I have a very conflicted relationship when it comes to trying new things. On the one hand I love tasting new foods and visiting different places. I’m always interested in going to a new restaurant that’s serving a type of food I’m not familiar with and there isn’t a country in the world I wouldn’t be excited about visiting. I think it’s important to broaden your horizons, to embrace change and diversity and greet new challenges and opportunities with open arms.
On the other hand, I could quite easily eat pasta for five nights in a row and not stray more than a quarter mile from where I live for a good two weeks or so. We’re creatures of habit after all and I derive a huge amount of comfort from things that have served me well in the past. Yes I could try that exotic sounding fish on the menu and I might feel happy that I’ve tasted it but I’m almost positive I’ll enjoy the wings and fries a whole lot more. Life is like a constant game of blackjack, in which you’re perpetually deciding whether to stick or twist. And life, just like blackjack, is mirrored by DFS.
My original opening for this post was going to be themed around trying new things. I was going to share an anecdote to illustrate how stepping outside of your comfort zone is a challenging but ultimately rewarding experience. I could have talked about going on a sky dive in Australia or pushing myself to do auditions during college and how these experiences are almost always worthwhile. This idea came to me as I was looking through the player pool this week and my eyes were drawn to some new names. My thoughts were as follows ‘oh look Jonathan Stewart is $3,800 this week and it looks like DeAngelo Williams is out = maybe I should build a complete team around players I haven’t rostered this year = oh that could lend itself to a nice intro.’ I’m a pretty simple person really.
But then I realized I didn’t really want to enter a tournament with the likes of Nate Washington or Steven Jackson as my shining lights and even more importantly I don’t even believe that it’s a great idea to forget about everything you’ve done in the past and throw yourself head first into a new situation. It’s about picking what works for you at that particular time. We’d all like to build a team that has an overall ownership of under 5.0% like we’d all like to be the first person to visit every country in the world but we’d probably be just as happy to take a day trip to that national park an hour away and be back in time for the six o’clock news……who am I kidding, be back in time to set your DFS line-ups for that night’s sporting event. As for the under 5.0% team, that’s the equivalent of buying something you don’t even want just to impress your friends, you’ll feel so smug and content initially but ultimately you’ll wind up with a stupid pair of pants and a team that finishes behind the one you selected while drunk on a Friday night.
So this intro isn’t all about stripping away what’s happened before and embracing the new world of Jonathan Stewart and Nate Washington. It’s about picking and choosing from both. It’s about ordering that Chinese swamp eel you’ve always thought about trying but hedging your bets with some French fries and ketchup on the side. In honor of this analogy I’m breaking my picks this week into two sections, the swamp eels and the French fries. The swamp eels are players I haven’t rostered all year and the French fries are players I’ve grown accustomed to picking almost every week.
The Swamp Eels
Quarterback – Andy Dalton $6,000
Didn’t see this one coming did you? There’s not much in the way of supporting evidence to help back up this pick, in fact there’s quite a lot of data that should make you steer clear of Dalton. He’s thrown 13 interceptions and 13 touchdown’s so far this year, he’s been pretty terrible at home including that atrocity against the Browns and he’s only averaging 15.6 Draftkings points, a far cry from the 24 we’d be looking for with his salary this week. Honestly my No.1 QB this week (with salary accounted for) is Russell Wilson. I fancied him from my first look at the prices but he’s also the QB that everyone else seemed to like early in the week as well. I just have a feeling he’s going to be the highest owned quarterback what with the extra possessions he’ll get playing against Philly and that’s never something you want for a large field tournament.
But back to Dalton. This pick is based on two things. No.1 – The chances of a ‘Ryan Fitzpatrick’ game. What I mean is that I heard people like Adam Levitan touting Fitzpatrick as a good bet for a 300 yard, 2 TD game last week, and what did he do? 358 yards and 6 TD’s. I’m not saying Dalton is going to replicate that but he’s a similar sort of play to me this week. He should get 250+ yards and 2 TD’s but he has a legitimate shot of getting a lot more. No.2 – Opposing QB’s can rack up points against the Steelers. 19.08, 31.6, 22.32, 17.18 17.52, 30.28. That’s the amount of DK points opposing QB’s have scored against the Steelers over the last six games, and that’s including the likes of Michael Vick, Zach Mettenberger and our boy Fitzpatrick. That’s an average of 22.99. They have the 8th worst pass coverage unit according to PFF, giving up the fifth highest amount of fantasy points to opposing WR’s. I see this playing out a lot like the Carolina game earlier in the year with a lot of points scored on both sides. I think Dalton is a solid bet to score 20+ points this week.
Running Back – Eddie Lacy $7,800
This one had to be approved by the swamp eels’ committee as I have technically rostered Lacy before but only in tilting afternoon or primetime games where my week long researched teams have turned into full blown dumpster fires. The reason I don’t generally play Lacy is that I don’t think he’s very good. He’s doesn’t have that gliding style of Foster or amazing lateral movement of Bell but what he does have is Aaron Rodgers. The brilliance of the Packers passing game opens up so much room for Lacy to plough into like an overloaded but damn efficient dump truck. I want some exposure to this game due to it being the highest o/u of the week and the fact that the Packers offense is unstoppable at home. I think the majority of people will pay up for Bell or Foster or take Anderson or Jennings who are priced similarly to Lacy. Just like Wilson and the QB position, I think Jennings is the pretty clear pick this week if he’s healthy but I don’t trust him and his injuries or the Giants coaching staff. Even if he’s good to go, I think Andre Williams might get more carries than people expect. There are a lot of options in the Green Bay offense but Lacy always seems to get his as they end up in the red zone so frequently and if they get ahead fast he should see plenty of work.
