Saturday’s MLB slate rolls out a hefty 15-game card, and it’s loaded with the kind of pitching mismatches DFS players dream about. Two aces in Chase Burns and Gerrit Cole headline the arms, while a struggling Max Scherzer gives the Phillies offense a runway to feast in Philadelphia. With confirmed lineups now up across the board, there’s plenty of signal to build around for both cash games and GPPs.
The approach today leans on swinging for stud pitching at the top of the price range, then pivoting to value bats in plus matchups to fill out the rest of the roster. That means rostering arms who can miss bats in bulk, stacking hitters against a clearly overmatched starter, and grabbing at least one cheap infielder who profiles well in a get-on-base, run-producing spot.
Chase Burns, SP — Cincinnati Reds ($8,800 DK)
Burns has been one of the best strikeout arms in baseball all season, sitting at 13-1 with a 2.35 ERA, 1.10 WHIP and 137 strikeouts across 118.2 innings. He’s been even better lately — 10-0 with a 2.23 ERA over his last 15 starts — and he just carved up Pittsburgh on August 2, going six innings with nine strikeouts while allowing just one run on two hits.
Today’s matchup against Washington isn’t the toughest test on the slate, but Burns doesn’t need much help. His K/9 sits north of 10 for the season, and he owns a sub-2.20 ERA at home this year, which is where this one is not being played — he draws the road assignment in D.C. Even away from Great American Ball Park, Burns carries a 2.51 ERA and an 11.8 K/9 in 2026, numbers that make him a legitimate cash-game anchor at this price. His volume of strikeout equity alone makes him a strong source of a DFS value play regardless of the win probability attached to Washington’s lineup.
Gerrit Cole, SP — New York Yankees ($8,900 DK)
Cole draws Atlanta on Saturday and brings a 3.42 ERA, 1.10 WHIP and 78 strikeouts over 73.2 innings into the start. What matters more for today’s roster construction is his recent form: since the All-Star break, Cole has allowed just six runs across 24.2 innings while striking out 31 batters in four outings. That’s a sub-2.20 ERA stretch with elite strikeout volume, exactly the kind of trend line you want to buy into for a top-tier DraftKings lineup.
Cole’s home splits back up the profile — a 3.31 ERA, 0.88 WHIP and 9.2 K/9 at Yankee Stadium this season, with an even sharper walk rate than his road numbers. Atlanta’s lineup carries pop from Ronald Acuna Jr., Matt Olson and Austin Riley, so this isn’t a total lock in terms of homer risk, but Cole’s swing-and-miss stuff and the venue trends give him a high floor for both cash and tournament builds. At $8,900, he’s priced as a premium arm, but the recent workload and command support paying up.
Kyle Schwarber, DH — Philadelphia Phillies
Schwarber leads all of baseball with 33 home runs and carries an .884 OPS into Saturday’s matchup with Toronto’s Max Scherzer, who owns a brutal 7.92 ERA and 1.63 WHIP across 30.2 innings this season. Scherzer has allowed nine home runs already, and Schwarber is precisely the type of pull-heavy power bat built to exploit a diminished fastball.
The track record here matters, too — Schwarber has gone deep against the Blue Jays before, including a two-run shot off Toronto’s bullpen earlier this year that pushed his season total higher. He went 1-for-4 with an HBP in Friday’s series opener, showing he’s seeing the ball well against this pitching staff even before facing Scherzer specifically. With Philadelphia at home in a hitter-friendly Citizens Bank Park and a clear salary discount relative to his production, Schwarber is one of the stronger GPP pieces on the board today, projecting as one of the better DFS value plays given the extreme matchup tilt.
Bryce Harper, 1B — Philadelphia Phillies
Harper is scorching over the past week, batting .348 with a .696 slugging percentage, two home runs and five RBI over his last seven games. He’s added an OPS near .900 on the season with 24 home runs and 70 RBI, and now he gets a Scherzer matchup that lines up as one of the most favorable pitcher-hitter spots on the entire slate.
Scherzer’s ERA sitting at 7.92 isn’t a small-sample blip — he’s allowed 35 hits and nine homers in barely 30 innings this season, and Harper’s recent surge suggests he’s locked in at the plate right now. Stacking the top of Philadelphia’s order against a pitcher this vulnerable is a textbook cash-game and GPP pick alike. Anyone building a Phillies stack should strongly consider pairing Harper with Schwarber near the top of the lineup, since both project as high-floor, high-ceiling pieces in the same plus matchup.
Nick Sogard, 2B — Boston Red Sox ($3,100 DK)
Sogard rounds out the picks as the clear value infielder on the board today. Priced at just $3,100 on DraftKings, he projects as the top second base value play on the slate against the Athletics, giving lineup builders a way to save salary at a shallow position without sacrificing much upside. His plate discipline profile — a low chase rate and a well above-average zone-contact rate — makes him a steady source of base-hit equity even without much home run pop.
Boston is red-hot at 64-51 and playing meaningful games down the stretch, which tends to correlate with more competitive at-bats and better lineup construction around a switch-hitter like Sogard who can pivot to whichever side gives him the platoon edge. At this price point, he frees up salary to pay up for arms like Cole and Burns while still contributing everyday-player production from the two-hole or bottom of the Red Sox order.
Building Your Lineup
The clearest stacking opportunity on this slate is Philadelphia’s top of the order against Scherzer — Schwarber and Harper both profile as premium plays, and rostering them together gives you correlated upside if the Phillies get into Toronto’s bullpen early. For pitching, Burns and Cole both carry strikeout-heavy floors that hold up even in cash games, though pairing two arms in that price range means you’ll need to find savings elsewhere, which is where a player like Sogard becomes valuable.
If you’re deep in a large-field GPP, consider fading the Phillies stack slightly since public perception of the Scherzer matchup is likely to push ownership up on Schwarber and Harper — pivoting to a Yankees-Braves game stack around Cole’s start, or diversifying with value bats in some of the smaller West Coast games, can help differentiate your build. Cash game players should stay closer to the chalk here: Burns, Cole, Schwarber and Harper all carry strong floors, and rounding out the rest of the roster with confirmed-lineup value like Sogard keeps salary in check without sacrificing safety. Whichever construction you land on, always double check confirmed lineups and lineup swaps close to first pitch, since a late scratch can change the calculus on any stack in a hurry — cross-reference against live MLB odds for the latest lines before locking your DraftKings lineup.
