The key to success in daily fantasy sports is research. With our Trends tool, research is easy.
Description
(Written the Friday before kickoff)
This week, I’m setting up trends that match opposing teams that have struggled lately to defend specific positions. So much of the NFL analysis we see and read is based on year-to-date numbers, but teams change, players get injured, and it becomes important for us to adjust our expectations appropriately. Luckily, splitting up an NFL season into smaller blocks of time is simple with our Trends tool.
The Trend
Here’s an example of what I’m talking about, starting with the quarterback position:
(Link to this week’s QB trend)
There’s quite a bit going on here, so let’s break it down.
• First, I’m restricting the results to include only the past six weeks by combining the NFL Season and Game Number filters.
• Next, I’ve set a salary threshold so that only regular starting quarterbacks will be considered.
• The Projected Ownership filter is not actually doing anything, but I want that field to display in the results.
• The Opposing Team list consists of the teams that have allowed a FanDuel Opposing Plus/Minus of at least +4.0 since Week 6. I determined this list by opening up the “Opposing Team” filter and then sorting by Avg +/- as you see below.
The process is repeated at both running back and wide receiver below. Here are the links:
Notice that the ownership levels are quite low at each position. That seems counterintuitive in that we’d expect matchups with the highest Plus/Minus values to have high ownership levels, but that has not been the case, at least not over the past six weeks.
Looking at the teams that match the various trends, I noticed there are several unexpected teams. For example, both the Cardinals and Seahawks — pass defenses we typically consider to be very good — have allowed top-five Plus/Minus values to opposing wide receivers.
The Seahawks have allowed three 20-point performances since Week 6:
The Cardinals data is a bit skewed by Taylor Gabriel’s 24.2-point performance, but there are still other notable performances they’ve allowed:
That’s the point of this trend. I want to find opposing defenses that are struggling recently, and if public opinion has not caught up yet then that’s even better.
The Matches
QBs
Among QB matches, Philip Rivers currently has the highest ownership projection (five to eight percent) in our Player Models.
In addition to yielding a high Opponent Plus/Minus to QBs since Week 6, Kansas City has given up a slate-worst +3.1 Plus/Minus to opposing QBs on the year, making Matt Ryan an attractive option, given Atlanta’s implied Vegas total of 27.25 points.
The Buffalo Bills have allowed a +5.6 Plus/Minus to opposing QBs since Week 6 — the highest mark among this slate’s teams. That’s good news for Derek Carr, who has a salary approaching his personal high.
RBs
The Packers and Rams have both been billed as strong rush defenses at various points this season, but both have struggled since Week 6, making LeGarrette Blount and Lamar Miller somewhat appealing. Spencer Ware has a ‘meh’ game log over the past month, but perhaps he’ll get going against the Falcons, who rank second to last against RBs over the past six weeks.
Jordan Howard faces the 49ers, who are indescribably bad:
WRs
At WR, I’m relying on some shaky options. In August, who would have thought Jamison Crowder would feel like the safest option in Week 13 from the list below?
Results
(Written Sunday night after games)
QBs
The best play of the QBs turned out to be Carson Palmer, although Rivers would have been right there had Travis Benjamin not dropped what would have likely been a long touchdown in the fourth quarter.
One notable name missing from the trend this week was Drew Brees. Although the Lions ranked as the second-best Plus/Minus matchup for QBs over the first five weeks of the season, they have been in the middle of the pack since Week 6. As a result, Brees was not a match.
RBs
The lone underperformer at RB was Miller, while Howard, Ware, and Blount combined for six TDs and a cumulative +32.62 Plus/Minus. With Le’Veon Bell and David Johnson both in play, ownership was reduced on both Blount and Ware. Even Howard’s 17.7 percent ownership — against the 49ers and their egregious +9.9 Opponent Plus/Minus — was reasonable.
WRs
The blandest performances came at WR: Both Hopkins and Crowder needed TDs to achieve modestly positive Plus/Minus values. D-Jax fell short of his implied total.
Review
A mistake we sometimes make is weighing too heavily what happened at the start of the season at the expense of mid- and late-season samples. When picking against the worst defenses over the last six weeks, I found many low-owned options. One potential pitfall of this (and any) trend that deals with smaller samples is that it’s more prone to be skewed by outlier performances. If you come across a big number in your research, glance over the past results to make sure it’s not the result of a random data point.
