MLB GPP Tournament Picks: 5-30-17

The purpose of this column is to highlight some players with upside and well-suited for tournaments. While the majority of the hitter picks will likely have power upside, that's not necessarily the case for all the listed options. Other contextual factors such as batting order, ballpark, opposing pitcher, price, speed, etc also come into play, and you'll see these items sprinkled into the write-ups below. Along with that, we'll be gauging the ownership levels, giving you some plausible pivots from the popular choices in a given game slate.

Top GPP Pitcher

Ray has looked good recently 14 2/3 shutout ball over his past two starts, which both came on the road. He owns a 0.81 ERA in 33 innings on the road this year as well. He also gets the pleasure of facing a pretty weak hitting team in the Pirates. Outside of Andrew McCutchen, who has come around lately, I don't really see Ray struggling all too much. The Pirates are averaging three runs per game and will feature a righty dominant lineup. Ray did struggle in his lone game against the Pirates, which might deter ownership. That game was at Chase Field, which is why I'm not too concerned about his previous history against the Pirates. He also owns a 5.73 ERA at PNC, but that was in previous years, when he was younger and didn't look as good as he does now on the mound.

Top GPP Hitters

After leaving Coors, Dickerson had a dreadful year in 2016, especially as far as batting average is concerned. Dickerson now is hitting .345, including seven hits over his past two games. He has hits in 11 of his past 12 games, including seven multi-hit games in that span. He's been crushing both right handed and left handed pitching, so if the Rangers try to neutralize him with a lefty out of the pen, he could still rack up points. Nick Martinez has struggled this year against lefties, allowing a .337 wOBA. When you add in the weather heating up in Texas, this could line up to be a huge game for Dickerson. He also gets the added bonus of snagging an additional at-bat or two since he hits so high in the order. Dickerson is expensive, which makes me think that his ownership rate might be lower than typically expected.

It's an understatement to say that Jay Bruce has had a good season. He's been an extremely viable option in DFS this year, despite throwing up a big goose egg yesterday. However, over his past seven games, Bruce has a .402 wOBA with two home runs. Zach Davies has only allowed one hit to Bruce in 11 at-bats, but that one hit was a home run. It should also be noted that Davies has taken a turn for the worst lately in regards to allowing home runs. Over his past five starts, Davies has allowed seven homers. Against lefties, he's been even worse. Davies is surrendering a 1.91 HR/9 to lefties on the season. Considering Bruce has hit 11 of his 12 home runs against righties this year, he's in a prime spot to take Davies deep again.

Despite the ballpark being such a huge negative overall, you have to like some of the Braves bats. Going up against Parker Bridwell, who will be making his first appearance this season, will definitely make you like a good amount of these lefties. Adams is a guy who stuck out to me, mainly because of the power he once possessed. He does come in the game as the cleanup hitter and almost a .200 ISO on the year. Adams has hit all of his three home runs this month with an ISO of .275 in May. In case you were concerned about not having a lot of power at the Angels Stadium, Adams does hold a pretty respectable .343 wOBA this month. In addition, Adams has two homers in his past eight games, as well as putting up a .362 wOBA.

One guy who has been hitting well lately but not getting rewarded is Yasiel Puig. He's still stuck hitting in the eighth hole despite a .183 ISO and nine home runs. He's even hit righties better than south paws this far in the year. He's also coming off back-to-back multi-hit games. I'm also a little gun shy about Puig only having one home run on the road. Regardless, he gets to face Michael Wacha, who is coming off one of the worst outings of his career, as he gave up six runs in four innings to this same Dodgers team. Although Wacha does have a much better 2.35 ERA at home, compared to the 6.19 ERA on the road, Puig still is a threat to do some damage, regardless of the park factors.