DFS Building Blocks – Week 13
Our studs and duds lineup was almost all dud last week, then near the end of the 4th quarter we had Roethlisberger hit Freiermuth for a TD, giving each player enough points to not be excited about, but not crush us either. That left us with Cooper Kupp and Davante Adams to play. They each got about 15, getting us to the min cash, but leaving a lot of points and profit on the table.
This week is all about how we treat the TB/ATL game and what we do at the RB position, with so many cheap RBs in good spots this week.
Lot of different ways we could look at the TB/ATL game with the highest over/under of the week, but also the second highest spread. That means we can comfortably look at a Tampa Bay stack without forcing an Atlanta player onto our roster. But we also have to consider whether to load up on the passing game, running game, or both, with Fournette coming off a 40-pt game against a much tougher Indy run D.
I’m inclined to focus on the passing game, hoping the public over weights Fournette’s performance last week. That doesn’t appear to be the case though, with Brady expected to be the highest owned QB, although Fournette is still relatively high on the RB ownership list. Godwin is really high on the WR ownership list with people expecting a bounce-back performance. If going to Godwin or Fournette, I’m likely to play them in a Brady + Fournette + Godwin stack as a way to get leverage on the individual ownership of each. But there are too many other good RB values this week, so I’m going back to a Brady + Evans + Gronk stack, with Gronk getting very little ownership attention and Evans and Gronk usually getting the redzone attention. That stack will get me exposure to the best game environment and will get me leverage on the Fournette and Godwin ownership. If playing a few cheap tourneys, I’d definitely mix up my exposure to this game though.
So, for now, let’s lock in Brady + Evans + Gronk and talk about RBs.
We have a lot of good value RBs this week. Mattison and Jamaal Williams starting this week. Conner starting again. Antonio Gibson won’t have McKissic taking away from him. David Montgomery is still cheap for his role (although expensive for his performance!). Eli Mitchell is healthy and putting up points. Myles Gaskin won’t have the newly acquired Philip Lindsay taking touches away this week. His other backups could take some work, but if the Dolphins truly felt that good about them they wouldn’t have picked up Lindsay. Of course, you could use the same logic as a knock on Gaskin, but he’s basically put up 3x his salary the last two weeks.
Out of all those options we really only see Williams, Gibson, Gaskin, and Montgomery priced as values. We’ll lock in Gibson out of those three and then see if we like any of the expensive backs enough to use. We’ll cross Montgomery off the list given the state of the Bears offense and a potential bad-weather game (although that may boost Montgomery).
Mattison is priced way up to $8,700, with neither him or Cook getting to 3x that price all year. For what it’s worth, it has seemed like Cook has never really been playing healthy, so a healthy Mattison in a dream matchup could see him get to the 3x finally. I really want to play Mattison, but we’re not really getting an ownership discount. I thought the price would scare people off but it appears he’s still near the top of the list.
On the other side of the field, Jamaal Williams is only $6,500 and Swift hit 3x that salary multiple times this year. We can expect the Lions to be trailing and can expect Williams to get a lot of passing work. If the Lions surprise and keep it close, he can also payoff with his rushing upside. He’s popular coming in just outside the top 5 in ownership, but, somewhat surprisingly, less popular than Mattison.
Conner is $7,300, not a bad price, but playing in Chicago in a potential bad-weather game. And he’s very popular this week.
Eli Mitchell is $7,600 and coming off a 27-carry game where he went for over 3x this week’s salary. He could easily repeat that performance with Deebo out.
Myles Gaskin seems like another solid option this week. He doesn’t appear to have a giant ceiling but his getting to 3x and would make a nice correlation with the Dolphins D, which is another good spot this week.
There are some expensive RBs in really great spots, too. Taylor is up to $10,500 which has traditionally been reserved for CMC and Henry. He gets a matchup with Houston but you really need 30 points to make it worth paying up. Of course, he recently had a 51-pt game… He’s also hit 30 twice this year and had 28 in his last game with Houston. Love the player, love the matchup, but don’t love the price enough to be forced into it. We have to ask ourselves who is more likely to 4x their salary… Gibson and Gaskin getting 24 points or Taylor getting 40 points? It could easily be Taylor, but odds are, most weeks, we’re more likely to see Gibson or Gaskin get to their 4x. Taylor could definitely get his 3x, but it doesn’t leave us much room for upside beyond that. And, we also have to consider the rest of our roster. We play Taylor at $10,400 and we might have to play a $5k WR. Or we play Gibson and we can play any WR we want. Do you like Taylor + Bryan Edwards or Gibson + Cooper Kupp better? That’s the way you have to think about these situations. For the record, we could do worse than Taylor + Bryan Edwards if forced into a cheap WR.
Mixon is in a great spot, but is pricey and still has relatively high ownership. He does make a nice pivot from Taylor and Mattison lineups though.
