Slate thoughts
This year there has been a player or more, that has “broken the slate” pretty much every week. By breaking the slate, I simply mean that you have to have that player in your lineup or you need perfect roster construction elsewhere to make it into the top 100 of a big GPP. Examples of these players include:
Week 6 - Austin Hooper and Stefon Diggs
Week 5 - Christian McCaffrey, Michael Thomas, Will Fuller, Aaron Jones
Week 4 – None – Close = Cooper Kupp, Robert Woods, and Jared Goff
Week 3 – Keenan Allen, Mike Evans
Week 2 – Austin Ekeler, Patriots Defense
Week 1 – Christian McCaffrey
While there are normally players that break the slate every year this year has been a little more so than in years past, especially week 5 which was the highest I have in my database. Weeks 2 and 6 were extremely broken as well. The higher the slate breaking week the “flukier” it is that you win. The reason is that if you had perfect insight into the future on all the players but the slate breaker you could still end up losing that week. Whereas without a slate breaking week you would likely crush. Since we can’t have perfect accuracy on all players every week, we should diversify our player pool in case there is a slate breaker or more so we have a good shot of getting them in our lineup.
For example, last week maybe Stefon Diggs wasn’t your favorite player because the Vikings have been trying to run the ball more this year and you thought he was overpriced. On the other hand, maybe you believed in the “squeaky wheel” narrative going around that insinuated Diggs would get more targets since he had been complaining to the coaching staff, Kirk Cousins, and media.
No matter what your stance was, the best answer is if you are making 10+ lineups you shouldn’t be crossing him off your player pool or you shouldn’t have been locking him into all your lineups. Without perfect hindsight vision, there is a likelihood that he does what he did or a chance that he busts with 2 targets for 10 yards. If you ignored him or went all-in on him you could have busted your lineups even if you nailed the rest of your player pool.
This process of diversity is talked about a lot in finance and DFS circles but the year to date results have shown just how important it is if you want to be a successful player and properly manage your bankroll.
How to play the chalk
One of the biggest decisions each week is how to handle the chalk on the slate. The chalkiest players are typically the ‘best’ plays on the slate if you are trying to maximize your total points produced. However, if you are looking to win a big tournament you can gain a lot of ground on your competition if you choose a player that outperforms there. If that player is in a lot of lineups you can pass a lot at one time. Balancing scoring the most points and playing against your competition is the toughest part of DFS. In this section, we talk about how to handle the toughest decision of the week. What to do with the chalk:
QB
A lot of people have been looking at the Falcons poor season last year and slow start to this year and blame Matt Ryan for the poor play. But Ryan continues to play as well or better than other notable quarterbacks like Deshaun Watson, Tom Brady, and Aaron Rodgers. The Falcons defense instead is the main culprit for the poor record. The defense has allowed 186 points which is the worst in the league. Those three quarterbacks mentioned above have defenses allowing 134, 48, and 115, respectively. Ryan would be on the top of his division as well with defenses like that.
Ryan has thrown for over 300 yards each week and has 2+ touchdowns in every game but one. Ryan’s opponent this week is the Rams who have already been in a couple of shootouts themselves allowing Mike Evans to break the slate in week 3 and their pass catchers nearly breaking week 4. All of this points to this game being a likely shootout and I would recommend Ryan being a staple in your tournament lineups this week even at the elevated ownership rates.
RB
At running back the main chalk currently belongs to Leonard Fournette. We should consider taking this with a little bit of a grain of salt as I have over projected Fournette’s ownership most weeks which has made him a better play than would have been expected. But I think things change this week as everyone loves playing running backs against the Bengals who rank second to last in defense against running backs. So, I think this is the week that Fournette finally reaches his ownership projections, which as of right now is over 30% on Draftkings and over 40% on Fanduel.
For the year Fournette continues to impress playing 93% of the Jaguars snaps, accounting for nearly all running back rush attempts, and getting a target on about 20% of snaps. He’s also had some huge plays with runs of 81, 69, and 48 through the first 6 weeks showing plenty of burst and upside. He does have only one touchdown though but that is likely to changes against the Bengals where I have him at just over 70% to score. All of that sounds good but the ownership is still a concern. At such high ownership levels, I will consider him to be a strong fade. If you see my ownership projections tick down over the weekend as injury reports come out, I would consider making him a larger part of your GPP plans. But for now, you should just splash him in with some lineups that are filled with other contrarian plays. Update: Based on some of the other chalky players that have come up I think there might be better fade options and you should put Fournette as a part of your core.
