Griffin Wong dives into Friday’s 12-game featured MLB slate to find players to use in your DraftKings lineups.

159 games have been played. Just three remain. With the final series of the MLB season upon us, shockingly little has been decided, as both the AL East and AL Central are still tied, and each league’s third Wild Card team holds just a one-game lead. This weekend should be exciting.

Because I only write the targets column on Tuesdays and Fridays, it’s also the last time this regular season that I’ll be providing my thoughts. Here are two pitchers, three infielders, and three outfielders I’m targeting for tonight’s 12-game featured DFS slate on DraftKings.

Set your DraftKings fantasy baseball lineups here: MLB $150K Relay Throw [$50K to 1st].

PITCHER

Stud

Trevor Rogers, Baltimore Orioles at New York Yankees, $9,600 – The Yankees have a great offense, and no hitter strikes more fear into opponents’ hearts than Aaron Judge ($6,500). But while Rogers won’t win the Cy Young Award — the top two will be Tarik Skubal and Garrett Crochet, in that order — he’s produced a tremendous season, giving up three or more earned runs just once, including a 1.19 ERA across his last 15 starts (24.3 FPTS per game). Advanced numbers are also extremely kind to him, because even though he’s given up a lot of hard hits, he’s also been good at inducing grounders. While he’s been worse on the road than at home, that just means 20.8 FPTS per game instead of 25.9 and a 1.66 ERA instead of a 0.96 mark.

Value

Sandy Alcantara, Miami Marlins vs. New York Mets, $7,000 – Late in the season, the 2022 NL Cy Young Award winner has found his former self, recording 22.8 or more FPTS in six of his last seven games and pitching to a 2.70 ERA across that span. The difference between a Cy Young winner and a low-tier starter is small: his sinker is still one of the best pitches in baseball, and his pitches have just as much movement as they did in 2022. The Mets have a good offense overall, posting the seventh-highest OPS this month, but they’re simply too inconsistent to trust. The last time Alcantara faced them, he pitched seven innings of four-hit, one-run ball (26.2 FPTS).

INFIELDER

Stud

Rafael Devers, San Francisco Giants vs. Colorado Rockies, $5,400 – Devers has been one of the main characters of this MLB season after his shocking midseason trade from the Boston Red Sox altered the trajectories of both teams. While he was dominant with the Red Sox and has been more up-and-down with the Giants, he’s recorded three 10-plus-FPT performances in his last five games and is facing a friendly opponent in Germán Márquez ($5,000). Márquez has recorded a 6.49 ERA this season (including a 6.96 mark in 14 starts on the road) in a disastrous season for Colorado’s pitching as a whole.

Stud

Drake Baldwin, Atlanta Braves vs. Pittsburgh Pirates, $4,200 – Baldwin was a mainstay in the value section early on this season before he over-performed so much that he became too expensive. The 24-year-old is ending his rookie season hot, as he’s averaged 14 FPTS per game in his last 10 contests as the Braves have won nine of their last 10 games. Baldwin has a fairly friendly matchup against Mitch Keller ($6,700), who’s had just a 6.04 ERA in his last 10 starts and has also allowed an OPS 142 points higher to southpaws. Keller also throws his four-seam fastball 43% of the time against lefties, and Baldwin has posted a 61.0% hard hit percentage against four-seamers.

Value

Isaac Paredes, Houston Astros at Los Angeles Angels, $3,700 – Paredes just came back from a two-month absence with a hamstring tear, and though he hasn’t been consistent from game to game, he’s had two 14-FPT performances and had his first multi-hit game since his return last night. The Mexican is mainly the choice here because of his matchup: not only has he crushed the Angels as a whole this season (14.5 FPTS per game across six games), Kyle Hendricks ($5,700) is one of the worst starters on tonight’s slate, posting a 4.79 ERA and inducing whiffs at just a third-percentile clip. I like Paredes to get at least one hit off of Hendricks in what could be the Los Angeles starter’s final career game.

OUTFIELDER

Stud

Shohei Ohtani, Los Angeles Dodgers at Seattle Mariners, $6,400 – I wanted to take at least one major award winner, and since it’s unclear whether Judge or Cal Raleigh ($6,300) will ultimately claim AL MVP, I might as well not overthink it and go with Ohtani. As the Dodgers’ offense as a whole rounds into form entering the playoffs, Ohtani has been his brilliant self, posting a 1.131 OPS and averaging 12.8 FPTS per game across his last 10 games, which doesn’t include his stats as a pitcher. Seattle’s George Kirby ($9,400) can have his flashes, including a 6.1-inning, 14-strikeout (40.4-FPT) performance the last time he started at T-Mobile Park, but he’s also prone to the occasional dud and has allowed an OPS 110 points higher to lefties.

Stud

Chandler Simpson, Tampa Bay Rays at Toronto Blue Jays, $4,200 – Simpson has been another regular player on this list throughout the season, and he’s turned into one of the most polarizing players in the league. While he makes exceptional contact and ranks second in the league with 43 stolen bases, he’s been one of baseball’s worst defenders, has no power, and walks infrequently. Still, he’s ended the season strong, averaging nine FPTS per game across his last 10 contests thanks to a .375 batting average and three stolen bases across that span. For Toronto, Shane Bieber ($9,800) would rank near the bottom quartile in expected batting average if he’d pitched enough innings to qualify, and he’s been mostly poor in the running game in recent seasons.

Value

Mike Yastrzemski, Kansas City Royals at Athletics, $3,600 – Yastrzemski hasn’t had a great season overall, but after some awful production in San Francisco, he’s at least found his power stroke again with the Royals, posting a .462 slugging percentage and averaging 6.5 FPTS per game. He’s also recorded nine or more FPTS in three of his last four games, so he could be trending in the right direction as the season winds to a conclusion. I like his matchup against Athletics rookie Luis Morales ($8,200), who’s had a solid season overall but has a bottom-septile barrel rate at the league’s second-most hitter friendly park. His ERA has been 1.59 runs worse in four starts at Sutter Health Park.