As we move into the tail-end of the season, pricing gets a little weird on the different daily fantasy sites. Just when they think they’ve fine-tuned their algorithms and figured out this year’s player pool, we see players returning from injuries or new players getting opportunities because of injuries. With so many fluctuations taking place, we’re bound to find inefficiencies in the site’s pricing structures.
As we find these value-priced players, we always need to ensure that they have merit and can reasonably be expected to meet or exceed their implied point value, regardless of how cheap they are. A minimum-priced player who posts a zero in your lineup will likely have mitigated any added value you’ve gained by being able to fit in the salary of a stud that week.
With this in mind, our look at bargains may be a bit different than columns featured at other sites. The focus won’t necessarily be on the cheapest option available, but instead it will lean towards finding a few great values on DraftKings, as compared to FanDuel and Yahoo pricing.
Our main method of measuring this will be Fantasy Labs’ Bargain Rating, which is a metric that allows us to measure how much of a discount a player is from one site to another.
We’ll also factor in overall price in relation to their position, price change over the past week and the past month.
And remember, you can always find a list of all players sorted by their Bargain Rating by visiting the Player Ratings page!
Jameis Winston
Bargain Rating on DraftKings: 100%
Current Price: $5,500
Price change over last week: +$200
Price change over last month: +$500
If I told you there have been only two starting quarterbacks that have exceeded their implied point total in every start this season, you probably wouldn’t be surprised to learn that Carson Palmer is one of them. But I’m guessing that while Jameis Winston has gotten some recent attention for his play, he likely wouldn’t have been the next guess for most of our readers – or myself for that matter.
Despite this crazy consistency, DraftKings has only recently taken notice. While his price has risen $500 over the past month, it is still down $500 from when the season began. With a Bargain Rating of 100%, it’s a rarity to see such a discrepancy in site pricing.
As I discuss in this space each week, just being cheap doesn’t necessitate plugging a player into your lineup. However with all of his receiving weapons healthy and a prime matchup with the New Orleans Saints “defense” this week, Winston is a player that likely would have been on people’s radar, regardless of his price point.
Over the past two seasons, we’ve seen seven quarterbacks with a 100% Bargain Rating on DraftKings and each one has exceeded their implied point total for the week. Factoring in the Saints horrendous defense – owners of the worst DVOA ever through week 13 – his bargain price and consistent play this season, Winston is shaping up as a great option this week. Needing a mere 13.36 DK points to meet value, the young signal-caller deserves consideration as you construct your lineups this week.
Michael Floyd
Bargain Rating on DraftKings: 96%
Current Price: $3,800
Price change over last week: $0
Price change over last month: $0
Likely due to constantly being in and out of the lineup, Floyd seems to be a player that DraftKings has had a tough time pricing this season. With a solid Bargain Rating of 96% this week, he offers nice value at a price point that has few options.
Excluding his one game absence and the following week where it was announced he would be limited, Floyd has averaged 8.2 targets, 5.2 receptions, 86.4 receiving yards and a touchdown over his previous five games. He has also hit the 100-yard receiving mark three times over this stretch, giving him a nice weekly point boost.
As noted earlier, DraftKings has had a difficult time pricing Floyd this season. As such, he’s found himself with a Bargain Rating of 80% or greater on four occasions thus far in the 2015-2016 season.
With the Cardinals’ blowout victory of the Detroit Lions notwithstanding, Floyd has absolutely crushed value when we’re able to exploit these inefficiencies between each site’s pricing. While Minnesota is a decent matchup on paper – they possess a -1.1 Opponent Plus/Minus rating – they’ve suffered a rash of injuries in their secondary. As of this writing, it appears they may very well be starting a pair of street free agents at safety on Thursday night. Arizona will likely look to emphasize the run as the Vikings will also be without Anthony Barr and Linval Joseph, but with Floyd’s ability to get deep – he is second on the team with six receptions of 25 yards or greater – this should set up well.
There are a lot of mouths to feed in Arizona, but at his low price Floyd offers great value if you’re opting to play the Thursday night slate this week.
Bonus Bargains
Because our Bargain Rating metric is correlated so highly with a player’s success, why not highlight a few more great bargains? Below you’ll find players who didn’t quite make the cut above, but are still a great value this week. If you find yourself wanting to utilize the Bargain Rating as a part of your weekly lineup construction, make sure to check out this short video from our co-founder Jonathan Bales on how he uses this rating within our Player Models tool.
Russell Wilson
Bargain Rating on DraftKings: 99%
Current Price: $6,300
Wilson has had a huge price jump over the past few weeks as he’s had back-to-back monster games. In a matchup with the Baltimore Ravens and their Opponent Plus/Minus rating of +6.2, he’s definitely in play. Before you go penciling him into all of your cash game lineups this week, please note that since they’ve come back from their bye week the Ravens have surrendered a meager 13.08 DK points per week to opposing quarterbacks.
Tyrod Taylor
Bargain Rating on DraftKings: 99%
Current Price: $5,400
“TyGod” appears to be back. After suffering through some mid-season injuries and subpar outings, Taylor has posted back-to-back games over 27 DK points. In a matchup with a struggling Philadelphia Eagles secondary that has surrendered 35.13 DK points to opposing quarterbacks over the past three weeks, Taylor makes for an excellent play in all formats in Week 14.
Austin Seferian-Jenkins
Bargain Rating on DraftKings: 100%
Current Price: $2,700
Priced just above minimum, Seferian-Jenkins offers a lot of upside against a Saints secondary sporting an Opponent Plus/Minus of +3.7. He finally appears to be healthy, and a stack with Winston just makes too much sense this week. With a Winston/Mike Evans stack likely to be the popular play, think about differentiating with ASJ or even a Winston/ASJ/Vincent Jackson stack if you feel the Bucs can reach their near-four touchdown implied team total in this one.
