Happy Dinger Tuesday! FanDuel has brought back one of our favorite promotions for the 2024 MLB season, albeit with some added restrictions. Let's get into it!
How FanDuel Dinger Tuesday Works
Firstly, make sure to OPT-IN on FanDuel for the promotion. Then, for every in which you place a $25 bet on any player to hit a home run, you’ll receive a $5 free bet for each home run hit in the game. The free bets pay out regardless of whether your pick hits or not, and you can use this promotion on every game on the Tuesday slate.
The caveat here is that FanDuel introduced a new $25 limit in free bets per day (last year it was $50). Some accounts, perhaps newer ones, might still have the original promotion that has no limit on free bets. Because of this, we’ll only look to be releasing 2-3 bets per day.
I’ll be tracking all my home run plays here at EWB as well as the free bet conversions. Last year we picked up +17.3 units betting home runs or $432.5! (Tracking $25 as a unit given the promotion parameters)
Weather Report for May 28
There looks to be a couple scattered storms across the country today, after much of the east coast was battered by severe thunderstorms on Memorial Day. Baltimore and Cincy look like less-than-ideal conditions. We’re avoiding Detroit in this one, where postponement could be imminent.
Hitting conditions look great in NYC today with a double header being played with winds blowing out to right at 15-20 mph. We’ll stick to Game 2 for that matchup, given the weaker pitching matchup.
Bet: Shohei Ohtani +340
Dodgers vs. Mets (Game 2)
Shohei Ohtani isn’t a player that needs much introduction so we’ll keep this one simple as to why we’re going with the Dodgers’ star. As mentioned, we’re going to play Game 2 of the doubleheader today, where we’ll find Jose Quintana (Mets) matched up against Gavin Stone for the Dodgers.
Quintana has not been good this season, struggling with hard contact and home runs when he is unable to keep the ball on the ground. I’m not concerned with the lefty-lefty matchup for Ohtani versus Quintana as Quintana has been slightly worse against left-handed hitters in terms of opponent OPS and K rate.
He’s also given up the majority of his home runs to lefties. I like the left-handed bat of Ohtani to take advantage of the wind conditions at Citi Field today, which is why I’d rather have him at +340 than the usual lefty killers in the Dodgers line (Will Smith/Teoscar Hernandez).
Quintana has just a 14% k-rate against lefties and a 2% BB-rate so far in 2024. Those figures lead me to believe Ohtani will certainly see some pitches to hit in his at-bats against Quintana.
Bet: Taylor Ward +470
New York Yankees vs. Los Angeles Angels
Griffin Canning takes the ball for the Angels against the red hot Yankees lineup in what should be a high scoring game in Anaheim. Canning has been extremely poor in 2024 and I’m not sure we can point to bad luck for the once top prospect.
Canning is struggling to miss bats with just a 6.7% K-BB. His xERA of 5.05 and xFIP of 5.34 support his poor ERA at 5.05. It seems like Canning is just leaving far too many pitches right over the plate and has been serving more as an innings eater for this Angels staff at this point through 2024. In a game that should yield a few home runs against Canning, it looks like a good chance to take up a bigger price play.
I’m actually going to roll with Taylor Ward here, getting +470 against Nestor Cortes. Cortes has been very good so far in 2024, but has a pretty concerning home/away split. The same size is small, but Cortes has been awful away from the Bronx, pitching to a 6.05 ERA on the road. He generally doesn’t give up much hard contact, but does give up a ton of fly balls.
If Cortes’ road struggles continue, I think Taylor Ward is a great price to go yard. For a more conservative approach, I’d be supportive of a bet on Juan Soto or Giancarlo Stanton in this one.
No Free bet conversion today as we were off last week.
