Jeff’s Hardcore Core- NFL Week 14

I would classify last week as my worst of the season and it isn’t really close.  I am hoping that I got it out of my system before the Fantasy Football World Championship (FFWC) which is in two weeks.  Ever since I qualified I have been even more focused than before and feel like I analyze every single aspect of every single game.  Every Sunday night and Monday I analyze the previous week to see what went right and what went wrong.  Despite the fact that I probably spent more time doing research last week than any other week this season, it still turned out poorly.  My personality is the type where I always want answers for things.  If something turns out a certain way, I want to know why.  That is why I struggle emotionally sometimes with fantasy sports because sometimes there just is not a definitive answer as to why.  Specifically, I wondered why Mike Evans had zero production, when he was matched up with  the back-up to a lousy cornerback on a bad defense in a week where his quarterback for whom he is his favorite target returned.  As many times as I bang my head against my desk, I am not sure it will produce a reasonable answer.  Why did Jordan Howard do zippo against the worst run defense in the NFL when he was the only weapon the Bears could possibly utilize that could produce offense?  Why did the best quarterback of all time underperform so badly in a great match-up coming in on an offensive roll and Rex Burkhead is somehow the benefactor of all the points.

All of these questions just don’t have answers and thus I am force to accept the variance of DFS and realize we are going to have bad weeks sometimes.  There were some great performances from members of my core last week like Alex Collins, Jamal Williams, Hunter Henry, Blake Bortles, Michael Thomas, Marqise Lee, Rob Gronkowski, Travis Kelce, and the Ravens defense.  Unfortunately when you have so many guys that put up terrible performances it ruins so many teams and the probability of hitting a big GPP goes way down.  Guys like Evans, Diggs, Brady, Howard, Parker, Hundley, and Jack Doyle all stunk.

I refuse to accept that all my research and long hours are for not because my results overall this season and every other year as a whole are positive, but it is just hard to accept bad weeks like last week even if it only happens a few times a year, but we must move on.

If you have been reading my column all year you know that I try to discuss a strategy or form of game theory that will help us be better DFS players.  I believe that this part of DFS is so undervalued yet plays such a huge part in successful GPP players success.  Everybody is focused on rankings and cheatsheets, but not much importance is placed upon fading ownership, roster composition, stacking, avoiding your own defense, etc.  I think this is true in DFS golf as well and I think we have a huge advantage because of it.  If you study the winning rosters week in and week out, like we do, it is possible to identify what winning rosters have in common and what type of strategies we need to employ.

The idea I want to discuss this week is game stacking.  One of the key strategies I have talked about many times is the idea of stacking a quarterback and receiver or tight end from a team in hopes that they connect on touchdowns and we get double the points.  This is mainly a GPP strategy because it is relatively boom or bust.  Last week we saw how a game stack would be beneficial.  With a game stack we are looking for a game that completely shoots out.  Both sides trade scores and the points run up for most everybody involved. When a game is one-sided, generally one team shuts down the big play attempts and becomes conservative putting the cap on scoring output.   Most of the time with a game stack we need a ton of passing because you get quicker scores and a lot of clock stoppages on incomplete passes.  When there is a lot of running plays in games, the clock runs and far less total plays are run.

Last week the perfect storm came together when the Jets and Chiefs played.  Both teams have terrible pass defenses and decent run defenses (funnel defenses).  Both teams also have explosive play-makers, but not necessarily the biggest, most popular names.  Looking back it makes so much sense that game was a shootout.  If it was New England vs. Green Bay (with a healthy Aaron Rodgers) everybody would have been all over it.  Both of those teams have a week pass defenses and both teams have explosive play makers, but the play becomes much more obvious to most people with big names like Brady, Rodgers, Cooks, Jordy involved.  When the names are Josh McCown, Alex Smith, Robbie Anderson, and Jermaine Kearse, the play becomes far less obvious to most.  The 69 points and 966 yards of total offense prove that we do not necessarily need obvious, big name players to make this strategy work.  I am guilty of not making very many stacks that took advantage of this game.  On one team I had McCown, Robbie Anderson, and Travis Kelce.  On another I had Alex Smith and Tyreik Hill.  But what I did not have was a total game stack, and that is what would have won a large field GPP.  The rosters that won large field GPPs last week contained at least four players from that game. Any combination of four or five of Alex Smith, Josh McCown, Robbie Anderson, Ty Hill, Travis Kelce, Jermaine Kearse would have put you well on your way.

This is not a strategy that we necessarily want to employ in single entry tournaments or anything other than large field GPPs, because it is extremely rare to have a total game shootout such as we saw in that game last week.  They do however exist and we need to be on the lookout for them.  If it is a game that is a bit under the radar because of less popular players, but still fits the criteria, even better yet.  It is just one of many strategies that I like to discuss with you as an option that we need to be aware of throughout the season as a possibility.

I wanted to get this column out to you early because I have key players in tonights game in my core.  I will be updating my

Best of luck this week Team FGI!

Jeff’s Strategy and Hardcore Core- NFL Week 14
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