NFL Week 6 brings us a second straight 10-game slate for the main DFS fantasy football contests on DraftKings. With four teams on a bye, six in primetime, and an early game in London, there are 20 teams in this week’s player pool. Just like last week, there are six games in the early wave at 1:00 p.m. ET and four games kicking off after 4:00 p.m. ET in the later wave.
With so many options to analyze and break down, it’s never too early to start strategizing for your NLF DFS lineups for Week 6. Some potential values are already popping in our early projections, and you definitely want to have these values on your radar for this week.
Throughout the season, every Wednesday, I’ll be taking a look at the players who are standing out as top values for the coming week by using the early projections in our NFL Player Models. Of course, these models update frequently.
Things will likely change between now and Sunday, but it’s still good to have a plan of attack.
If there’s news between now and lock — and there will be — the models will update to reflect that.
As always, they’re powered by Sean Koerner — one of the most accurate fantasy rankers in the industry.
Finally, make sure to check out all the projections available for purchase (Chris Raybon’s come included with a FantasyLabs subscription) within the FantasyLabs Models. Subscribers now have the option to purchase Derek Carty’s THE BLITZ from our Marketplace. Projections from One Week Season and Establish the Run are available if you’re a subscriber to those specific sites (our optimizer is a separate add-on feature).
You can also combine them to create your own aggregate projections:
NFL DFS Quarterback Values
Justin Fields ($5,800) Pittsburgh Steelers (+1) at Las Vegas Raiders (43 total)
Fields and the Steelers are headed to Vegas, baby! He has the second-highest Projected Plus/Minus and Pts/Sal of any quarterback in an evenly blended three-way aggregate of Koerner’s, Raybon’s, and THE BLITZ projections. He doesn’t take the top spot in any of the three projections but is in the top six in each of them, which nets him out to the second spot in the aggregate.
At this point in the week, it appears Fields will continue to start ahead of Russell Wilson (calf), but Wilson’s health could shorten Fields’ leash. However, Fields has impressed by leading the team to a 3-0 start before losing by only a field goal to the Colts and Cowboys.
Overall, he has a 67.6% completion rating with 7.1 yards per attempt and five touchdown passes while adding 172 yards and three rushing scores. He produced over 15 DraftKings points in each of the last three weeks and brings both a high floor and a high ceiling with his added rushing potential.
He has a good matchup this week against the Raiders, who were just beaten badly by rookie Bo Nix ($5,400) and the Broncos last week and by veteran Andy Dalton ($5,200) and the Panthers in Week 3.
In Week 4, he had a massive week in Indy and finished as the top QB scorer of the week with 35.98 DraftKings points and over 300 yards passing. Since this game will be in a dome (like his game against the Colts), I love Fields’ upside this week at this salary.
NFL DFS Wide Receiver Values
Darnell Mooney ($5,300) Atlanta Falcons (-6) at Carolina Panthers (41.5 total)
The different projections have different options at the top of their Projected Plus/Minus this week, but they’re all from the same team. Koerner has Mooney in the top spot, THE BLITZ has his teammate Drake London ($6,700) with the second-highest Projected Plus/Minus, and Raybon gives Ray-Ray McCloud ($4,300) the highest Projected Plus/Minus at the position. What’s nice is that the three WRs are spread across the salary spectrum, so there’s a Falcons receiver for every price point.
The Falcons passing game was a little stuck in the mud early in the season, but they broke out in a big way last Thursday night against the Bucs. Kirk Cousins ($6,200) finished with an impressive 509 passing yards, which made just about every receiver in the offense worth a look this week.
Of the group, I like Mooney the most at his price point. The free agent acquisition has been extremely involved in the passing game. In each of the last four games, he has 50+ receiving yards and at least six targets. He had 16 targets on Thursday and hauled in nine passes for 105 yards and 34.5 DraftKings points. He led the team in targets and touchdowns in their big win and should remain involved this week in a favorable matchup against the Panthers.
Carolina has allowed eight wide receiver touchdowns in its five games this season and an average of 147.2 receiving yards to the position each week.
While London is still the top target on the team, and McCloud brings sleeper upside, Mooney’s big-play ability gives him a high enough ceiling to make him a steal at this salary.
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NFL DFS Running Back Values
Tony Pollard ($6,000) Tennessee Titans (+1) vs. Indianapolis Colts (43 total)
Pollard and the Titans come off their bye week with a favorable home matchup against the Colts, and he has the highest Projected Plus/Minus of all running backs in the aggregate projections. He does continue to split time with Tyjae Spears ($5,100) which increases his volatility, but he still has had a big enough role to exceed salary-based expectations in three of his four games before the bye.
When we last saw the Titans, they were defeating the Dolphins on Monday Night Football in Week 4. In that game, Pollard had 88 yards on 22 carries with a rushing touchdown while adding 20 yards on two catches as well. He has had multiple catches in each game this season and produced over 15 DraftKings points in three of four games with the lone exception a rout by the Packers.
Pollard’s 22 carries in that win show he still had enough volume to be an impact player, even if he does lose a few snaps to Spears and even gets vultured a few times. He played 60% of snaps in Week 4, compared to 42% for Spears.
The Colts have allowed the eighth-most DraftKings points to running backs this season and gave up two touchdowns and over 100 yards last week to Tank Bigsby of the Jaguars. The Colts have allowed an average of 119 rushing yards and 46.4 receiving yards to the position, which should be enough to keep both Pollard and Spears busy on Sunday.
With questions at QB, the Titans should rely even more heavily on Pollard and Spears, making Pollard a very solid value at $6,000 as their 1A running back.
Don’t forget to check out our SimLabs Lineup Generator to create advanced DFS lineups using the power of simulation:
NFL DFS Tight End Values
Cade Otton ($3,500) Tampa Bay Buccaneers (-3.5) at New Orleans Saints (41.5 total)
Otton has the second-highest Projected Plus/Minus at tight end this week in our aggregated projections, and the third-year tight end from Washington has been a big contributor over the last three weeks for Baker Mayfield ($6,500) and the Bucs.
In the wild Thursday night high-scoring game between the Bucs and Falcons, Otton had three catches for 44 yards. He totaled 13 catches on 17 targets over the previous two games, finishing with 47 yards against the Broncos and a season-high 52 yards against the Eagles. He had double-digit DraftKings points in each of those two games and 7.4 DraftKings points on Thursday.
Otton gets a great matchup this week against New Orleans, which is part of the reason he is so high in our projections. The Saints have allowed the second-most DraftKings points to opposing tight ends in the NFL this season, including over 100 yards to opposing tight ends in two of their last three games and an average of 5.8 catches for 64.2 receiving yards per game to the position.
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