Welcome to the Paydirt NFL DFS main slate breakdown! This article will go over some of the most important aspects of the NFL DFS main slate. It’ll typically include things like team totals, popular plays, and important stacks. The content of this is mostly geared towards Draftkings but is plenty applicable to Fanduel as well. Likewise, this article goes over the slate based on the range of outcomes models for NFL found here at Paydirt, so if you are interested in the same data we use, grab a subscription today!
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NFL DFS main slate breakdown:
Team stats, rates, and touchdown projections
- The highest team total on the slate is KC at 26.50, the lowest on the week is NYG at 14.75.
- The highest game total on the slate is BUF/PHI at 48.50.
- Highest passing TD expectation is KC at 1.90 with BUF at 1.84 then a drop to LAR at 1.66.
- Highest rushing TD expectation is PHI at 1.44 and then a significant drop to IND at 1.14.
- Highest dropback expectations go to KC and BUF at 39.22 and 38.85.
Here are the top 10 overall stacks in median projection:
BUF and PHI at the top are no surprise, it’s two high powered offenses in the highest game total of the week, but the prices aren’t doing you any favors on stacking them. In fact, the teams in the best spots are appropriately expensive, which makes this week more difficult than the last few with obvious value spots to lean on.
Ownership is mostly in line as well, except KC is getting way too little attention and are probably the best stack on the slate.
Sorting by team total:
There are a couple things that stand out here for me:
- KC is getting less ownership than BUF and PHI, but with a higher team total and higher passing TD expectation.
- IND is super cheap and is getting less ownership than JAX who is the trendy cheap stack.
- LAR is relatively expensive if you aim for Puka/Kupp but makes a lot of sense based on their team total and super low ownership.
- HOU and BUF have relatively low team totals for their prices, it’ll be interesting to see how that affects ownership when we turn over the cards.
- New Orleans with legit no ownership makes for a really interesting value stack.
Highest projected ownership
- Jonathan Taylor chalk looks…. Okay. I think that 40% is too much and people are just kind of saying “fuck it” when the optimizer suggests him. But he’s a good play in a vacuum.
- Trey McBride is way overvalued here, he’s appropriately priced and should not be played at 30%+ ownership.
- Justin Watson lmao
- Why is Zay Flowers showing up here?
I’m fine with some pieces here but it seems weird to overvalue Trey McBride. Both him and Jonathan Taylor feel a lot more like the Industry getting some tunnel vision on players that they have had interest on for a couple weeks and frankly there are just better spots.
I’m kind of blown away not to see Derrick Henry on this list? If he’s going to be low owned against the Panthers you just jam him in and move along.
Two players that I expect to catch a lot of steam up to lock are George Pickens and Jaylen Warren. There was a report that came out that mentioned the Steelers wanting to get them more involved this week, which is a good report to follow if the QB doesn’t suck shovel handles in his spare time. I’m not touching the Steelers until we see that Pickett isn’t the problem.
Undervalued options
Usually I have a little graphic here showing players that have a high LevX but this week I’m just going to call out a couple that I think are way undervalued overvalue based on sentiment:
- Alvin Kamara has the highest expected fantasy points in the league, the 10th best utilization of all RBs in the league, and the Saints are in a pretty okay spot. I understand why he is low owned, because he’s pretty expensive and Taysom Hill’s package continues to grow like some radiation infested blob, but he has slate breaking upside and will be 5% owned.
- Adam Thielen is looking like 5% owned or so and continues to have one of the best roles of any WR in the league. He had another 10+ target game last week and has only had one week with single digit PPR points in the last 10 weeks. He’s not even overpriced!
- Derrick Henry has been giving some work to whoever the fuck that RB2 is on the team but he still has a couple ceiling games left in him and this spot makes a lot of sense. The Titans are home favorites against a trash team and Henry has had the largest win/loss splits in terms of fantasy output over the last 5 years. He’s going to be like…. 10% owned and a quarter of the ownership of Jonathan Taylor.
The really nice part here is with Henry/Thielen you can build a nice secondary correlation across your lineups.
Usage and expected fantasy points
There is really low ownership on the majority of the highest expected fantasy point players here. Why are people jamming in Jonathan Taylor of D’Andre Swift? Why is Travis Kelce only 11% owned? Joe Mixon at 6% owned? Weird week.
So let’s go ahead and sort this by Ownership now instead:
The more I look at this week the more I think the chalk is kind of bad. Jonathan Taylor and Trey McBride have good roles but you aren’t getting super big discounts on them and there are a lot of pivots in the price ranges. Justin Watson chalk is out of this fucking world weird. Demario Douglas chalk? I guess?
I think this is going to be the week that the chalk nerds finally get punished.
Overall slate notes
- Main stacks are looking like BUF, PHI, and KC but if you need some value it makes sense to go with IND, JAX, and NO.
- Secondary stacks are LAR and HOU, but it’s hard to justify them with the prices when other heavy hitters are in better spots.
- I don’t think you can play Trey McBride this week unless it’s as part of a game stack or ARI stack, which helps you get the benefit of correlation. He’s appropriately priced without it.
- Derrick Henry and Adam Thielen secondary stacks to the fuckin moon, my dudes and dudettes.
- I’m not going to be touching PIT stacks until we see that Pickett can be the guy. I think he’s a bottom 5 QB in the league and Matt Canada being gone won’t change that much if any at all.
- After looking at the chalk, I think having some pay down stacks and hitting the mid range fantasy upside guys makes a lot of sense. There’s some bad value chalk out there.
- The the chalk gobblers die.
NFL DFS Cash Game Core:
(Finalized after 12pm EST)
This core of players will help you build a strong foundation in cash games. While it is best to use all these players, it’s not a requirement. Generally, you’ll want to focus on the QB, RB, and TEs listed.
QB – Trevor Lawrence
RB – Jonathan Taylor
RB – Rachaad White
WR – Michael Pittman Jr.
WR – Justin Watson
TE – Trey McBride
DST – Chiefs DST
NFL DFS GPP Core:
(Finalized after 10am EST)
This core of players will help you build in priorities to your stacks. Likewise, it’s worth noting that the wide receivers and tight ends listed are meant to be in addition to your chosen stacks.
QB – Josh Allen, Patrick Mahomes, Derek Carr, Trevor Lawrence
RB – Alvin Kamara, Derek Henry, Jonathan Taylor, D’Andre Swift
WR – Adam Thielen, Devonta Smith, Stefon Diggs, Josh Downs, Chris Olave
TE – Dalton Kincaid, Travis Kelce, Dalton Shultz, Taysom Hill
DST – Whoever you want
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