Where We Are
Early in the morning of August 1, 2016, the NFL (daily fantasy sports) season officially started: FanDuel released its Week 1 salaries. (Note that the season-opening Thursday game between the Panthers and Broncos is not included in the first slate that FanDuel released.)
In this series — The Freedman Files — I’m uncontrollably spewing my thoughts systematically analyzing these FanDuel salaries on a position-by-position basis.
— Part 1: Quarterbacks
— Part 2: Running Backs
— Part 3: Wide Receivers
— Part 4: Tight Ends
You’re welcome.
For a macro perspective on Week 1 FanDuel salaries, be sure to check out FantasyLabs co-founder Jonathan Bales‘ recent piece.
I Generally Don’t Trust Guys Named ‘Todd,’ But . . .
In his analysis of Week 1 salaries on FanDuel, Bales notes the superior Consistency of top-tier running backs, who last year met their salary-based expectations in 54.9 percent of their games.
As a point of comparison: Top-tier tight ends were second in Consistency with 50.0 percent — although by ‘top-tier tight ends’ I basically mean Rob Gronkowski and more Gronkowski, so the sample isn’t super representative, but it is suggestive. Even when he is priced up, one of the most dominant players in league history meets his salary-based expectations half of the time — and he’s still less consistent on FanDuel than the expensive players at the most fragile and/or replaceable position in the NFL. That probably means something.
I’m generally not a fan of paying up at running back. Instead, I prefer to try to find cheaper runners who will have greater-than-expected opportunities, because opportunity is everything for running backs. Basically, it’s the position at which I attempt to employ a good ol’-fashioned arbitrage approach: Find guys who are priced differently but have comparable opportunity, and then roster the cheaper guy.
But you could do a lot worse than paying up in Week 1 for top-tier options Todd Gurley ($8,900), David Johnson ($8,800), Adrian Peterson ($8,200), Devonta Freeman ($8,100) and Jamaal Charles ($8,000). All of them regularly get double-digit carries and are on teams favored to win. Per our Trends tool, those factors have resulted in FanDuel value over the last two years for players in the $8,000-$8,900 salary range:
Volume is THE everything. As Week 1 favorites who have all served as strong workhorses for at least stretches of the last year, these five players are poised to eat a lot of pork on opening Sunday.
[Note to Self: Work on pigskin puns.]Additionally, all of these players have some built-in protection — some auxiliary redundancy — through their peripheral roles as pass catchers. Johnson, Freeman, and Charles are clearly among the best receiving backs in the league, and AD and Gurley are also better as receivers than people think.
Peterson has two 40-reception seasons in his career, and last year he was targeted 36 times — which is a lot for a guy who ‘doesn’t catch passes.’ Gurley was targeted ‘only’ 25 times in his 12 starts last year, but as a sophomore in college, he did impress as a receiver with 37 receptions for 441 yards and six touchdowns in only 10 games. It’s not as if this guy is a big-bodied bruiser with hands of soft stone. He can catch the ball.
Of course, these players aren’t without their concerns. AD and ‘Todd’ — which I still can’t believe is his name — are A) on the road and B) on teams implied to score fewer than 25 points. That’s not an especially ideal situation, even for workhorses:
Additionally, JC Superstar is returning from an ACL injury and may need to share touches with Charcandrick West and Spencer Ware, who aren’t untalented players.
And Johnson and Freeman (and even ‘Todd’), though great in 2015, are still guys who have been studs for less than one full season — and guys like that always carry risk. Remember last year when C.J. Anderson was ‘only’ $8,400 in Week 1? It’s always possible for one of these top-tier options to sh*t his pants with a massive -6.24 Plus/Minus dump.
The Targets-Per-Game Superstars
To borrow from The Producers: Who does Danny Woodhead need to f*ck to get a break in this town?
In his two healthy seasons in San Diego (2013 and 2015), Woody has been a fantastic back in formats that award (even partial) points for receptions, averaging 78 catches and 102 carries for 1,062.5 yards and 8.5 touchdowns per season. Last year, he was third at the position with 6.69 targets per game — just behind Dion Lewis (7.14) and Arian Foster (7.00), whose averages are slightly suspect because neither of them played in more than six games.
In 2015, Woodhead was the No. 14 FanDuel back on a points-per-game basis. For Week 1, he has the 35th-most expensive salary at the position ($5,800). #Shame
(You’ve got about 27 seconds before that last link becomes remarkably NSFW.)
