Daily Fantasy Football Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - Week 9 11/6/16

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QUARTERBACKS

Aaron Rodgers FD 9100 DK 7800
Opponent IND
Proj Points FD - 22.79 DK - 23.47
Two of your top receivers out? No running back? No fantasy problem for Rodgers who last week put up one of the best games of Sunday throwing for 246 yards and 4 touchdowns while also adding 60 yards on the ground. He was able to complete 74% of his passes continuing a solid three week trend in which he’s been much more accurate. That’s come at the sacrifice of big yard accumulation. But the passing volume makes up for it some respects. The Packers, without any real (or at least traditional) running game are forced to take it to the air much more. Plus Rodgers’ ability to run keeps his floor so high on a given week. He has another plus matchup this time around against Indy who rank 29th in the league in DVOA against the pass. I suspect after a huge week against Atlanta we see Rodgers’ ownership climb quite a bit and he continues as a safer cash play.

Drew Brees FD 8600 DK 7200
Opponent SF
Proj Points FD - 21.66 DK - 22.44
The Saints have the third highest implied total of the week going in behind the Packers and the Cowboys with Brees possibly in line for another high volume passing day. San Fran’s been bottom third in the league against the pass this year, ranking 20th in DVOA. (For what it’s worth they are worse against the run.) Because the Saints’ D is such garbage it’s tough for them to pull away in games which lends itself to shoot out type game scripts. Brees has a number of weapons in the passing game and four of his seven games has seen the dude throw for 350 yards or more. He won’t run so he needs all of the volume he can get and the throwing touchdowns have seen a bit of variance this year. That’s the one reason we’ll occasionally trend away from pocket passers in cash games because the floor can get limited without adding points on the ground. All that being said, this is another great spot for Brees even away from home.

Blake Bortles FD 7300 DK 5800
Opponent KC
Proj Points FD - 16.79 DK - 17.88
Rodgers and Brees have arguably as much upside as they do safety, but if you're looking to cut against the grain a bit, it's probably worth looking into Blake Bortles. The Jaguars are generally a mess, but in the past two seasons they've done one thing spectacularly well: pass the ball while behind. It doesn't always work out for Bortles' fantasy totals, but when it does, boy does it pay off. The Jags are one of the most pass-heavy teams in the NFL while trailing, and last week was sort of the classic example of that. They fell behind early to Tennessee, then ran the ball just 11 times over the course of the game. And Bortles had 4 of those runs! The Chiefs are favored by 7.5 points here, and while this play has as low a floor as you'll find, his ceiling is in the neighborhood of guys you'll pay $2,000 more for. The Chiefs are a top 10 passing defense, but that won't stop me from having Bortles in my big tournament rotation.

RUNNING BACKS

Ezekiel Elliott FD 9200 DK 7900
Opponent CLE
Proj Points FD - 21.91 DK - 23.64
The Cowboys have the second highest Vegas implied total on the week (currently sitting at 28) and are solid favorites (-7.5) against the lowly Browns. If we are looking for high volume runners in favorable implied game scripts then you don’t really need to look any further than Zeke. Dem Boys are still leaning on him heavily and he’s had only one game this year with less than 20 carries. Combine that with the use in the passing game and he’s averaging right around 25 touches per game. Few other running backs are seeing this kind of usage. Is it correct for a team to running their prize draft pick into the ground in his first year? No, but what do we care? This is DFS. The Browns rank second to last in the league in DVOA against the rush and I suspect Elliott is a chalkier play in this one. He’s expensive, but we can find savings down the line.

Jay Ajayi FD 7100 DK 6000
Opponent NYJ
Proj Points FD - 17.5 DK - 17.82
With 2 weeks to let his absurd fantasy performances marinate, the cat is more than out of the bag on Jay Ajayi. And it's weird, because with any other team you'd windmill slam a guy who had 56 touches for more than 400 yards over a 2 week span, particularly if you could get him for $7,100 on FanDuel and $6,000 on DraftKings. Sadly, he's on the Dolphins. We debated this internally for a bit, and ultimately the decided that even the Dolphins are fairly unlikely to screw this up. Ajayi has been really the only bright spot on the Miami offense this season, and while the Jets are certainly a bad match-up, the game should be close enough that Ajayi is still the focal point of the Miami offense.

Charcandrick West FD 5600 DK 4400
Opponent JAX
Proj Points FD - 15.07 DK - 16.14
As of this writing Jamaal Charles was out for the season (and maybe for the career) and Spencer Ware still hadn’t cleared concussion protocol. That could leave West as one of the last competent men standing the Kansas City backfield. He picked up a majority of the carries last week when Ware went down going a pedestrian 14/52 while also seeing three targets in the passing game. He’d slot into enough of an every down back role that for his price it’s easy to see playing him in cash games. This is the old price and opportunity event we are looking for in DFS and he gets a matchup against the Jags who’ve been gashed by the run this season (mostly because they go down early in every game and the other team is just trying to get out and go home). If Ware were ruled out West becomes the chalk this week.

