Sunday Morning Update

Primary Cash Lineup Update #1: 8:53 AM

Where I'm currently struggling is a 3 vs 3 between three different options. The issue I keep going back to is regarding the tight end position and the lost value with the favorable pricing that we have this week based on the Primetime game last week. 

Saturday Lineup: Jonathan Taylor, Hunter Henry, and Colts Defense
Option 1: J.K. Dobbins, Cade Otton, and Commanders Defense
Option 2: J.K. Dobbins, Travis Kelce, and Colts Defense

I don't love J.K. Dobbins as it is a touchdown dependent play as the Titans have given up 7 touchdowns to running backs over the last three weeks, but have been stingy when it comes to yards. However, the upgrade from Henry to an Otton or Kelce is significant. A very popular option would be to go with Aaron Jones, Cade Otton, and Colts defense, but I'm personally just not a fan of Jones this week at $

Currently, I've decided on Option 2 with Kelce. This should be raising the floor significantly this week given the 24 receptions he has over the last two weeks. With Otton, it feels like the 49ers defense might be able to game plan around stopping the tight end by putting Fred Warner on him or utilize former safety Nick Sorensen's game plan to stop the red hot tight end. If you wanted to go with a different running back such as Najee Harris you could certainly do that as well. The touchdown upside is likely lower, but he will likely have more yardage this week. 

Primary Cash Lineup:

• QB Justin Herbert, LAC, $6,900
•  RB Alvin Kamara, NO, $8,500
• RB Bijan Robinson, ATL, $8,800
• WR Khalil Shakir, BUF, $6,200
• WR DeAndre Hopkins, KC, $6,000
• WR Ladd McConkey, LAC, $6,300
• TE Travis Kelce, KC, $7,000
• Flex RB J.K. Dobbins, LAC, $7,300
• TD Indianapolis, $3,000

SITUATIONS THAT STAND OUT TO THIS WEEK ON THE MAIN SLATE.

• • San Francisco (at TB) – 28.0 points
  • Minnesota (at JAC) – 25.5 points
  • Buffalo (at IND) – 25.0 points

Week 9 Recap

Week 9 wasn’t a dominant win, but did end up being a winning week taking the Primary Cash Lineup to 6-3 on the season. Last week, the amount that you won largely depended on the number of identical lineups in a 50/50 contest. That ranged anywhere from 12% to 30% of lineups had the same lineup depending on that contest. While that lineup had a great week largely boosted by a $5,400 Mike Gesicki, playing Mike Gesicki at $5,400 is one of the worst plays that we’ve seen all season and is encouraging that the people copying that lineup are going to have people copying their “source” once again. Not going to name specific sites, as from what I can tell there were two somewhat popular non-DFS sites that gave out that lineups. What you didn’t see is the sharp players using that lineup.

When I say that playing Mike Gesicki at $5,400 was a bad play, it’s mostly because it is indicative of how some people play FanDuel which is why there is such a bigger edge on FanDuel than DraftKings. We’ve spent time writing about this and talking about this before on the Footballguys DFS show, but a vast majority of DFS content creators start their week with DraftKings and let DraftKings pricing influence their decisions when they move over to FanDuel. There is a massive amount of groupthink in the fantasy football content industry, which is something I’ve chosen long ago to actively avoid in my 14^th year of playing DFS and 10^th year creating content. Mike Gesicki was a fantastic punt play at tight end on DraftKings last week at $3,100 as there was a $2,000 savings when comparing Gesicki to the better tight ends for last week such as Kyle Pitts, Jake Ferguson, Evan Engram, and almost a $3,000 savings to Brock Bowers and Trey McBride. On FanDuel which has a $60k salary cap compared to $50k on DraftKings, you were saving about $500-$1000 of salary to that first range, and $1,500-$2k to the top-end range.

Notice, the only people who played Mike Gesicki were those who played that specific lineup? They aren’t driving a DeLorean with a time machine built into it, it was just that people copied a bad lineup that never should have been put into existence. We saw on Thursday this week that even when Joe Burrow through for 428 yards and 4 touchdowns, Gesicki had just 30 yards.

If there is one thing that I could have done differently last week, it would have been sticking with Jaxon Smith-Njigba and not having made the second-Primary Cash Update. Smith-Njigba was unbelievable with 180 yards and 2 touchdowns.

Total points scored- 130.7

Primary Cash lineup:

• QB Lamar Jackson, BAL, $8,900- 23.6
•  RB Alvin Kamara, NO, $8,800- 27.5
• RB Chase Brown, CIN, $6,300- 27.2
• WR Calvin Ridley, TEN, $6,200- 9.8
• WR Khalil Shakir, BUF, $6,100- 8.0
• WR CeeDee Lamb, DAL, $9,100- 9.8
• TE Kyle Pitts, ATL, $6,000- 1.6
• Flex RB Austin Ekeler, WAS, $5,500- 15.8
• TD Las Vegas, $3,000- 5.0

Injuries Create Opportunity:

