Jeff’s Hardcore Core- NFL Week 13

When you play GPPs in DFS Football you are looking to have guys capable of blow-up games. This is similar to trying to identify guys in golf that have high upside (high ceiling) that are capable of winning a golf tournament. Guys like Charles Howell III in golf are great cash game players because they often make the cut, but their upside is capped because they never win. In football, players with high upside and blow-up potential often have a combination of big-time talent, extreme volume and outstanding match-ups. I will talk about cornerback match-ups in a bit, but that is a huge determinant on whether a guy can have a blow-up game or not.

Last week we saw several blow-up games from players and no matter how great your rosters are, if you do not have these guys with blow-up games on your rosters, you will not win a large field GPP. The guys with the blow-up games last week were Kamara, Robby Anderson, and of course Julio Jones. Every team that was in contention in the millionaire maker event on Draftkings had at least Julio, but many had all three of them. Thankfully my core included both Julio and Kamara and I had significant exposure to both. Unfortunately, not only did I not have Robby Anderson in my core, I literally had zero exposure to him on any of my GPP teams.

So how do we identify those players capable of a blow-up on any given week?

1. There are only a handful of guys in the NFL who have the combination of talent and volume that makes them capable of a 50 point game and you can count them on one hand: Julio Jones, Antonio Brown, Leveon Bell, Ezekial Elliott, Todd Gurley, and maybe A.J Green. That’s really it.

2. They need to catch passes. This is built into the WR position, but for running-backs if they do not catch passes, they are not going to put up over 40 points. Think about it, if a guy rushes for 180 yards and 3 touchdowns, but does not catch a pass he has scored 39 points. This is what separates elite pass catching runningbacks on Draftkings because of the full point PPR. Bell, Gurley, Kamara, Elliott, David Johnson, etc. This is why I rarely roster guys like Lynch or Blount, because even if they have a great game on the ground, without the point per catch, they just are not going to be as valuable.

3. They need to have good match-ups. I was at the bar with my buddies the other night (I usually get out 1 night a week after I get the kids to bed to meet up with the guys, shoot the shit and solve the worlds problems at the bar). I was talking to my buddy Ryan who is in our home fantasy football league. He was surprised that Marquis Lee had such a bad week last week after being so good ever since Robinson and Hurns went down. I thought back to last week and remembered that Patrick Peterson shadowed him, which is why I chose not to own him on any lineup. I said “Ryan, yes but Patrick Peterson was going to shadow him why did you even play him?” The look on his face was if I just asked him to explain to me quantum physics.

Being immersed into DFS football, I forget sometimes that the vast majority of people playing fantasy football and even DFS football do not have a fraction of the knowledge that we have. It was very reassuring to know that what we are doing is giving us a huge edge over the average player. The reason I bring this up is match-ups are sooooo critical every week. Knowing what cornerbacks are going to be covering or shadowing receivers is everything. Just take a look at last week for example. In the games prior to last week, Marqise Lee had been solid with DK point totals of 15, 11.2, 21.5. 19.5, and 9.5, which is good for a guy priced in the high $3k or low $4k range. Last week with Peterson guarding him on 89% of his routes, Lee had zero targets. The other 11% of the time he had 1 catch for 13 yards and a whopping 2.3 points. We knew that by Peterson shadowing him that he had a slim chance of producing meaningful points before he stepped on the field.

Here is another example: Jalen Ramsey another elite corner covered Larry Fitzgerald on 64% of his routes. Fits’s line in that time = 2 catches for -4 yards. Finally, A.J Green had Jason McCourty, who has been really good this season shadowing him 83% of the time. Green ended with 5 catches on 7 targets for 66 yards. The key is to know the cornerbacks that are covering the receivers because it is critical as even the best receivers can be shut down.

Going back to blow-up spots, the match-up is going to tell us whether a blow-up really has a chance to happen. I am not saying an elite receiver can not have a very strong day with an elite corner covering him, but the chances of that happening are reduced significantly. As often as we see guys like Brown, Green, Jones, put up 30 points, it is very rarely when an elite cornerback is covering them. But, you put them up against a defensive backfield like the Tampa Bay Bucs and the chances of that blow-up opportunity go up tremendously. I have listed some of these guys before but here are some guys again that I steer clear of for the most part on a weekly basis: Peterson, Hayward, Slay, McCourty, Jacksonvile’s secondary, Denver’s secondary, Rhodes. Last week we did see it was possible for an elite corner to be had a little bit as Marvin Jones put up a pretty good line against Xavier Rhodes (although the second td was a little flukey). We play probabilities though, so it is not 100% all the time, just more times than not.

Jeff’s Strategy & Hardcore Core- NFL Week 13

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