So Gibson and Gaskin are locked in. I was originally locking in Williams, planning to pair him with Jefferson. If I’m fading Mattison, that’s still a good game theory mini-stack, but Jefferson is very popular this week as well, so we wouldn’t be getting the ownership discount we’d want. I may approach this by taking a secondary lineup with a Vikings stack of Cousins + Mattison + Williams + Jefferson. If you want to add the Williams + Jefferson stack though, easy enough to throw an RB into the flex this week. A trio of Gibson + Williams + Gaskin (+ Miami D) is a great starting point.
So I’m at Brady + Gibson + Gaskin + Evans + Gronk + Miami D, leaving me about $7k each on two WRs and a flex, giving us a ton of options. Pay up for one with something like Kupp, who is too popular this week, Jefferson, Thielen, Godwin (too popular), Chase (not the greatest matchup), Allen (lot of volume, but not enough upside – usually best on DK), Hopkins (solid pick on DK this week), McLaurin (we’re already locking in Gibson), Diontae Johnson (Steelers too much of a mess in a potentially low scoring game), Marquise Brown (staying away from this game). So not a lot at the top that I really want to play, but there are two names I skipped…
DK Metcalf and Brandon Aiyuk. Absolutely no one wants to touch a Seahawks player right now. For good reason? Yes. But we want to find talent in low-owned situations. There is public talk about getting Metcalf more involved this week, but the public ownership doesn’t match it because of the high price. We’re paying a premium for his name, but we saved salary at RB, and we’re hunting for high upside at low ownership. Metcalf fits the bill. Then we can add Aiyuk who is the type of high-upside player we like to target, particulary in a game with Deebo Samuel out. If we’re not going to Mitchell at RB, Aiyuk makes a lot of sense.
Now… that is what I’m likely to do, but it’s not comfortable. The far safer play is going with the Williams + Jefferson combo with Gaskin in the flex.
This leaves us looking for a flex. Take your pick of who else you can fit. Should note that we can still fit Jamaal Williams into this lineup at the flex. He feels like a much safer bet to get 3x than any of the WRs in that same price range. Could take a flier on Sanders who, in theory, is a good play this week, but that’s not nearly as safe as Williams.
Let’s talk about a few pieces we didn’t cover much above. I’m locking in Gronk at low ownership since the public is running to Pitts, Kittle, and Moreau. Pitts is off my list without Ridley. He again last week disappointed when all the attention was on him. On paper, you can make a case for him this week especially as an addition to our TB stacks, but I’m skipping him. Kittle is great and may get even more work with Deebo out but hasn’t been getting to 3x. Moreau is popular with Waller out. He could be the best value of the week, or he could be fools gold. I’m skipping Moreau against a tough Washington D. Would rather play him on DK where we’re more stretched for salary. That’s another concept we haven’t talked a lot about this year. You can take advantage of the different pricing on FanDuel and DraftKings to get exposure to other players and games. It gives you a natural way to diversify your lineups.
At WR, the Rams, Bengals, and Chargers are getting a lot of attention. The Rams should pass a ton even against a weak Jacksonville team. The Bengals and Chargers have a high over/under and a tight spread which could mean fantasy goodness. But both teams have similar defenses and I could see this game playing out as a low-scoring, slow game. This is a great spot to go to a DraftKings lineup pairing Mixon + Allen. On FanDuel, I’m either playing Mixon alone, skipping the game completely, or stacking the game since the QBs are getting less ownership attention. Ekeler is in play in these stacks as well.
Marvin Jones looks like a great value option that allows you to play Cooper Kupp. I’m not going this way because of Kupp’s popularity and the low likelihood of the Jaguars actually putting up points, but if you wanted to build a Stafford stack, Jones would be in play.
Pittman or even Pascal can be considered as pieces to fill out your lineup. We’re not expecting Jonathan Taylor to bust exactly, we’re just not expecting him to get another 50-pt game. If he doesn’t live up to expectations, it could be because the passing game does the scoring. A Wentz + Pittman + Cooks stack would be super low owned. Or even a Tyrod Taylor + Cooks + Pittman. Or if playing Jonathan Taylor, a Taylor + Taylor + Cooks stack.
With the public going to Pitts, I actually like Russell Gage as a low-owned option to stack with TB. I’m not prioritizing an Atlanta player, but, if I do add one, it will be Gage.
Bryan Edwards and Zay Jones aren’t priorities for me, but are cheap pieces on the other side of Gibson that could pay off. They could also get 0 though. Would rather play Renfrow but he’s popular this week.
At DEF, Dolphins are cheap and in a great spot. If you want to pay up, Eagles, Cardinals, and Rams are also all great options. If you do go with Jonathan Taylor lineup, I’d add Colts D to get some leverage.
For an off-the-radar pick, pairing Gibson with Washington D could pay off nicely and get you leverage on the Moreau ownership.
And, finally, since we’re not targeting an Atlanta player, we could round out our Brady + Evans + Gronk stack with Bucs D.