The dynamic game of Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) requires much more than simply knowing the sport for which we’re entering contests to be successful. We must be adaptable, precise, and open to learning from previous endeavors, the latter of which will be the primary focus of this weekly written piece. Game Theoretic methodologies will allow us to analyze and dissect the previous week’s winner of the largest and most prestigious Guaranteed Prize Pool (GPP) tournament on DraftKings – the Millionaire Maker. These same tenets of Game Theory, which can most simply be explained as the development of decision-making processes given our own skill and knowledge, assumptions of the field based on the cumulative skill and knowledge of others playing the same game, and the rules and structure of the game itself, will allow us to further train our minds to see beyond the antiquated techniques of roster building being employed by a large portion of the field. Approaching improvement through these methods will give us insight into the anatomy of successful rosters and will help us develop repeatably profitable habit patterns for the coming weeks. We’ll start by looking at the previous week’s winning roster, extract any pertinent lessons for future utilization, and finish with a look ahead towards the coming main slate.
Winning Roster
Don’t miss episodes of Fantasy Football Happy Hour with Matthew Berry and Rotoworld Football Show all season long for the latest player news, waiver wire help, start/sit advice, and much more.
Lessons Learned
Multiple Players from Same Team without QB
What really made DraftKings user needlunchmoney’s roster unique on this slate was the inclusion of both Amon-Ra St. Brown and Jahmyr Gibbs without quarterback Jared Goff, which covers a potential path of the game tree from the Lions game unlikely to be covered by the field. The game happened to unfold along that path on the game tree at virtually no ownership, marking the single greatest point of leverage on the roster. Oftentimes, humans like to simplify things as much as possible, which can lead to areas of the game tree that go underutilized or completely overlooked, as was the case from this two-person skinny stack on the team with one of the top Vegas implied team totals on the slate. We’ve become so engrained in thinking primary team stacks must also include their quarterback but that’s not always how the games play out.
You Can Win with a Zero
As was proven this week, you absolutely can ship a major tournament with a zero from one of your players. Obviously, the path narrows if you are playing with eight roster spots against a field of rosters utilizing all nine roster spots. That said, this point is mostly here to highlight the fact that humans generally seek security over uncertainty, something that can aid in our decision-making process as we struggle with the question of how much variance we are willing to accept. Searching for that one last player to make your roster work at the end of the roster construction process? Maybe embrace additional variance with that final spot at greater frequency moving forward.
Double-TE is Almost Never Optimal
The state of the tight end position in the league currently is such that very few options carry consistently high volume. The way to view that puzzle is to break up the tight end position into two distinct groupings of players. Players that can put up a score that separates from the field go into one bucket (most commonly referred to as the players that can put the slate out of reach) and players that can return viable salary multipliers go into another bucket (pretty much every tight end in the league not named Brock Bowers or George Kittle). We play the players in the first bucket for their path to elite ceiling while we play the players in the second bucket as a viable path to meaningful salary multipliers should the players in the first bucket fail to put the slate out of reach. But if one of the two players in the first bucket put the slate out of reach, their score is required to win on that given slate. This is an important concept to grasp as the most common double-tight end roster construction tendencies are used as a means of generating value, which includes two players from the second bucket. This tendency is not going to win tournaments at a high frequency.
Looking Ahead
Viable RB Plays are Plentiful
Saquon Barkley in a workhorse role, Derrick Henry with four of seven games over 132 yards, Kenneth Walker in a demi-workhorse role in an offense scoring 25.7 points per game, Joe Mixon with 29.4 DK points or more in all three games he finished this season, J.K. Dobbins in the softest rushing matchup in the league, Breece Hall thrust back into a workhorse role with the change in offensive coordinator in New York, Kareem Hunt as the focal point of the Kansas City offense, even Javonte Williams against a team allowing a ridiculous 34.7 points per game this season. The sheer number of viable running back plays on the Week 8 slate is overwhelming, at first glance. But that also means that the running back position is likely to be a key deciding factor in the coming slate.
Baker Mayfield + Jalen McMillan + Cade Otton
Baker Mayfield has returned 29.66 DK points or more in four of seven games this season. That is remarkable. Furthermore, the Buccaneers have yet to fully figure out their run game and consistently harbor positive game environments while facing the most pass attempts per game in the league (more on this below). As such, it is much more likely the team continues in their pass-heavy ways without their top two pass-catchers in Mike Evans and Chris Godwin, immediately vaulting both Jalen McMillan and Cade Otton to the top of our considerations list on the Week 8 slate. And while both pass-catchers are not likely to go overlooked here, I have a feeling the field is not going to be comfortable playing Mayfield with the injuries on the roster.
Tampa Bay has Faced the Most Pass Attempts this Year
As was alluded to above, the Buccaneers have been a team with the perfect mix of pass-heavy tendencies on offense and a pass-funnel lean on defense, leading to their defense facing the most pass attempts through seven weeks. We just saw what the Falcons did against this same team three weeks ago, with Flacons quarterback Kirk Cousins setting career-highs in multiple statistical categories including pass attempts and completions. This is another spot where we might see the Falcons attempt more than 35 passes, a mark they have gone over only one time this season (the last time these two teams played). Considering the state of their offense, with an offensive coordinator that is more reactive than proactive when it comes to pushing game environments, this currently sets up to be the perfect mix of inputs to feed Drake London the requisite volume for him to return an elite GPP score. The secondary Atlanta pass-catchers can also be considered, but I would reserve those plays for rosters that also include Cousins.