WR
As mentioned earlier the Falcons defense is one of the worst in the league, if not the worst. As such Cooper Kupp is drawing a lot of attention and rightfully so. The Falcons have allowed the 5th most passing yards, 2nd most passing TDs, and 2nd most yards per attempt. Kupp continues to pull away from his counterparts as Goff’s favorite target with 522 receiving yards compared to 355 for Robert Woods and 343 for Brandin Cooks.
One concern is Jared Goff’s recent play, including last week’s disaster where he threw for 78 yards on 24 pass attempts for a pitiful 3.25 yards per attempt. Additionally, Goff has yet to exceed 2 touchdowns in any game yet this year. Everyone was taking their victory laps on Joe Flacco’s poor Thursday night but Flacco has outplayed Goff for the majority of this season.
Weighing Goff’s poor play and Kupp’s high ownership against Kupp’s receiving market share and the Falcons defense is a tough one. I would say that as long as his ownership stays in the low 20% range I would consider buying on Kupp and stacking him with some of the Ryan shares we bought earlier but if he starts to get much higher owned I would start selling.
TE
One of the best ways to profit this season has been to play all tight ends against the Cardinals defense. According to Austin Lee’s Normalized Strength of Schedule, the Cardinals are allowing 82% more points than expected to tight ends so far this season. This week it is Evan Engram's turn to play the Cardinals. Engram is averaging 13 points thus far so basic math would say that Engram should get 24 points! If Engram gets that he should be the top TE on the slate and with some good luck a slate breaker.
The problem is that defense against tight end isn’t nearly that predictive. However, we shouldn’t expect the Cardinals to give up much more to tight ends going forward than their averages would dictate. Engram is also coming off a knee injury that kept him out of last week’s game so he may not be 100%. I faded Austin Hooper last week and it didn’t work out so well when he broke the slate and there is a risk that Engram could as well but I will likely be under the field on Engram.
Playing contrarian
If you play too many chalky players you will be competing against too many people to win first place and the odds will be stacked against you. If you play too many contrarian players you won’t score enough points. Remember, the plays are contrarian because most likely there is something wrong with that player. In general, the public is very smart. Finding that right mix is the second hardest thing to do in DFS. In this section, I will try to point you to some of the most contrarian options on the slate.
As a major Colts fan, this season has been pleasantly surprising with a 3-2 record and a game against the Texans for a shot at the division lead. According to my metrics, the Colts are the 2nd most run-heavy team when controlling for the passing situation and rightfully so with Marlon Mack’s excellent play. But in a game against the Texans who are likely to put up points on this stout Colts defense the Colts will be forced to rely on Jacoby Brissett and if he hits on a couple of TD passes I think he has a better chance of winning you a GPP than the public is giving him credit for in terms of his ownership.
As mentioned above, the Texans are expected to score points but Carlos Hyde continues to get no love across the DFS industry despite being priced low across the industry and having scored 3 TDs in the first 6 games. Hyde won’t help you in the passing game but if he scores another touchdown and approaches 100 yards rushing like he got last week he will be a great piece of your GPP portfolio.
Just two weeks ago Auden Tate was the chalk of the slate. Last week he fell to 2% owned across the industry. I am not sure what happened to change that thought process as he has had target totals of 12, 6, 6, 10 in his last 4 games He’s not gone over 100 yards yet but has come close twice and has scored a TD in one of the other games. We should fade guys like Tate when they are high owned and play them when they are low owned.
If Brissett has a big game and he is in your lineup as a contrarian play you can easily play him with T.Y. Hilton. But plenty of people have that same idea. A better idea might be to pair him with Jack Doyle who is being owned at about 1% across the industry. Doyle’s season has been a disappointment as the Colts have relied on the ground game but again if they have to keep up through the air Doyle could catch some passes as he has been on the field 73% of the snaps and he is always a target in the end zone.
As always please send any questions or comments to Buzzard@footballguys.com or follow me on Twitter Follow @SteveBuzzard