DK Building Blocks Week 5
If it wasn’t enough to have to follow injury reports throughout the week to try and figure out who would play and how much, now we have to follow the COVID news as well. Thankfully for me, it’s a bit easier than most as Johnny Danger is tapped into NFL lifeline making sure we get news of every positive test. That means you too will have that information in the articles as it’s made available. It seems like we’re in the clear this week for DFS as a few of the games have already been moved. This leaves us with a smaller slate of only ten games and condenses the player pool a bit from past weeks. As such there won’t be as many plays in the building blocks.
These are not the only players I’m considering and there may be additions to this list that I like. Join us on the Draught for Upside First Sip show around 11 am for further analysis every game day.
Quarterbacks
Patrick Mahomes($7700)- The recipe here is simple. Mahomes projects raw point rise as one of the top plays for the week. He holds a higher price tag than some of the other guys in the area and is coming off a bad game. His floor is better than every single one of those guys beneath him. He’s playing at home against a Vegas team that has given up 30 points in 3 of their 4 games. Their fantasy points allowed look good against the pass but when you look at their DVOA it’s a different story. The leverage and the match up exist and it’s Always Mahomes.
Deshaun Watson($6900)-Watson has one of the best match-ups for Quarterbacks thus far this season. I’m a huge a Fitzpatrick fan, how can you not be. But it’s easy to realize that Watson is a better passer and runner than Fitz and we saw what Fitz did to this Jags defense. Burrow and Tannehill, both having decent seasons passing the ball are still not on Watson’s level. You have to believe if there was a players revolt Watson at least had some say in that as the QB for the team that just signed a huge contract. I expect him to have a bit more say in the offense and we see them open it up a bit.
Teddy Bridgewater($5900)-Every year it seems like Atlanta’s secondary is destroyed by injuries. This year is no different. Even before all of that this secondary was one that we would want to pick on. Going to their second-string at many positions only makes it a better spot. People will gravitate towards Mike Davis as a play this week and I think that’s fine. He’ll be talked about later, but that should reduce the ownership of Bridgewater. He’s a guy that the community and even some of my co-hosts believe is a game manager. He doesn’t try and force the ball downfield unless it’s there and the result is a pretty accurate QB. That said he’s still got over 8 yards per attempt and 11 yards per completion for the year. This is a little below guys like Mahomes but not absurdly so like some of these Game Manager truthers would have you believe. Teddy is also adding a rushing element to his fantasy upside with 12 attempts for 70 yards and a touchdown. He only has 4 passing touchdowns which have kept his price low, but this week I’m looking for him to connect for at least 2 and eclipse the 300 yard mark for the second time this season getting us a nice 3 point bonus.
Honorable Mentions – Dak, Daniel Jones, Big Ben, Kyler
Running Backs
Clyde Edwards-Helaire($6800)- The rookie has been a monster. Playing the majority of the snaps and being involved in both the running and passing attacks. They’ve had a few tough match-ups that he’s still performed admirably in. This week is not one of those games. The Chiefs play one of the worst defenses against the run, and the 1 defense in allow points to running backs. If you’re not playing Mahomes I hope you get a piece of the offense by rostering CEH. It’s okay to play both.
James Robinson($6800)-We have another guy that’s emerged as a usage monster for his team. Recently seeing an uptick in his passing game role. It’s a tall price to pay for Robinson in a game that they may be trailing. That’s the risk, that’s the downside and I’m not sure I end up with more than one share. But it’s hard to deny the match up. If Vegas has been bad, Houston has given them a run 29th in DVOA and 3rd in points allowed. They gave up monster games allowed 28.4,48.2,58.1, and 18.6 to opposing teams running backs. That one lone game with the lower total was against Buffalo and we know they feature Allen a bit like a running back in Red Zone situations and thus limit their point upside. I love Robinson today, but as I mentioned I can see a clear path to failure. Tread lightly.
Mike Davis($6400)- It’s a running theme for the running backs today. Do you like that pun? Anyway, Davis has a huge role in this offense filling in for CMC. The Carolina backfield had to bring some guys in off the street and I don’t expect anyone to take many snaps from Davis. Sure, for a breather here and there, but the guy will play 80% of the snaps and get all the usage. It’s not just on the ground where he’s getting action he’s seeing 6 to 9 targets a game and goes against an Atlanta team that ranks 7th in points allowed to the back. If you believe the Panthers get ahead and can play with that lead then Davis should get some extra rushes. If you think they play from behind then there should be a fair amount of passing game work for Davis. In either situation, he’s a super-safe play at the 6400 and my favorite play on the board from a floor perspective.
