Daily Fantasy Football Running Back Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings Week 3 - 9/24/17

We already covered Le'Veon Bell, Jay Ajayi and Ty Montgomery in our main picks article article. For this article we’ll cover some more cash game considerations as well as some tournament targets.

Week 3 in the NFL sees some pricing inefficiencies as well as some weirdness with RB usage coming out of Week 2. There's a lot to consider at the position this week.

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CJ Anderson FD 6900 DK 5800
Opponent BUF
Proj Points FD - 15.85 DK - 16.96
I mentioned him in passing in the main picks article but wanted to look a little closer at his opportunity this week. The Broncos have leaned heavily on CJ to start the season carrying the ball 20 and 25 times in the first two weeks respectively. He hasn’t been overwhelmingly efficient in that span (4.3 ypc) but it’s hard to ignore this kind of usage. The Broncos have dominated the time of possession in the first two weeks with their defense generally stymying the Chargers and especially the Cowboys. The Bills are (significantly) worse than both those teams and Denver comes in as a -3 road favorite. It wouldn’t shock me to see them play another grind it out game with CJ leading the charge. He’s priced in the middle tier for a guy getting elite volume. He’s a borderline cash game play and definite GPP target.

Tarik Cohen FD 5600 DK 5600
Opponent PIT
Proj Points FD - 13.75 DK - 16.99
Look, I’m reserving the right to swap Cohen right over to the cash game article if Jordan Howard were to sit out Week 3 with an injury. If that were the case, then Cohen would likely become a chalk play across the industry. As it stands though, he’s in play even in his current role. Cohen has an absolutely insane (considering his relative unknown nature in the preseason) 21 targets in the passing game good for 15/116/1 through the air. He’s actually one of the NFL’s leading target guys through two weeks. The Bears haven’t used him much on the ground, but in PPR his passing down usage is almost enough to sustain the DK price. And again, if Howard sits then he likely becomes one of the highest owned players on the slate.

Dalvin Cook FD 6500 DK 5900
Opponent TB
Proj Points FD - 15.13 DK - 16.91
It’s actually great news for Cook that Sam Bradford is practicing this week. The Vikings need their quarterback in order to open up all facets of the offense. Cook was the beneficiary of a balanced attack in Week 1 when he went 22/127 in Week 1 against the Saints. Now of course that run defense is pretty sieve-like so don’t expect the exact same returns here and TB kept the Chicago run game in check Week 2. But I am loving the reduced price on Cook as it’s tough to find RBs who could be in line for 20-ish touches in these prices ranges. Don’t be spooked with the 37/23 Cook/ McKinnon snap breakdown from Week 2. The Vikings were playing from behind with a backup QB. This is a home game and should stay close (no line on the game as of now while we wait for official Bradford status).

Isaiah Crowell FD 6600 DK 4800
Opponent IND
Proj Points FD - 13.85 DK - 15.28
Do you want to watch this game? Me neither. But, this is an interesting spot for Crowell. The Browns aren’t going to head into many games this season where they aren’t an overwhelming underdog. And they are going to play a lot of catchup this season which will leave Crowell mostly without a role. But this week they’re actually a slight road favorite (this won’t happen again folks) against the even lowlier Colts and I suspect we see Crowell early and often. It’s tough to imagine Indy pulling out to some kind of lead (and forget the insurmountable type). He’s had two tough matchups to start the year in Baltimore and Pittsburgh. Indy isn’t a pushover against the run, but I do think we see a more concentrated effort to get Crowell going. He’s coming very cheap on DK if you think he pushes up towards 20 total touches which we saw around 5 times last season.

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