I hate the days Clayton Kershaw pitches, and am often inclined to just skip the matches. It's only one day right? The problem I see is that before you answer any of the myriad questions you need to set a good DFS lineup, you are forced to first answer the question, "Do I or do I not start Clayton Kershaw?" In effect, the very first wagering decision is which side of the Kershaw Line you fall on, and this is always a tough call because of the pricing.
Today's Clayton Kershaw rolled of the presses on Draft Kings for a whopping $15,000. Fan Duel and Yahoo had pretty steep prices too. So I built this little table to bring my thoughts more in focus:
Based on what the target score is for a good game by site, we can determine what number Kershaw needs to put up in your DFS lineup to keep pace with the target score, and thus be worth rostering. In all cases, he has to beat his seasonal average game to be of value (I understand average might not be the best metric as he's been pitching significantly better over the last month than early in the season). The Fan Duel Number seems entirely makeable as he has done it or better in each of his last 4 games. The Draft Kings and Yahoo numbers seem a bit high, almost requiring a phenomenal game, but in reality, Kershaw's done it in 3 of his last 4 games on those sites too with scores in those games in excess of 46 points, It's hard to clearly say at this point, whether he's worth it or not, because of the other variables.
The biggest variable is how well your hitters do, with the savings you might get by giving Kershaw a pass on the day. This is far too complex to answer breifly, so I am just going to assume that we all do a reasonable job of fielding batter versus cost on average, and hold this constant.
The other thing to consider is how other pitchers might fare in comparison. I put together a list of other pitchers I have considered fielding for the day, and what they need to score to keep pace with the numbers Kershaw needs listed above.
The higher priced pitchers don't seem to be saving you much, until you get to Dallas Keuchel, who basically saves an entire decent hitter in value should you move off Kershaw. On the Value side, the numbers needed by Daniel Norris & Aaron Nola seem pretty plausible. Of course for this to work, they need to pitch well, and you need to use the saved money wisely on your batters. The table does clarify how value hunting in Pitching works, Nola & Norris do have a better chance of greatly exceeding expectations than Clayton Kershaw.
So what is the answer to the question poised at the beginning? Is Clayton Kershaw worth it?
At today's pricing, and considering what other players are out there, I would say it depends on the website you decide to play on:
Today's Clayton Kershaw rolled of the presses on Draft Kings for a whopping $15,000. Fan Duel and Yahoo had pretty steep prices too. So I built this little table to bring my thoughts more in focus:
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| *n=$1000 for Draft Kings & Fan Duel; n=1 for Yahoo **on Draft Kings & Yahoo, you still must buy a costly second Pitcher |
Based on what the target score is for a good game by site, we can determine what number Kershaw needs to put up in your DFS lineup to keep pace with the target score, and thus be worth rostering. In all cases, he has to beat his seasonal average game to be of value (I understand average might not be the best metric as he's been pitching significantly better over the last month than early in the season). The Fan Duel Number seems entirely makeable as he has done it or better in each of his last 4 games. The Draft Kings and Yahoo numbers seem a bit high, almost requiring a phenomenal game, but in reality, Kershaw's done it in 3 of his last 4 games on those sites too with scores in those games in excess of 46 points, It's hard to clearly say at this point, whether he's worth it or not, because of the other variables.
The biggest variable is how well your hitters do, with the savings you might get by giving Kershaw a pass on the day. This is far too complex to answer breifly, so I am just going to assume that we all do a reasonable job of fielding batter versus cost on average, and hold this constant.
The other thing to consider is how other pitchers might fare in comparison. I put together a list of other pitchers I have considered fielding for the day, and what they need to score to keep pace with the numbers Kershaw needs listed above.
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| Mid Point Pitcher is Edinson Volquez (Draft Kings), Hisashi Iwakuma (Fan Duel), & Aaron Nola (Yahoo) |
The higher priced pitchers don't seem to be saving you much, until you get to Dallas Keuchel, who basically saves an entire decent hitter in value should you move off Kershaw. On the Value side, the numbers needed by Daniel Norris & Aaron Nola seem pretty plausible. Of course for this to work, they need to pitch well, and you need to use the saved money wisely on your batters. The table does clarify how value hunting in Pitching works, Nola & Norris do have a better chance of greatly exceeding expectations than Clayton Kershaw.
So what is the answer to the question poised at the beginning? Is Clayton Kershaw worth it?
At today's pricing, and considering what other players are out there, I would say it depends on the website you decide to play on:
- Fan Duel
Likely, Yes - the selection of only one pitcher leaves you with $2700 to field the rest of your roster. This won't be enough to get the Bryce Harper or Paul Goldschmidt alongside, but you should be able to put together a roster of 8 hitters with potential enough to assist your pitcher by picking up the remaining 30 points needed to get to 50. This is mostly because of Fan Duel's comparatively relaxed pricing structure for middle of the pack hitters, rather than anything necessarily gleaned from the charts above.
- Draft Kings
Maybe, Yes; Maybe, No - the price tag is astounding, but because there are available today a number of pitchers in the $7K range who teamed with Kershaw would still leave you with $3.5K per player to draft 8 hitters. If there were no cheaper Pitchers worth a damn, the answer would probably be no. But for today, I wouldn't object to trotting out Clayton Kershaw and Aaron Nola.
- Yahoo
Likely, No - the $70 price tage combined with another $40 pitcher leaves you with only $11.8 dollars per hitter to fill out your roster. The way Yahoo prices, there aren't a lot of opportunities to buy very cheap hitters, as almost anyone with a pulse cost $10, and any regular starter cost $13. And considering the high percentage of budget even value pitchers take up, fielding Kershaw will cause significant difficulties in fielding a halfway decent roster. Their extraordinarily tight pricing makes me think the target number on Yahoo should be lowered to about 110 points, but considering they basically use Draft Kings rules with more points for wins, I did the calculations using the number I arrived at for DK.
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