Jonathan Stewart – $3,800
If Lacy is the pivot away from the more obvious choice of Jennings in the higher range of RB’s, than this is the obvious lower priced RB of the week. It seems that DK pricing has generally tightened up recently, outside of the Tre Mason situation last week, so you’re really having to find some cheap options if you want to spend big at any other position. It’s looking like DeAngelo Williams will definitely miss the Saints game at the weekend leaving Stewart as the lead back in the Carolina backfield. This is a positive when it comes to that much sought after situation, opportunity, but Stewart has also been by far the better running back. He’s averaged a decent 4.3 yards on 96 carries this year but he looked great in his last game where he averaged 7.1 yards per carry against a decent Vikings run defense (8th ranked per PFF). I would have considered Stewart as a sneaky play this week even if Williams wasn’t banged up, now that he’s definitely out, I’m going to have a whole lot of J-Stew (do people call him that?) in both cash and tournaments this week.
Defense – Chiefs $2,900
Skipping straight to D/ST as every one else falls into another category. Defense turned out to be a pretty important pick last week. If you didn’t have the Rams or at least the Vikings it was virtually impossible to finish with a decent payday. There’s a whole lot of expensive defenses this week and usually I’d jump all over a matchup like JJ Watt against the Jags but I’d rather spend my money somewhere else. There’s no way you can predict scoring like the Rams put up last week and it’s even harder to predict pick sixes which is what you really need for a decent D/ST score. I think the Chiefs against Drew Stanton have as good a shot as anybody for grabbing a few interceptions in what is projected to be a pretty low scoring game.
The French Fries
Wide Receiver – Josh Gordon $8,100
Ok so obviously I haven’t been playing Gordon all year but I’ve had him in my team every week since he’s been back and I held on to him all year on my regular fantasy team so he feels as familiar as a crispy, greasy French fry. He’s also another pick that’s dependent on an injury and now that Vontae Davis has officially been ruled out I’m probably going to have Gordon in every line-up this week. He’s going to be highly owned but like we saw with Mason last week sometimes you don’t need to over think these things. He’s had 29 targets over the past two weeks, he’s the No.1 option in this offense, Davis (15.9 CB rating per PFF) will be replaced by a combination of Greg Toller (-7.7), Darius Butler (-3.6) & Josh Gordy (-2.0) and it’s Andrew Luck on the other side of the field so they’re going to have to air it out if they have any hope of staying in the game. Gordon could well end up as the highest scoring WR of the week.
DeAndre Hopkins $6,600
Hopkins is slowly turning into my muse at this stage as he’s been heavily featured in my last two posts. In fact he’s easily my most consistent play on this team as I’ve considered or played him almost every week this year. There was never any doubting his talent and he finally broke out against the Titans. Luckily for us his price tag hasn’t come up a huge amount and much as I hate rostering players after a big week I’m making an exception here. I have a checkered past when it comes to playing him of course but he’s obviously in form and the matchup is there. The Jags have been better defensively over the last few weeks but they’re still the 4th worst ranked pass coverage unit (PFF) and they give up on average 24 fantasy points to opposing WR’s. That’s without factoring in the 100+ yards bonus on DK. Hopkins has had 9,9 and 8 targets over the last three week so it’s not like last week was a freak occurrence, he’s going to get plenty of opportunities again this week and I think he’ll make the most of them.
Tight End – Jordan Reed $4,600
Another questionable selection for the French fries section because of Reed’s injuries this year but I’ve used him as a cheaper alternative to Gronk and Graham nearly every week he’s been available. Although Colt McCoy threw for 392 yards last week he just loves to check the ball down and specifically he loves checking it down to Reed. Reed had 9 catches on 11 targets last week after accumulating 7 catches in McCoy’s last start. He’s probably going to be the chalk play at this position due to Gronk’s ever increasing salary and Graham’s mysterious donut last week but at this price he’s hard to resist.
The ‘Swamp Fries’
Wide Receivers – Jarvis Landry $5,600 & Charles Johnson $4,300
I’m breaking my own rules here and slightly contradicting the whole premise of this post but in a way it’s perfect because these two really do straddle both sides of the two categories. I had never even considered either of them until about three weeks ago but I’ve played them almost every week since. Johnson also encapsulates the classic problem of playing DFS. You go all in on a player one week, he lets you down and then you’re left with that classic fantasy football conundrum. Stick with him because it’s too small a sample size and get him at a smaller ownership percentage or realize that you made a mistake and move on to someone else. I’m going with the former here. I didn’t see the Vikings Panthers game but it seemed like an odd game from the box score. The Vikings got up fast and then….nothing much else seemed to happen. They barely showed any of it on Red Zone. The good news is that Johnson has been confirmed as the starter again this week so I’m looking for a bounce back game against a, we say it every week, suspect Jets secondary! He’s also gone up by $300 which I like as less people will be inclined to roster him again.
Landry isn’t your classic tournament play as he gets the majority of his catches around the line of scrimmage. Wallace would probably be the more obvious play here but whatever is going on between Tannehill and Wallace, they don’t seem to be on the same page. I’m not too worried about the fact that Landry won’t get me the big play because on a full PPRsite like DK a WR can quickly reach value by catching a lot of 8 yard slant routes. Landry hasn’t gone below five receptions in his last five games and although big play ability is important when it comes to a high finish in a large field GPP, possession receivers can play their part as well. One last fact, the winning line up for the millionaire maker last week had Robert Woods in the flex spot. He caught 4 passes for 71 yards giving him a total of 11.1 DK points. I think Landry can easily outdo that and be a nice reliable piece in a high scoring line-up.
And now I have to go because this guy has been patiently waiting for me to bring him for a walk for the last hour!
Good luck to everyone this weekend!
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