Apr 23, 2016; Houston, TX, USA; Houston Astros relief pitcher Ken Giles (53) pitches against the Boston Red Sox in the eighth inning at Minute Maid Park. Astros won 8-3. Mandatory Credit: Thomas B. Shea-USA TODAY Sports

MLB Picks and Pivots – FanDuel Picks April 24

Welcome to the Sunday edition of Picks & Pivots, a daily fantasy column focused on providing analysis for the upcoming MLB FanDuel slate. The purpose of this column is to first identify key building blocks that can be used for any roster construction and then identify pivot points to help differentiate your lineup in hopes of a big pay day!

FanSided and FantasyCPR have you covered – For additional FanDuel MLB analysis, take a look at my fellow staff writer Matt Rogers FanDuel Economics column or Mike Marteny who provides Draft Kings MLB Picks analysis giving you the most in depth DFS coverage for tonight’s baseball slate.

We get a typical Sunday kicking off at 1:05PM EST with an “all day” slate concluding with the Sunday night game of Boston and Houston.

I will continue to track winning GPP lineups and compare trends over 5 day periods to help us understand what it takes to remain profitable. I HIGHLY recommend each of you do this each morning to look back on the previous night and understand how the winning lineups are constructed in the games you participate in.

The view below tracks GPP entries over various time periods, breaking out key metrics to understand the trends and compositions of GPP winning rosters:

Friday was another high scoring night consistent with Thursday, materially outperforming the 5 day and season long trends. The winning rosters had two mid-priced veterans with Justin Verlander and Gio Gonzalez as their winning pitchers but Aaron Nola, my top pick from Friday, came through with 51 points(good for 7x value) and was found on many entries that cashed out. Going into Friday, the top arms all seemed to be overpriced based off their matchup and the results proved that dropping down to mid-tier arms was the most profitable strategy.

I highly recommend gamers track their game performance across the various types of games they play – GPP’s, Cash, Multipliers etc – as this simple exercise will help teach you more about profitable roster construction that any article you can find.

Now on to the picks…