If you look through Woody’s gamelog, you’ll see that he’s rather inconsistent as a scorer — in 2015 all of his touchdowns came in four games — but as a receiver and yardage accumulator, he is fairly reliable on a game-to-game basis, a fact which (in the context of his perpetually-absurd salary) makes him a DFS value. Last year when Woodhead was comparably priced, he was a source of outsized production:
The Chargers are road underdogs who have the slate’s second-lowest implied total with 18 points. That’s pathetic. But Woodhead doesn’t need to score touchdowns to have a good chance of living up to his salary.
Circling back to Lewis and Foster: They’re $6,200 and $6,500, respectively, tied for the 23rd- and 17th-highest salaries at the position. It’s hard to know what we should expect from either of them. Both are returning from injuries and are playing in new circumstances (Dion is expected to be without Tom Brady and Arian is now in Miami). Both might be limited to change-of-pace duty. And both, like Woodhead, play for road underdogs implied to score relatively few points.
But last year Lewis was the No. 9 FanDuel running back on a points-per-game basis and Foster was No. 4. In 11 games, they combined for a +5.23 Plus/Minus on 72.7 percent Consistency. These guys have their fair share of risk, but maybe that just means you roster them in guaranteed prize pools instead of cash games.
And let’s talk about a few more 2015 targets-per-game superstars, comparing their Week 1 salaries with their points-per-game production last year:
— Theo Riddick, $5,100 (tied for 53rd): 8.69 pts/g (42nd)
— Bilal Powell, $5,500 (42nd): 10.15 pts/g (28th)
— Charles Sims, $4,700 (tied for 79th): 9.66 pts/g (34th)
All three players were top-15 backs last year in tgts/g and are now available at substantial discounts to their 2015 production, even though each of them has a reasonable chance to play the same role he played last year in the same offense. Riddick finished the season with 80 receptions (tied with Woodhead for first), Sims had one of the quietest 1,000-yard campaigns ever, and Powell easily was the Jets’ third-best pass catcher behind wide receivers Brandon Marshall and Eric Decker.
As you might expect, they were good DFS assets last year:
Combining for a +3.59 Plus/Minus on 72.1 percent Consistency, these three running backs were very undervalued last year.
They’re still undervalued.
Being Good Is His Forte
If there’s a reason to be hesitant about Powell — besides the fact that he’s probably not that good — it’s the arrival of Matt Forte in New York. Last year, Powell was the pass-catching complement to Chris Ivory, who’s decent at receiving, but it’s not his . . .
Pop Quiz
A. Strength
B. Specialty
C. Passion
D. Forte
Meanwhile, with the exception of Jamaaler the Baller, Forte might be the best all-around back of his generation. In 2014, with the pass-happy Marc Trestman as his coach and play caller, Forte had 102 receptions. Jets offensive coordinator Chan Gailey doesn’t target his backs in the passing game the way that Trestman does, but he’s still a guy who likes to throw the ball and likes having backs who can catch it.
Last year, Gailey’s running backs were collectively targeted 117 times. In his career, Forte has averaged 84.8 targets and 64.9 receptions per 16 games. On the season, Forte has a good chance of earning a lot of targets, and in Week 1 he’s facing a Bengals defense that last year ranked 24th in pass defense against running backs, per Football Outsiders’ Defense-Adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) metric.
It’s true that Forte’s on a Jets team implied to score only 20 points, but at least he’s at home. Running backs with Forte’s targets tend to do alright in that situation:
Forte is tied for the 17th-most expensive salary at $6,500. Last year he was eighth in FanDuel points per game with 14.82. In 2014, he was fourth with 18.48 points per game.
In No Universe . . .
Should Melvin Gordon ($5,700) be $100 more expensive than Giovani Bernard ($5,600) — at least A) not with the information at our disposal and B) not until he, you know, scores a f*cking professional touchdown. #StillWaiting
Gordon’s Chargers are seven-point road underdogs implied to score only 18 points and he’ll be facing a division opponent that last season had a top-12 DVOA rushing defense that ‘endowed’ opposing runners with a league-worst -1.30 Plus/Minus on 25.0 percent Consistency. And it’s not as if he’s likely to get a lot of targets if his team is in catch-up mode, because he’s teammates with the NFL’s best receiving back.
The good news is that in 1956, rookie Preston Carpenter scored no touchdowns while rushing the ball 188 times, so last season Gordon didn’t have the worst all-time rookie season for a first-round running back. It was just (barely) the second-worst. Of course, Carpenter played in an era when teams played only 12 games and could go 5-7 while scoring only 16 offensive touchdowns, so . . . f*ck it. Last year Gordon had the worst all-time rookie season for a first-round running back.
