FanDuel was back at it again with their massive Week 1 Sunday Million contest, requiring a $25 entry fee with 23,381 people getting paid out at least $40. This massive $2 million GPP tournament had 92,485 entries available for buy-in and ended up overlaying as only 79,876 entries were sold before lineups locked. There was an overlay of 12,609 entries for $315,225, which helped to make your $25 entry go just a little bit further as it had a better chance at cashing. Each week FanDuel will be running a Sunday Million GPP Contest and we will break it down here at Footballguys.com and see what the keys were to having the top lineup on the week and taking home the top prize of $200,000.
Here's how Week 1 of the Sunday Million shook out.
|
DFS Screen Name | Points | Prize Money |
1st | grohballs | 208.62 | $200,000 |
2nd | gcove101 | 203.52 | $100,000 |
3rd | curtispainter | 202.02 | $60,000 |
4th | boomer4 | 201.50 | $40,000 |
5th | sr51 | 200.10 | $30,000 |
Grohballs is the newest winner of the FanDuel Sunday Million taking home the top prize of $200,000 with a solid score of 208.62 points. The difference between first place and 2nd place was 5.10 points and that came from a difference of three positions: WR3, TE, and Kicker. Grohballs went with Willie Snead, Gary Barnidge and Matt Prater in those spots and the 2nd place enter Gcove101 went with Amari Cooper, Martellus Bennett and Justin Tucker. An interesting fact about grohballs team was that he was not a "Highly Experienced" player at FanDuel yet as his designated experience tag was listed as "Experienced". In fact 4 out of the top 7 winners in the Sunday Million were listed at "Experienced" players which goes to show you that you don't have to be a DFS pro to be able to win these type of big GPP contests.
Looking further at Grohballs team, he used his entire $60,000 salary cap and had a New Orleans Saints super stack of QB Drew Brees with WR's Brandin Cooks and Willie Snead. He also had the perfect combo at running back with DeAngelo Williams and Spencer Ware that the entire top 10 teams in the Sunday Million also had. It was surprising that both Williams (23.6%) and Ware (20.9%) were both only owned in the low 20% range as they were both talked about lengthy in the DFS community as the chalk plays at the running back position. GPP always offers a different avenue as some DFS players tend to fade the chalk because of the ownership percentage but this week it was a week that you wanted to lock in those two inexpensive RBs because of their great match ups.
The winning team not only had a super stack of Brees, Cooks, and Snead but it also had a RB/WR stack in DeAngelo Williams and Antonio Brown. So out of nine players that you are able to roster, five of them came from two teams in the New Orleans Saints and Pittsburgh Steelers. Predicting game scripts is how you are able to attack these big GPPs and put your roster ahead of the field. You have to look for stacks with a high correlation and if that means stacking a QB/WR/WR and a RB/WR that is ok, as it helps you to create a unique team from the large tournament field.
The hardest spots to pick this week were the tight end position and the kicker position. This was evident in grohballs lineup as he had a combined 8.00 points from both of those spots with Gary Barnidge taking a zero and Matt Prater just 8 points. It was the Minnesota Vikings that led all defenses with 21 points for a $4,600 price. The best thing about the Vikings defense was that it was only owned by 4.3% of the field and playing them gave you a huge advantage as no other defense came close to them as far as points.
Position | Player | Salary | FanDuel Points | % Owned |
QB | Drew Brees | $8,700 | 31.42 | 6.2% |
RB | DeAngelo Williams | $7,100 | 32.10 | 23.6% |
RB | Spencer Ware | $5,400 | 29.40 | 20.9% |
WR | Antonio Brown | $9,300 | 28.60 | 33.5% |
WR | Brandin Cooks | $7,600 | 30.40 | 9.0% |
WR | Willie Snead | $6,400 | 27.70 | 2.7% |
TE | Gary Barnidge | $6,300 | 0.00 | 4.2% |
K | Matt Prater | $4,600 | 8.00 | 3.8% |
D | Minnesota Vikings | $4,600 | 21.00 | 4.3% |
$60,000 | 208.62 |
Going through the top 10 teams in Week 1 of the Sunday Million it was Drew Brees and Andrew Luck that you wanted to have rostered as your quarterback as 6 teams had Brees and 2 teams had Luck with one team each with Blake Bortles and Ben Roethlisberger. At running back it was all DeAngelo Williams and Spencer Ware as Williams was on all 10 teams and Ware was on 9 of the 10 teams. The only lone other RB play was Latavius Murray on the 7th place finish team the jtbolts.
