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.
Smaller buy in players have had a good run in the milly maker in recent weeks, but that trend ended in Week 8. “JasperJ” took down the contest with one of their 108 lineups. That does give us a chance to see which players they were high on and which they stumbled into in their winning lineup — which won the contest by 3.7 points.
The Lineup
The Stack
JasperJ was massively overweight the field on Dak Prescott and the Cowboys, rostering the quarterback in more than half of his lineups, compared to just 6.4% of the field. Once the 49ers ruled in Brock Purdy — thus removing Sam Howell as a budget option — the field mostly pivoted to top-tier quarterbacks, namely Lamar Jackson and Jalen Hurts — both of whom had salaries over $8,000.
That left an ownership gap in the middle range, which JasperJ was wise enough to exploit. Prescott and the Cowboys had the highest team total in any game with a spread less than seven. Those likely blowouts limit quarterback ceiling to an extent, with closer games better for passing attacks.
It didn’t exactly work out that way, with Dallas dominating the Rams for nearly all 60 minutes. However, the Rams did do just enough late scoring to keep the Cowboys attacking, with a fourth-quarter touchdown pass from Prescott making a big difference to his fantasy day.
They didn’t do enough to justify a bring-back, which JasperJ avoided. We’ve seen multiple winning lineups without a bring-back player from the team opposite the main stack, and it seems to be a viable strategy for large-field tournaments.
While this lineup used a double stack of top receiver CeeDee Lamb and budget option Michael Gallup, the latter wasn’t really a part of its success. A single stack with Lamb and a different cheaper options would’ve ended up scoring higher — but the real value was in enabling access to some other pricey players.
Other Correlations
Interestingly, there were no other actual correlation plays in this lineup. However, JasperJ did build in some correlation to a player not in this lineup. Jalen Hurts was projected as a top quarterback on the slate, and by rostering AJ Brown, this lineup gained some exposure to his fantasy production without rostering Hurts.
That’s a solid strategy if you’re torn between multiple players at quarterback, especially those with concentrated passing attacks like the Eagles. Brown came into the week with a top-five target share and top-two air yards share in the league. With Hurts possibly slowed by a knee injury, rostering Hurts earned exposure to the vast majority of Hurts’ upside without blocking off the quarterback position.
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The Chalk
The top few running backs in Week 8 stood head-and-shoulders above the rest of the field. Running back production is somewhat easier to project than other spots, leading to (good) chalk forming on the best options. This week, that was Breece Hall and Alvin Kamara, among a few others.
While there were a few other names worth considering, JasperJ hitched their wagon to those two backs. They were both in 74% or more of their lineups, with no other back topping 12%.
Even when multi-entering, taking a stand at more projectable positions like running back makes sense. Randomly mixing and matching every player that stands out could lead to whiffing on the correct combination. However, taking a stand at a position — and getting it right — greatly increases the odds of having the correct lineup built around it.
Of course, that’s not always a viable strategy. In weeks where no backs stand out the way these two did, taking a stand elsewhere makes more sense than at running back. As with all things DFS, there are rarely blanket “rules” that always lead to success.
Outside of running back, JasperJ ate the chalk with Trey McBride. McBride was stepping into a massive role with Zach Ertz injured and was easily the best Pts/Sal option in our models. Ironically enough, JasperJ was actually underweight on the field on McBride but played a ton of Logan Thomas.
There was some leveling going on here, with McBride used by “just” 19.5% of the field. His ownership was likely held down by the fact that the field assumed everyone else would play him. While it’s hard to predict when this type of galaxy-brain thinking will occur, sometimes we should just play the best plays.
We already touched on Brown above, but he qualifies as chalk with 21.7% ownership. However, given Hurts’ popularity, my intuition is that playing Brown without Hurts was a far lower-owned combination.
The Sleepers
The real piece de resistance of this lineup was sub-1% DeAndre Hopkins. In his first game with rookie Will Levis, Nuk looked like his old self. He turned six targets (a 20% share) into a ridiculous 4/128/3 line. It’s easy to see the case for Hopkins with hindsight goggles fully on. The quarterback play in Tennessee had been dreadful. Could their alpha wideout get it done with a new passer?
Of course, had I seen that coming before the game, I might have been a million dollars richer too. Hopkins was a double-dose of leverage here, given that he was playing against the Atlanta Defense. Atlanta was the most popular defense on the slate.
Speaking of defense, Seattle was relatively contrarian too. Despite being the third-most used group, they still came in under 10%. JasperJ largely mixed and matched at the position, though. That’s generally a wise strategy, as is targeting bad opposing quarterbacks. PJ Walker of the Browns certainly fit the bill.