• Dak Prescott was placed on IR with a hamstring injur this week. Cooper Rush will get the start for Dallas. At $6,500 he’s not cheap enough to be in consideration this week, and we likely need to take a wait and see approach. Jake Ferguson is likely the only player who is in consideration in this offense although at $6,800 he’s likely too expensive this week.
• Chris Olave will miss this week and may be placed on IR after suffering his second concussion of the season. This will funnel most of the offense through Alvin Kamara who had 35 touches in Week 9. Taysom Hill is also interesting, but at $6,300 is likely priced a little bit too high for cash this week.
• Drake London is questionable with a hip injury. Atlanta should be able to move the ball however they want against New Orleans’ defense, but Bijan Robinson and Kyle Pitts would see the biggest benefit if London would miss. Darnell Mooney is too expensive at $7,500 this week, while Ray-Ray McCloud III is too inconsistent.
• The Bills are a team to monitor this week. Keon Coleman has already been ruled out, while Amari Cooper is still dealing with a wrist injury that caused him to miss last week’s game. Cooper was a limited participant in practice this week. Khalil Shakir at $6,200 should be a great play this week, but he would move up to a must play if Cooper were to miss.
• Nico Collins could return this week after passing the team’s medical tests. This will be a critical decision point this week, as Tank Dell would become a near must-play if Collins were to miss this week, as $7,200 is a fantastic price for the receiver who had 126 yards last week. With the Texans already missing Stefon Diggs, this is a unit that will rely heavily on Dell if Collins does not go.
• Michael Pittman Jr has been ruled out this week with a back injury. Josh Downs has been outstanding with Joe Flacco at quarterback and should be a strong consideration this week even as the price has increased at $7,100.
• Trevor Lawrence will miss this week with a shoulder injury. Mac Jones will get the start for Jacksonville. Even in a favorable matchup, this kills the upside of just about every player on the Jaguars this week. Evan Engram is at least in consideration at $6,200.
• JuJu Smith-Schuster will miss another game this week with a hamstring injury. This should narrow the target volume to both DeAndre Hopkins and Travis Kelce this week, both of who are fairly priced as they get the traditional primetime boost where they had big games in a primetime game after the pricing had already been locked.
• Will Levis will start this week for Tennessee. This creates some significant risk for Calvin Ridley this week who otherwise would be a top play this week as Ridley and Levis just have not been on the same page in any of his starts this season.

Week 10 Thoughts: Difficult Pricing On A Short Slate

This is one of the most difficult pricing weeks of the year. At the running back position, there are very few options that are under $7,000. Meanwhile, at the wide receiver position, the $6,500 to $7,500 range has largely been decimated by either injuries to quarterbacks, injuries to receivers such as Chris Olave, or overpriced players such as Darnell Mooney, George Pickens, or Jordan Addison.

What this is going to do is force people to pick and choose where they want to find savings this week. Normally this would be the tight end position, but there are two very underpriced tight ends this week in Cade Otton and Travis Kelce this week that should provide at least a five-point advantage over the tight ends that are $1,000 cheaper this week. So that leaves us either going a complete punt at quarterback or going with a low-cost wide receiver, as we know we are going to be spending up at the running back position. For me this week, that answer largely depends on whether Nico Collins is active. If he’s out, Tank Dell becomes a top play at just $7,200 and very underpriced with Stefon Diggs out for the season. If Collins is active, there’s just not a lineup you can feel great about by spending up at wide receiver. The higher-priced wide receivers are just not as safe as the upper-tier wide receivers.

Player Pool

Lineups

One thing to call out here as some people have been asking about what the lineups mean. This article is a cash game article, and we evaluate the article’s success or failure each week based off of the Primary Cash Lineup. The other lineups are more just fun lineups to give an idea of lineup construction and my current thinking but have a significantly less amount of time put into them as the Primary Cash Lineup does, as that has in most cases 10-15 hours of tinkering, research, and thought put into just building that one lineup.

For better GPP advice, I would check out Dan Hindery’s Weekly GPP article as he is breaking down in much more detail how to approach GPP’s on a weekly basis.

ROSTER 1 ($60K) – PRIMARY CASH Lineup- (FBG PROJECTED POINTS = 129.2)- 

• QB Justin Herbert, LAC, $6,900
•  RB Alvin Kamara, NO, $8,500
• RB Bijan Robinson, ATL, $8,800
• WR Khalil Shakir, BUF, $6,200
• WR DeAndre Hopkins, KC, $6,000
• WR Ladd McConkey, LAC, $6,300
• TE Hunter Henry, NE, $5,300
• Flex RB Jonathan Taylor, IND, $8,600
• TD Indianapolis, $3,000

ROSTER 2 ($60K) –Cash Plus - (FBG PROJECTED POINTS = 128.1)

A cash plus lineup is one that is designed to be used in something like a 100 player or less contest where 20-30% of the prize pool cashes. These can also be used for 3-person or 5-person contests where the top person wins. Often these will have a heavier emphasis on stacking built into them, but not factoring in roster percentages compared to a true GPP lineup which may avoid some of the higher projected rostered players.

• QB Justin Herbert, LAC, $6,900
•  RB Alvin Kamara, NO, $8,500
• RB Najee Harris, PIT, $7,100
• WR Ladd McConkey, LAC, $6,300
• WR DeAndre Hopkins, KC, $6,000
• WR Tank Dell, HOU, $7,200
• TE Travis Kelce, KC, $7,000
• Flex RB Bijan Robinson, ATL, $8,800
• TD Washington, $3,500

ROSTER 3 ($60K) – GPP Lineup (FBG PROJECTED POINTS = 127.)

A GPP lineup is often going to avoid some of the higher rostered players and try to create stacks or game stacks that could pay off. This often is a riskier approach and is more designed to help you understand the philosophy rather than a direct copy of the lineup. We have a GPP article written by Dan Hindery that I highly recommend if you’re looking for GPP guidance.

• QB Justin Herbert, LAC, $6,900
•  RB Alvin Kamara, NO, $8,500
• RB Bijan Robinson, ATL, $8,800
• WR Khalil Shakir, BUF, $6,200
• WR DeAndre Hopkins, KC, $6,000
• WR Ladd McConkey, LAC, $6,300
• TE Travis Kelce, KC, $7,000
• Flex RB Najee Harris, $7,100
• TD Indianapolis, $3,000

Player Chart