At the wide receiver spot the popular choices were Antonio Brown (6 teams), Brandin Cooks (7 teams), AJ Green (4 teams), Willie Snead (3 teams), Amari Cooper (3 teams). Sammy Watkins, Will Fuller, Julio Jones, Donte Moncrief, Doug Baldwin, Randall Cobb and TY Hilton were all on single rosters. Even with the value at RB this week you had to be smart with your selection at WR as Antonio Brown was really the only high priced option that panned out. Players like Cooks, Green, Cooper, Snead probably went a little under owned because of all the people paying up at WR.
Tight End was the toughest spot on the week as their was no clear cut play coming into the week and no clear cut winner at the end of the week. The crazy part about TE was the winner having Gary Barnidge and he didn't make a single catch or record a single point. Only Travis Kelce and Jordan Reed were rostered by more than one of the top 10 teams and they were both only owned twice. Jason Witten, Martellus Bennett, Julius Thomas, Dwayne Allen, and Coby Fleener were the other TEs rostered out of the top ten teams.
The kicker spot saw 9 different kickers out of 10 so it almost didn't even matter who you rostered at this spot this week. Stephen Gostkowski was the only kicker that was on more than one team and the other kickers were Prater, Tucker, Novak, Walsh, Crosby, Barth, Hopkins and Santos. At defense you wanted to have the Minnesota Vikings and their 21.00 fantasy points as 7 out of the top 10 teams had them and it made a big difference. The other three defenses rostered were the Philadelphia Eagles, Kansas City Chiefs, and the Seattle Seahawks.
Finish | Score | QB | RB1 | RB2 | WR1 | WR2 | WR3 | TE | K | DEF |
1 | 208.62 | Brees | Williams | Ware | Brown | Cooks | Snead | Barnidge | Prater | MIN |
2 | 203.52 | Brees | Williams | Ware | Brown | Cooks | Cooper | Bennett | Tucker | MIN |
3 | 202.02 | Brees | Williams | Ware | Green | Cooks | Watkins | Kelce | Novak | MIN |
4 | 201.50 | Luck | Williams | Ware | Brown | Cobb | Fuller | Reed | Walsh | MIN |
5 | 200.10 | Bortles | Williams | Ware | Brown | Cooks | Cooper | Thomas | Crosby | MIN |
6 | 197.30 | Luck | Williams | Ware | Green | Jones | Moncrief | Allen | Gostkowski | PHI |
7 | 196.70 | Roethlisberger | Williams | Ware | Brown | Green | Baldwin | Witten | Barth | MIN |
8 | 195.92 | Brees | Williams | Murray | Cooks | Cooper | Snead | Reed | Hopkins | MIN |
9 | 195.72 | Brees | Williams | Ware | Brown | Cooks | Snead | Fleener | Gostkowski | KC |
10 | 195.62 | Brees | Williams | Ware | Green | Cooks | Hilton | Kelce | Santos | SEA |
***FanDuel's Week 2 Sunday Million will remain the same as Week 1 with $2,000,000 in prizes with 23,381 out of 92,485 people taking home some cash. First prize remains at $200,000 as this contest offers a very balanced payout structure. So far the first two weeks of the Sunday Million are about half the size of last years contest and if you are looking to crack the top 10 your odds are much better this year.
Head over to FanDuel now and catch the action for Week 2.