Cracking DraftKings Thanksgiving

Photo: Rhona Wise, USA Today Sports

Thursday Morning Update:

We will be updating this on Thursday Morning in this section for anything that has changed. This update will be if any surprise injury news does get announced.

Thanksgiving Slate Thoughts

With this being the 12^th Thanksgiving DFS slate that I’ve participated in each slate is a little bit different. Some years, there are a number of cash game plays, while other years based on the teams playing it is more of a GPP slate. This year, is more of a GPP year, just because there are such narrow spots where a significant portion of the targets go to one player with situations like Josh Allen/Stefon Diggs, Kirk Cousins/Justin Jefferson, Dak Prescott/CeeDee Lamb, and Jared Goff/Amon-Ra St. Brown or there are teams that we have historically wanted no part of their passing game in New England and the New York Giants. So, needless to say, it’s going to be a difficult slate that you’re going to have to take chances on some players who may not have the best numbers on the season.

DraftKings Specific Thoughts:

DraftKings did a wonderful job pricing this slate. There are a number of ways that you can construct your team, and while there are difficult choices throughout building your lineup. For example, it is punishing to build a lineup with both Josh Allen and Stefon Diggs, but it is not impossible to the point where you’re having to take tight ends who may catch one pass.

PSA-

While I don’t ever like doing this, we did have to re-use some of the write-ups and stats in this and the FanDuel Thanksgiving Article. My time unfortunately is cut somewhat short this week as my wife had our second child on Monday and this is the busiest week of the year football wise with two very important slates. Thank you for your understanding, and we tried to limit the amount of write-ups to just statistical based writeups. All rankings, analysis, has been done independently of the FanDuel article, but you may see some wording re-used.

SITUATIONS THAT STAND OUT TO THIS WEEK ON THE MAIN SLATE.

• Buffalo (at DET) – 32 points
• Dallas (vs NYG) – 27.5 points

Quarterbacks:

Josh Allen- $8,000

At the quarterback position, this is really the first position that you need to address this week. Should you play Josh Allen in cash? DraftKings has lowered Allen’s price to a very fair $8,000, but the cause for concern is the struggle that Allen has had throwing the ball over the last four weeks. In three of his last four weeks, he has failed to top 215 passing yards. With a team having 32 projected points, this is still the cash game play that you’re going to want to have as his upside is significantly higher than any quarterback on this slate.

For a GPP play, he’s likely someone you’re going to want to consider fading. Expect Josh Allen to be the highest rostered player on this slate, and we don’t know that he is 100% healthy given some of his recent passing struggles. While the Bills are projected to score 32 points, logic would tell you that a lot of those points should come through Josh Allen, but if the Bills get up early it could come from the running backs as we have seen in recent games.