Postseason baseball kicks off Tuesday with four wild-card round matchups, beginning at 1:08 pm EDT. Though the slates will shrink considerably, the standard roster and salary settings still apply. Let's break down the matchups.
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Pitchers
Unsurprisingly, it's a very strong set of pitchers taking the mound. Tarik Skubal ($10,000) is one of three starters with a strikeout rate higher than 30 percent, he also has one of the more forgiving matchups against the Guardians. Hunter Greene ($8,200) is a second pitcher with a high strikeout rate and he projects to be one of the better value pitchers of the day, despite drawing a Dodgers' lineup that has heated back up.
Blake Snell ($9,200) doesn't quite reach the top tier of pitcher from a skills perspective, but he's still a good option thanks to a matchup against a Reds lineup that has the second-highest strikeout rate and the second-lowest wOBA in the last 30 days among the teams playing in this round.
Gavin Williams ($7,000) and Nick Pivetta ($7,500) are both viable value options. The Cubs have swung the bat well overall lately, but have also struck out at an elevated 23.8 percent rate in the last 30 days. That gives Pivetta some upside. Meanwhile, the Tigers have a team wOBA of .292 paired with a 25.6 percent strikeout rate over the last month, making Williams an interesting boom-or-bust option at pitcher.
Top Hitters
The Cubs-Padres matchup looks to be the best hope for some offensive fireworks, and we'll cover the other side of this matchup later. Even at his most effective, Pivetta often struggles with the home run ball. He's curtailed that a bit in 2025, but he served up three home runs in his second-to-last outing and has surrendered at least one long ball in five of his last seven starts. Michael Busch ($4,500) and Kyle Tucker ($5,500) are both bats that should be considered in the Chicago lineup.
Value Bats
Paul Goldschmidt ($3,500) closed the regular season as the Yankees' leadoff hitter against lefties. If that continues, he'll be a nice value on the slate in a matchup against Garrett Crochet. Crochet is one of the most talented pitchers in the league, but he quietly gave up multiple homers in three of his last five outings to close the regular season. He's far from a pitcher to stack against, but getting some cheap exposure against him makes some sense given the limited slate.
The story is similar for Rob Refsnyder ($3,700). He often hit cleanup for the Red Sox against lefties during the regular season. If that remains the case against Max Fried, Refsnyder is a solid, cheap bat to consider.
Stacks to Consider
Detroit Tigers vs. Cleveland Guardians (Williams): Parker Meadows ($2,600), Gleyber Torres ($4,100), Kerry Carpenter ($4,000)
As was noted in the Pitchers section, and which should be apparent to anyone who has watched baseball in the last month, the Tigers have not been swinging hot bats entering the postseason. However, relative to the rest of the pitcher pool, Williams is weak in the ways we want to target for hitter stacks, most notably pairing an 11.8 percent walk rate with a 1.23 HR/9. The good news is that Detroit can be a secondary stack given the price of their projected top of the order hitters.
San Diego Padres vs. Chicago Cubs (Matthew Boyd): Fernando Tatis ($5,200), Luis Arraez ($3,700), Jackson Merrill ($4,400)
Boyd is the worst pitcher of the day at generating swings and misses, which immediately puts him in consideration to stack against. He also ended the season in poor form, posting just a 9.9 K-BB% paired with a 1.37 HR/9 in his final five starts of the regular season. The concern is that the Padres weren't a very good lineup against lefties this year (.302 wOBA).