David Johnson($5200)- I get it, we don’t know what the offense is going to look like with the coaching change. If it’s any indication of how it will look when Romeo was head coach of the chiefs they featured Jamal Charles quite heavily. David Johnson is a ridiculously low price. It’s not than many years removed from this guy being around 10k. He isn’t the same guy and doesn’t justify that price. But this is just criminal. Additionally, while the Jags defense DVOA against the pass is worst in the league their points allowed to RB’s is 4th worst. There are a lot of places to attack in this game and a game stack is certainly viable.
Honorable Mentions- Kareem Hunt, Kenyan Drake, Myles Gaskin, Antonio Gibson, Le’Von Bell
Wide Receivers (I think these picks will be somewhat chalky. Try to be different elsewhere as a result)
Will Fuller($6600)-If Fuller makes it through this game healthy I don’t see how he doesn’t pay off this price. He’s going to be owned and it reminds me of the game last year on October 5th I believe. I was driving to Florida up to Virginia. It was Will Fuller week and despite a series of poor performances, the industry was on Fuller. He delivered a monster game. This year it’s a bit different, the same type of +EV match-up, amazing price, but the difference is that he’s had a good season thus far. Becoming the primary option in Houston has seen him command a 30-50% Air Yard share with a 20%+ Market Share of targets. There was that one game where he was invisible but we’re throwing that out. Play Fuller with confidence this week.
Robby Anderson(($5900)-It should be obvious at this point that I’m targeting this Carolina offense pretty heavily against the Falcons this week. If you’ve been with us since week 1 you’ll know that I was higher on this unit than most. While I’ve tempered that confidence the last few weeks due to match-ups I’m back on this train. Anderson is the WR1 in Carolina, not DJ Moore. I’ll be curious to see which of the two has higher ownership this week but I lean towards Anderson. His target share has been higher almost every week, his air yards had trailed DJ’s until last week. The biggest thing for me is his usage in HVT situations. 3-1 last week versus DJ. The biggest knock on DJ has always been he doesn’t get into the end zone a lot. It’s hard for anyone to do when you’re playing with CMC but in his absence, we still haven’t seen that change. I’m running a ton of Anderson but don’t hate the play on the side of the formation.
Diontae Johnson($5600)- Before he got hurt he was running double-digit targets per game. How can you not like that type of usage with this price? An extra week to recover? Yeah, sign me up.
Darius Slayton($4800)- Dallas hasn’t been able to stop anyone through the air. Their defense has been gutted from guys leaving and others getting hurt. Slayton has flashed big-play two Touchdown games before. While this Giants offense has struggled to get going this year, this is a prime spot for them to do so against a division rival. The price is right, but the floor is real. The ownership will be off the charts so it might be a spot to avoid….. again though 4800 is a hard price for him not to pay off.
Honorable Mentions- Hopkins, Chark, Hill, Boyd, Gage, Zaccheaus(Julio didn’t practice.)
Tight Ends
It was just two weeks ago when we couldn’t figure out who to play at TE because there just didn’t seem like many options. This week it’s the same be in reverse. There are SO many good options that I don’t think there are many that need to be highlighted. This is a position you can use in your stack or your run back. It also may just come down to salary.
Kittle- Obvious
Kelce- The Raiders stats against TE this year have been good but they’re deceptive. They haven’t played any quality TE’s or offenses that feature them. Last the year they were one of the worst and Kelce has had some monster games against this team. He has a safe floor of about 12fpts, but we need 18+
Andrews-Double TD upside
Waller-Massive usage
Ertz-Still a big part of this offense. Having other weapons alongside him should open it up for him
Gesicki-He’s basically the WR2 in Miami
Schultz-If this the team falls behind he has a role in a massive passing attack
Engram- Game could be a shoot out
Ebron- We saw during Pitt’s last game what it could look like if he was featured and Philly has had a tough time against TE’s this year, well Kittle.
Logan Thomas- New QB, maybe the passes to him will be catchable? Allen can’t throw deep, but that isn’t Logan’s role.
Defense
Pittsburg($3800)- A defense that creates pressure on the QB? Check. An offense that has a suspect offensive line and allows pressure? Check. A QB that has more confidence than ability and is prone to mistakes? Check. – This match-up has it all.
LARams($4000)- Don’t be fooled. Kyle Allen is bad. This Ram’s defense is pretty good and will create pressure that can lead to Kyle Allen’s mistakes. The price is a steep one along with Pittsburgh.
Honorable Mentions Cleveland, Indianapolis, Houston