Meanwhile, for his entire three-year career, Bernard has averaged 164 carries and 49.3 receptions for 1,146.7 yards and 5.7 touchdowns per season — and in Week 1 there will be extra targets to be had in Cincinnati with the departures of wide receivers Marvin Jones and Mohamed Sanu and the uncertain status of tight end Tyler Eifert, who suffered an injury in the most embarrassing way possible: In the Pro Bowl.
In no universe should Gordon be more expensive than Gio in Week 1.
That Which Is and That Which Should Not Be
In case you forgot: Justin Forsett ($6,900) is old, small, nonathletic, and a horribly-inefficient receiver. And his teammate Javorius Allen ($5,400) is young, big, athletic, and already one of the best receiving backs in the NFL. Per the RotoViz Game Splits App, the Sith Lord thrived once he turned to the dark side of the Forsett. [Translation: Buck kicked ass without Forsett.]
Extrapolated over the season, Allen’s 14.07 points-per-game average would have made him the No. 10 FanDuel running back in the metric and his 7.17 targets per game would’ve led the position.
At some point this season, Trestman will prefer Allen to Forsett. That could happen as soon as Week 1.
It’s Miller Time!
Last season, Lamar Miller averaged 13.03 FanDuel points per game, the 13th-highest mark at the position. He did that despite getting only 194 carries and 57 targets (in 16 games) on a dysfunctional Dolphins team that scored the sixth-fewest points in the league. This offseason, he signed a four-year, $26 million contract with the Texans, who in Week 1 are four-point home favorites against the Bears, who in 2015 were dead-last in DVOA rushing defense. 4for4’s Chris Raybon has recently pointed out the bump that runners get as home favorites, and comparable runners have certainly done well in that situation:
If you don’t feel like paying $8,000 for a potential stud, Miller has a good chance of getting the job done at $7,600.
15 Years of Sad Data
In the last 15 NFL drafts, teams have done remarkably well when investing top-five picks in running backs . . . sorry, let me finish that thought: They’ve done remarkably well at selecting players who fail to live up to expectations.
— Trent Richardson: 2012 . . .
You know, I was going to go through the effort of listing all of these soul crushers, but I’ve probably already made my point.
I want Ezekiel Elliott to be good, but the Cowboys made a massive mistake in drafting him.
Nevertheless, Zeke’s ceiling as a rookie is 2014 DeMarco Murray, who was second on the season with 20.16 FanDuel points per game. His non-injury floor is 2015 post-Joseph Randle Darren McFadden (another top-five draft pick!), whose 10-game points-per-game average of 12.14 would’ve been good for 16th if extrapolated across the season.
The sample is small-ish, but over the last two seasons the Giants haven’t done a good job as road underdogs at keeping runners from annihilating DFS expectations when their salaries are comparable to Zeke’s $7,900:
The one guy in the cohort who didn’t meet value? Reggie Bush, who A) kind of doesn’t count and B) is another top-five pick.
Just Because It’s Obvious . . .
Mark Ingram is the lead running back on a Saints team that is favored and implied to score 25.75 points. Over the last two years, that situation has suited him well:
Don’t be the donkey who overthinks this. He’s available for $7,300.
And then there’s DeAngelo Williams, who last year . . .
You probably don’t need me to tell you this, but in 2015, Williams was the No. 1 FanDuel running back on a points-per-game basis when he was the lead back for the Steelers.
Unless Le’Veon Bell ($8,800) is able to convince the NFL that his magic dragon is a real dragon, Williams is going to be the Steelers’ lead back in Week 1, and as a DFS asset, he’s much closer to Le’Veon than their $1,700 salary spread suggests.
Conclusion
Frank Gore is only $6,200 and he’s the lead back on a Colts team favored by five points at home and implied to score a slate-high total of 27 points. I guess???
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The Labyrinthian: 2016, 75
This is the 75th installment of The Labyrinthian, a series dedicated to exploring random fields of knowledge in order to give you unordinary theoretical, philosophical, strategic, and/or often rambling guidance on daily fantasy sports. Consult the introductory piece to the series for further explanation.
Previous installments of The Labyrinthian can be accessed via my author page. If you have suggestions on material I should know about or even write about in a future Labyrinthian, please contact me via email, [email protected], or Twitter @MattFtheOracle.