WIDE RECEIVERS

The Green Bay Packer WR Smorgasbord
Jordy Nelson, Randall Cobb, Davante Adams, Ty Montgomery (and more)
It's early in the week and without definitive injury news out we can't say for sure who will be out or on the field for the Packers on Sunday. But whoever it is deserves top cash game consideration. The starting receivers for the Packers are seeing so many targets per game. Last week Adams lead the team with 14 and Jordy Nelson came behind him with 9. The week before against the Bears it was Adams 16, Cobb 15 and Montgomery 13. Clearly Adams is the guy who's carried the looks over from Week-to-week and his opportunity increased when the Pack started using Montgomery and Cobb more out of the backfield in Week 7. This is all to say that one (Adams) and likely two (someone else) Packers come out in as top end values for Week 8. The Green Bay offense relies so much on the pass that starting two in cash games is fine. We are just going to need to wait on injury news before making final decisions.

Stefon Diggs FD 6500 DK 5900
Opponent DET
Proj Points FD - 16.5 DK - 19.83
Diggs was plagued by hamstring troubles for two weeks before coming off the injury report for the Vikes' Monday night tilt with the Bears, and he responded, putting up 76 yards and a touchdown. While those aren't eye-popping numbers, it was a hugely welcome sign to see him draw 13 targets after being mostly absent from the offensive game plan in the two weeks prior. We've seen Diggs show flashes of WR1 upside in the past, and if he's fully healthy, we could see his price rise 10% or more in the near future. The Lions are a bottom 10 pass defense, and his stock is on the way up. A fine play in any format.

Michael Thomas FD 5800 DK 5500
Opponent SF
Proj Points FD - 15.01 DK - 18.15
We moved Thomas down quite a bit when it came out that he'd be covered by Richard Sherman, and in retrospect it looks like the right move. He garnered just a 10% target share, and put a rather underwhelming 9.3 FanDuel fantasy points. But honestly? That's not THAT bad a total to put up against Sherman. And he's still less than $6k on FanDuel! Thomas has 1 fewer target than Brandin Cooks this season, and the Saints have the second highest implied total of the week. With the uncertainty around the running game in New Orleans, I could see them deferring to Thomas' short-yardage game even more than usual. Seems like a high floor, high upside option.

TIGHT ENDS

Eric Ebron FD 5400 DK 3100
Opponent MIN
Proj Points FD - 11.18 DK - 13.43
After missing a three weeks with leg issues Ebron got right back into the fold against Houston seeing 10 targets on his way to a 7/79 line. That was his biggest target share of the year though it wasn't like he was an afterthought in the offense prior to this. He'd been averaging more than six looks per game before the injury. He's a fantastic value on DraftKings for only $3100 though the matchup against a slower Minnesota team isn't nearly ideal. The midrange value on FanDuel is also fine for cash games if you think he's working himself into a larger portion of the offense.

Antonio Gates FD 5500 DK 3000
Opponent TEN
Proj Points FD - 11.98 DK - 14.93
The old man's still grinding away out there. Over the last two weeks Gates has seen 19 targets with Rivers looking his way early and often. The problem's been the conversions as he tuned those 19 targets into only a combined 9/71 line. That's a little troubling in that he's either A: not getting separation or the passes simply weren't there. It could also just be sample size as his conversion rate was significantly higher earlier in the season (albeit at a lesser volume). He and Ebron comprise the cash game considerations at tight end as far as our system is concerned and I don't think we need to spend up big at the position.

DEFENSE/ SPECIAL TEAMS

The Kansas City Chiefs vs. the Jacksonville Jaguars
I recommended Bortles as an upside play above, but that was largely because Vegas sees the Jaguars playing from behind for most of this game. Bortles is third in the NFL with 9 interceptions, and the Chiefs' defense leads the league with 11. In a game where the Jaguars are very likely to have to pass, this gives the Chiefs' D considerable upside. Vegas sees the Jaguars as having the lowest implied total of the week, and their complete and utter lack of a running attack means the Chiefs will get snap after snap to try and accrue sacks and picks. I suspect they'll be the chalk defense of the week.

The Minnesota Vikings vs. the Detroit Lions
When you're trying to find a high impact defense for big tournaments, you'll generally want teams than generate lots of sacks and interceptions. It doesn't hurt if they are actually good at stopping other teams from scoring, either. The Vikings check all of these boxes - they're 8th in the NFL in sacks with 20, 2nd in the league with 9 interceptions, and have allowed the fewest yards AND points per game. Not a bad start. The next thing we'll look for, of course, is the team they're playing against, The Lions are normally a great offense to try and get a high upside defensive performance from, but they've profiled a little bit differently than usual. Stafford is having his best season ever in terms of both completion percentage and TD/INT ratio, and that tempers my enthusiasm here somewhat. Much of Stafford's improvement has come on the back of the Lions renewed focus on running short routes to running backs and possession receivers (like Tate and Riddick), but with Riddick missing practice this week, they may have to stretch the field a little bit more. The Vikings are kind of expensive here, but I think they're on the short list of teams that could be in GPP winning lineups this weekend.

If you're thinking about going cheap, consider the New York Giants. They're not a high upside defense necessarily, but Vegas has Philly for a very modest total, and they'll allow you to spend up at higher impact positions.

Football, baby!

Again, you can grab a free trial of our NFL DFS suite of tools including full projections, optimal NFL lineups and our Player Lab, which includes filters to help you create NFL lineups for FanDuel and DraftKings for any format. It’s a set of tools well beyond anything we’ve ever had, and something we feel will help our users crush it this daily fantasy NFL season.

You can grab a go test it out yourself.