orioles offense that does have decent numbers against right-handed pitching this season but a team that was also shut down by Lucas Giolito last night as he tossed seven scoreless innings. Buehler has had good moments this season for the Red Sox and this Orioles team continues to just play poorly. 

Patrick Corbin, Texas Rangers

Over the last few years we use to celebrate when Patrick Corbin took the mound because it meant we were looking to stack hitters against him. This season, really hasn't been the case with the Rangers lefty sporting a 3.59 ERA while having not allowed more than three earned runs in any start this season. Instead, today, we look to use Patrick Corbin as he draws a matchup against the Chicago White Sox, a team that ranks 28th in wOBA, 22nd in ISO and 21st in batting average against lefties with a 24.8% strikeout rate.

FanDuel ONLY - Will Warren, New York Yankees

Here's the deal. This is obviously an elite spot for Warren against a really bad Rockies lineup but the weather here is also not supposed to be good and we could have multiple in game delays. In game delays are usually death for starting pitchers as teams don't often want their starter warming up over and over again. IF the weather outlook improves here then fine, the strikeout upside is ELITE but just know he could go two innings and get pulled if a long rain delay occurs.

 

 

Recommended MLB DFS Hitters

There is definitely some matchups to target here today with the likes of Mike Soroka and Dean Kremer on the mound to stack against. We also have the Cubs in Cincinnati against Nick Lodolo who has some REALLY bad home splits this season and Brandon Pfaddt who has really struggled this season against left-handed hitters and now faces a Cardinals lineup fully of lefties. 

Core MLB DFS Hitters

Rafael Devers + Boston Red Sox

Almost nobody in baseball is as hot as Rafael Devers is right now with the Sox designated boasting a slugging percentage over .700 since his 0-for-20 start to the season. Lefties have a .568 slugging percentage with a .389 wOBA off of Kremer this season which makes a Devers, Duran, Abreu and Mayer stack appealing today.

Chicago Cubs vs Nick Lodolo

Here is Lodolo's ERA at home over the last three season:

  • 2023: 5 starts - 8.46
  • 2024: 11 starts - 6.09
  • 2025: 4 starts - 6.33

Not great, he's allowing 2.1 HR/9 at home this year with opponents hitting .303 with a .528 slugging percentage and a .386 wOBA.

The Cubs offense is loaded with fire power, even if the majority of it comes from the left side of the plate, I wouldn't be shy.

Cincinnati Reds vs Ben Brown

Other side of that matchup we have the Reds vs Ben Brown. Brown has a ton of strikeout upside but he is no stranger to the big inning and and putting guys on base. The Reds offense is as boom or bust as they come but this Cincinnati ballpark is one of the best hitter parks in baseball.

Tampa Bay Rays Lefties vs Chris Bassitt 

We got through this with every Bassitt start but the facts are the facts and those facts are that he still really struggles against left-handed hitters, allowing a .293 average with a .457 slugging percentage and .341 wOBA. His one saving grace is that he is keeping the ball in the ballpark more this season against lefties than ever before but with 90+ degree weather and wind blowing out in Tampa Bay in a very hitter friendly ballpark this could be trouble for Bassitt today and the Rays lineup that has six left-handed hitters in it today.

FanDuel ONLY - New York Yankees vs Colorado Rockies

Listen. the weather is NOT going to be good but like I said in the weather section, the Yankees aren't coming back to Colorado so I just think they play this game with multiple delays and potentially long delays. This still makes it good for the hitters and the Yankees offense is obviously elite.

 

 

Player Pool

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Stacks

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