As DFS players, we spend most of our time looking forward to the next slate, the next season, etc. Equally important, though, is looking back. Figuring out the thought process that leads to winning lineups is crucial. That’s what makes us better players long term.
The winner of the Week 9 Millionaire Maker was chindog619, with a fairly concentrated portfolio of 10 lineups but just 30 players. They won it going away, with a nearly 20-point gap between the winning lineup and second place.
Let’s see how that lineup got there and check in on their overall player exposures.
The Lineup
The Stack
Three players appeared in 60% of chindgo619’s lineup, including my favorite value quarterback of the Week 9 slate, Geno Smith. I specifically pointed to some positive touchdown regression being imminent for Smith, and that’s exactly what happened with all three of the Seahawks’ touchdowns coming through the air.
From there, it was a fairly obvious stack with Jaxon Smith-Njigba, considering JSN has clearly passed Lockett for the No. 2 WR role in Seattle and DK Metcalf was out.
Perhaps the only surprising part of the stack was the lack of a Rams bring-back. It made some sense, though, considering the Rams had three skill position players with high salaries and a fairly evenly distributed offense. It was hard to build a case for any one of them without also including Matthew Stafford, and since QB was already accounted for, this strategy made sense.
Other Correlations
The only other correlated pieces in this lineup were opposing WR1s Courtland Sutton and Zay Flowers in the Broncos-Ravens game.
Baltimore has been an easy team to throw against all year, so it made sense to roster the clear top option against them. Denver’s passing offense is fairly concentrated around Sutton. He has a 21.2% target share, and the only other player in double digits is running back Javonte Williams. Sutton threw for the Broncos’ only touchdown this week, which was obviously fluky, but nobody wins contests this big without some outlier luck.
Flowers was one of chindog619’s most-owned players, appearing in 50% of his rosters. Most of those were stacked with Lamar Jackson (40% exposure), with this lineup as the one outlier. Flowers has a top-5 target share in the NFL this season and is well clear of his teammates. He was an obvious Jackson stacking partner, but it worked out nicely that chindog619 had one lineup with Flowers but not Jackson.
The Chalk
The most popular pieces of this lineup were running back De’Von Achane and tight end Mike Gesicki. Achane was one of many running backs in a good spot, as quarterback Tua Tagovailoa views him as the team’s No. 2 receiver on top of his rushing workload.
Gesicki was the most popular tight end play on the slate with Tee Higgins set to miss and the Bengals facing a bad Raiders defense. chindog619 was actually under the field on Gesicki, wisely mixing and matching at the high-variance tight end position.
Gesicki somewhat predictably had a big game here, and they were lucky to have Gesicki on their otherwise strong roster.
Saquon Barkley wasn’t quite chalk due to all of the good running back plays but came in at 12.3% ownership. The Eagles offense is playing well right now, and they had a strong matchup with the Jaguars. One, but not both, of Barkley or Jalen Hurts are strong plays on a weekly basis. It just depends on whether the touchdowns come from “tush-push” goal-line plays or farther out. This week, it was the latter.
Be sure to check out all the pick’ems Sleeper has to offer with Sleeper promo code LABS1 for a $100 deposit match.
The Sleepers
I’d like to chalk it up to good luck that Quentin Johnson made an appearance in this lineup — but chindog619 used Johnson in six of his ten lineups.
I certainly didn’t see the Johnson play coming, particularly with the recent breakout of Ladd McConkey for the Chargers.
It’s worth noting that 619 is the San Diego area code, so chindog619 is probably a fan of the (formerly San Diego) Chargers. Sometimes having deeper knowledge of a specific team can be a huge factor in DFS — or they just wanted to root for their favorite player.
Either way, it made them a million dollars richer in Week 9.
