3 Daily Fantasy Baseball Stacks for 4/8/21

Stacks are the backbone of cashing daily fantasy baseball lineups. Correlation drives upside, creating the potential to place high or even win GPPs when your selected stacks explode offensively.

This column will do the digging and the dirty work to determine which stacks are worth rostering each day. Scoring upside will fuel the stacks that get the nod. Sometimes that will lead to chalky selections, but contrarian stacks will get their fair share of love, too.

In addition to utilizing the touted daily stacks in handbuilt lineups, numberFire premium members can throw these highlighted stacks into an optimized lineup using our DFS Sharpstack tool. Our hitting heat map tool is also available to premium members looking for more stacking options. It provides valuable info such as implied total, park factors, and stats for identifying the quality of the opposing pitcher.

Let's take a look at the top stacks on today's main slate, which locks early at 1:10 pm ET.

Boston Red Sox

There's a lot to love about stacking the Boston Red Sox today, and they're my top stack on today's slate. First, their salaries aren't prohibitive to rostering any of my three favorite pitchers, in order, Corbin Burnes ($9,400), Jose Berrios ($9,600), and Eduardo Rodriguez ($8,200).

The venue for the American League East showdown is a plus. Camden Yards has park factors of 1.022 for runs and 1.171 for homers, per the three-year average used at FantasyPros.

A matchup with Matt Harvey is superb for their outlook despite his surprisingly adequate start against them last week, as well. Harvey's lowest ERA in a season over the last five years is 4.86 in 2016. According to FanGraphs, in 416 and 1/3 innings pitched since 2016, he owns a 5.79 ERA, 4.75 skill-interactive ERA (SIERA), 1.50 WHIP, and surrendered 1.62 homers per 9 innings.

One mediocre start doesn't wash away five years of ineptitude, Harvey's the caliber of pitcher daily gamers wisely stack against.

The Red Sox will be chalky, but they're worth eating the chalk to use. My favorite options are their premier hitters, J.D. Martinez ($3,800), Xander Bogaerts ($3,300), and Rafael Devers ($2,900. Using the trio has the added benefit of correlation, slotting third through fifth in the lineup. Alex Verdugo ($2,800) is nestled into the two-hole ahead of them, making him a strong inclusion for a full four-person stack.

Don't sleep on toolsy outfielder Franchy Cordero ($2,200), though. He has massive raw power that's produced a .218 isolated power (ISO) against righties in 161 plate appearances since 2018.

Colorado Rockies

It's a new day, but the story remains the same. The Colorado Rockies are at home, and the game's over/under total is gaudy. With MLB odds listing the total at 11 runs, it's the only main-slate contest with a double-digit total, two runs clear of the second-highest total of nine runs in Baltimore. Further, the Rockies are -130 favorites, leaving them with an eye-catching implied total.

The totals are routinely high at Coors Field because the hitting conditions there are unmatched. The park factor for runs of 1.362 is clear of the second-highest park factor at 1.106 by a margin of .256. In other words, it boosts runs by 36.2 percent compared to a neutral park and bests the second-highest-scoring park by 25.6 percent. Additionally, the park significantly boosts singles, doubles, triples, and homers. No matter who takes the hill, there's always a case for stacking the offenses playing in Colorado.

I believe the Rockies have the more favorable pitching matchup against ho-hum Merrill Kelly. The righty overperformed his ERA estimators by a wide margin last year, and his 4.20 ERA and 4.63 SIERA in his career are better barometers for his true talent level. Kelly strikes batters out at a below-average rate and coughs up hard-hit balls at an eye-popping 43.2 percent clip for his career. The combination of a below-average strikeout rate and hard contact allowed should result in Colorado's hitters feasting today.

Ryan McMahon ($3,700) is off to a hot start to the year, including a three-homer game on Tuesday night. He's worth a look in a stack. Trevor Story ($4,100) is my favorite piece of the lineup, slotting third and owning a .298 ISO, .369 on-base percentage, .403 weighted on-base average (wOBA), and 125 weighted runs created plus (wRC+) against righties at home since 2018.

Charlie Blackmon ($3,900) and C.J. Cron ($3,900) are my next two favorite options, rounding out three-through-six hitter full stack if they trot the same lineup out as they have in all three games they've squared off with a right-handed pitcher this year. If Sam Hilliard ($3,000) starts, he's a great stacking option, as well. The slugging outfielder has a .324 ISO in 150 plate appearances against righties in his young career.

New York Mets

The Miami Marlins haven't officially announced a starter as I write this, but it's reportedly either Nick Neidert or Paul Campbell. Both options are right-handed pitchers, and neither carries much prospect fanfare. Injuries are forcing the Marlins to dip into the reserves for a rotation fill-in, and consider me optimistic the New York Mets can rough up either pitcher, namely since neither was able to secure a rotation spot.

Further, their active roster is jam-packed with hitters who pummel right-handed pitchers. Nine members of the active roster have a wRC+ above 100 against righties since 2018, seven of them are above 110, and five are over 130.

The five at the upper end of that range are Dominic Smith ($3,100), Michael Conforto ($3,100), Pete Alonso ($3,500), Brandon Nimmo ($2,800), and Jeff McNeil ($2,500) at 132, 135, 142, 144, and 145, respectively.

They all have a case for being stacked together, but the combo of Smith, Conforto, and Alonso is my favorite. Newcomer Francisco Lindor ($3,700) isn't a slouch, either, with a .238 ISO and 115 wRC+ against righties since 2018.

Joshua Shepardson is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Joshua Shepardson also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username bchad50. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.