Welcome back to DFS First Look. Whether you've been grinding DFS for years or are just giving it a shot for the first time this season, the goal is the same: find the best values, attack the right matchups, and build lineups that can win.
Week 1 is always a little different. In the weeks ahead, we'll be digging into recent usage trends and comparing each team's implied total to their season averages. Right now, we don't have any of that data. We are mostly guessing about what usage will look like in many key spots, and we do not have any actual 2025 data points about how good each matchup is. Instead, we're all making the transition from season-long mode into DFS mode. Personally, I've drafted hundreds of best ball teams over the past month and just wrapped up my home league draft on Tuesday night. Flipping the switch from redraft to daily fantasy mode can be a challenge.
To help bridge that gap from redraft to DFS, I built a model that compares each player's season-long ADP to his Week 1 DFS salary. It's a simple way to highlight who looks underpriced before we even get into matchups, projections, or other considerations. If the numbers don't line up, then it's a strong signal that a player is underpriced and could be one of the most popular options on the slate. It is not a surprise that many of the players who leap off the page as the top DFS bargains for Week 1 are the same players who have seen their redraft ADP skyrocket over the past month.
We'll use the Redraft ADP pricing model as our starting point and then break down the Week 1 game environments. By the end, you'll have a clear picture of where to start building lineups as we kick off the 2025 season. This article will become even more data-driven in future weeks once we have 2025 results to factor in.
Top Bargains According to Redraft ADP
The table below highlights the top FanDuel bargains according to my ADP model. The model takes two inputs: player position and redraft ADP. From there, it generates a predicted Week 1 FanDuel salary. The Model Salary column shows the predicted salary, the Salary column is the actual Week 1 price, and the Difference column shows how much lower the real salary is than expected. Players at the top of the list stand out as the best early values for Week 1, at least according to redraft ADP.