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Fournette was a controversial play going up against the Bucs last week, who are now widely regarded as a "funnel defense" that forces teams to pass to beat them. Fournette had a tough time on the ground, but caught 9 balls for 53 yards on 11 targets. This level of usage is just impossible to ignore, and going from Tampa Bay to the Chargers is an incredible breath of fresh air. Where the Bucs rank 1st in rushing DVOA this season, the Chargers rank 25th, and given that Fournette's price has dropped I'd expect he'll assume the title of highest owned RB this week.
Opponent MIA
Proj Points FD - 16.62 DK - 18.85
Le'Veon Bell saw more ownership than I expected last week, and didn't do a whole lot with it. The snaps have come down since his early season workloads, and he hasn't exactly been effective when he does touch the ball. I'd be ready to swear off Bell entirely, and probably will after this game, but grabbing him at reasonable prices against the Dolphins looks awfully enticing. Miami has the 4th worst DVOA against the run this season, but even more importantly for running backs, they almost always allow their opponents to control the game. I'd guess Bell's touches balloon from 15 to 22ish this game, and in a great spot like this I'd be happy to roster him in cash games.
Opponent CAR
Proj Points FD - 14.9 DK - 16.55
Freeman saw 22 total looks on 62 snaps last week, and it looks like the Falcons have finally decided to give him the entire workload. He wasn't exactly effective in his last two weeks against New Orleans, but like the above guys, there are some serious match-up considerations this year. The Saints boast the league's 4th best rushing DVOA. Freeman's opponent this week, the Panthers, rank dead last. With Brian Hill headed back to obscurity (where he likely belongs), I think we see 20+ more touches for Freeman en route to him being a fantastic DFS option on both sites this week.
A note on the expensive guys: Alvin Kamara has San Francisco, and while he should be involved regardless of the game script it's still far from an easy task to pay a $7,600 price tag in a match-up like that. Dalvin Cook was forced from the Seahawks game with a shoulder injury, and while he swears he'll be suiting up this weekend it looks like far from a lock that he'll get his former workload. Paying $9,100 for Derrick Henry seems nuts considering he doesn't catch balls out of the back field.
That leaves us with Christian McCaffrey against Atlanta, who saw huge ownership last week in a similar spot. He was pretty bad, and after back to back weekends of tough YPC it's easy to wonder if the incredible workload is catching up to him. Still, he was targeted 13 times last week, and has to be in consideration against this lousy Atlanta defense.
With Eric Ebron out of the picture, Doyle caught 6 balls for 73 yards and a touchdown on 11 targets against the Titans. You just don't see tight end production like that very often in the 2019, and getting him at less than premium prices means we'll likely see some serious ownership on him this week. Tampa Bay has been great against the run but generally bad against the pass, and given that the Colts can't really run the ball at all right now it's hard to imagine Doyle not garnering 8+ targets again this week.
Opponent NO
Proj Points FD - 14.48 DK - 17.26
Opponent TEN
Proj Points FD - 13.42 DK - 16.03
I view these two guys very similarly. Kittle had three straight solid weeks before disappearing against Baltimore. New Orleans has a good defense, but they are much better against the run. We could see a Kittle resurgence here, but it's a little terrifying to just pencil it in after what we saw last week.
Waller disappeared for the middle of the season when the Raiders seemed good, and now that they seem terrible he's back in the mix. The Raiders are three point dogs to the Titans, who have been sort of a Bucs-lite this season, doing well against the run but being well below league average against the pass. At a similar price point, though, it's hard to imagine playing Waller over Doyle.
On DraftKings Ryan Griffin is the weekly cheap guy who is coming off a reasonable 7 target week last week. I still think you want Doyle though.
We played the Redskins' defense in cash games last week, and to be honest, it was awesome. As Doug and I were working through our defensive options last week, we did a pretty deep dive into what DFS defenses had been providing at various price points. And you know what we found? Even the best defenses tend to return a pretty lousy points per dollar multiplier on a week to week basis. Unless you know something about predicting defensive touchdowns reliably, good defenses are very often over-priced.
While Redskins are a laughing stock, they have 36 sacks and 19 turnovers generated this season. They allow points, but their ability to make big plays leaves them relevant. I'm not sure if this is the answer on FanDuel, but at $1,700 on DraftKings I'm absolutely considering going back to them this week even in a bad match-up with Green Bay.
Opponent MIA
Proj Points FD - 7.4 DK - 7.4
The revitalized Dolphins just worked over a supposedly good Eagles defense for 37 points last week, so we can't automatically include defenses against them every single week, I suppose. But the Jets would have been $900 more expensive than this if this game took place 3 weeks ago. While I'm as big a believer in Fitzmagic as anyone, the Jets are still a legitimate top 5 defense by DVOA's standards, and that just has to be good enough against this Dolphins team at less than premium prices.
The rest: Like I wrote in the Redskins write-up, defenses are just so rarely an actual value that you often want to start by spending as little as possible and then finding the best play in the appropriate price range. For a frame of reference, the best points per dollar play in our system is the Saints at 2.02. That's a little worse than our 11th best running back, Joe Mixon or our 20th QB, David Carr. You're never "locking a defense" and going from there.
Some other candidates that our system likes as the best plays in their respective price ranges:
The Browns and Steelers at the top end, and then the Saints and Panthers if you go down a tier.
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