3 Daily Fantasy Baseball Players to Avoid on 5/21/18

Miles Mikolas, SP, St. Louis Cardinals

FanDuel Price: $8,800

Miles Mikolas has been a big acquisition for the Cardinals, as reflected by his 2.63 ERA. Still, the price tag is far too lofty for Mikolas, even on a short slate with a dearth of pristine pitching options.

While his walk rate is low, Mikolas doesn't have the strikeout upside that other pitchers have. His strikeout rate is just 18.0%, and his swinging-strike rate sits at 8.8%. And while he has gotten plenty of ground-balls, he has also been hit hard to the tune of a 35.0% hard-hit rate. All of this adds up to a 3.57 SIERA, a solid mark but well above his current ERA.

It also isn't advisable to target a pitcher with low strikeout upside against the team with the lowest strikeout rate against right-handed pitching in the majors. The Kansas City Royals strike out just 16.7% of the time against right-handers, next best is the Boston Red Sox at 18.5%. And even Boston doesn't hit the ball quite as hard as Kansas City does against right-handers as the Royals rank 9th with a 36.9% hard-hit rate in the split.

Especially with such a high price tag, Mikolas profiles as a scary investment tonight.

Akash Bhatia is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Akash Bhatia also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username tenswimrun1. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in his articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.