MLB

3 Daily Fantasy Baseball Players to Avoid on 7/23/18

Akash Bhatia  —  @AkashBhatia24 Jul 23rd, 2018
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Corey Kluber, SP, Cleveland Indians

FanDuel Price: $11,000

If you take a glance at Corey Kluber's stats this year, you may see his 2.76 ERA and assume the reigning American League Cy Young winner has been his typical dominant self. And while he's certainly still been excellent, there is a noticeable dropoff in his peripherals from last season.

The strikeouts are way down. He still has an excellent 25.8% strikeout rate, but that's a far cry from last year's 34.1% clip. This isn't just a fluke, either, as his swinging-strike rate is down from 15.6% last year to 11.0% this year.

He is also allowing more hard contact. He limited batters to a 28.9% hard-hit rate in 2017, but that has spiked to a 37.0% rate here in 2018.

Against a Pittsburgh Pirates team that strikes out at the second-lowest rate in baseball (19.3%) versus right-handed pitching, Kluber doesn't have the upside in what has so far been a "down" year for him.

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