1:10 in Detroit, and there's no real starting pitcher on this board. Oneil Cruz is my captain at $15,600.
Here's the pitching. MLB.com and ESPN both list Kirby Yates as Pittsburgh's probable. He's a reliever opening a bullpen game: 40.2 innings on the year, 48 strikeouts, a 3.32 ERA. Detroit's probable is Justin Verlander, and DraftKings still has an IL tag on him. ESPN's preview has him on the 15-day IL, eligible today, and lists him as the starter anyway. So he's coming off the IL to pitch, and his season so far is 3.2 innings with a 12.27 ERA. I'm not paying $11,200 in the flex to find out if he's all the way back.
Yates is $4,000. An opener won't win you the slate, but he's the one Pirates arm a page actually names today. Paul Skenes is $11,800 and isn't the probable. Braxton Ashcraft has the best DK average on the board, 18.8, and he's carrying an IL tag at $11,200. Jared Jones, Bubba Chandler, Mitch Keller (IL), and the rest are guesses about who follows Yates. Leave them. Same for the Detroit side: Troy Melton and Jack Flaherty are both tagged IL, and Flaherty's on the same ESPN IL list as Verlander.
That makes this a hitters' showdown, and Cruz is the hitter. He has 20 homers and 30 steals in 96 games, hitting .281 with a .368 on-base, per ESPN. Homers and steals are the two ways a hitter wins a captain slot, and he's the only one here doing both.
Brandon Lowe is in the flex at $9,000. He has 34 home runs. Riley Greene is $8,400 and hitting .282 with a .477 slug. Eduardo Valencia is the one I'd sneak in at $8,200: .350 with a .617 slug over 40 games. It's a small sample, but it's a loud one. Dillon Dingler has 27 homers at $8,000 if you'd rather have the full season.
Cruz, Lowe, Greene, Valencia, and Yates leaves $4,800 for the last spot. Jake Mangum fits. So does John Peck. Kevin McGonigle is a fine player at $9,600. I'd still rather have Lowe's power for $600 less.
Esmerlyn Valdez has an IL tag, and ESPN says he was eligible to come back yesterday. I'm not chasing that at 1:10.
Captain Cruz and let the pitchers sort themselves out. @numeric_dfs
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