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FanDuel was back at it again with their massive Week 5 Sunday Million contest, requiring a $25 entry fee with 17,830 people getting paid out at least $40. This massive $1,500,000 million GPP tournament had 70,588 entries and filled completely for the first time all season as the past 4 weeks there has been some good amounts of overlay. While the overlay has been great for the consumer it probably hasn't been the best for FanDuel itself so seeing their big contest fill has to be a good sign for the Sunday Million moving forward. 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 $300,000.
Here's how Week 5 of the Sunday Million shook out.
|
DFS Screen Name | Points | Prize Money |
1st | janxon007 | 210.98 | $300,000 |
2nd | jle1127 | 198.10 | $100,000 |
3rd | janxon007 | 197.68 | $50,000 |
4th | fdnd | 196.74 | $30,000 |
5th | xball6 | 196.30 | $20,000 |
The winner of FanDuel's Week 5 Sunday Million was janxon007 who put up an impressive score of 210.98 points which was better than the second place jle1127's team by 12.88 points. This is one of the biggest margins of victory so far in the Sunday Million this season. Janxon007 had a great showing at the top of the leaderboard as he also took home the third place team with 198.10 points with a swap of Theo Riddick for Terrance West. The difference in those two teams was $200 salary as the team that won the contest left the $200 on the table helping to create a more unique lineup as a majority of the field used their entire salary cap. Janxon007 has the "Highly Experienced" player tag next to his name so he is not new to winning GPPs but this 1st place prize of $300,000 is surely his top prize to date.
His team started with a QB/WR stack of Derek Carr and Amari Cooper which was only moderately owned as Carr was 13.9% and Cooper at 17.9%. Cooper has been seeing plenty of targets so far this season but has been having a hard time finding the endzone but that was not the case this week as he and Carr connected for 6/138/1 stat line on the day. He hit on all players on his team as the only player to score under 22.98 points was his defense in the Minnesota Vikings and they were a top 2 scoring defense on the day. He paired T.Y. Hilton and Brandon Marshall with Cooper at WR and all three of his WRs were 3 of the best this week not named Sammie Coates Jr.
The running back position was interesting as he went with some softer priced players in Jordan Howard at $7,200 and Theo Riddick at $6,200. Howard had the perfect matchup against the Colts bad defense and he delivered with a solid 23.80 points and was owned by 17.6% of the field. It was Theo Riddick that made all the difference to this lineup as he was priced the exact same as Jerick McKinnon who was one of the more chalkier plays so fading McKinnon for Riddick looked very smart at the end of the day. Riddick was his lowest owned player at just 5.1% and he scored 23.20 points against the Eagles defense.
Another one of his strong plays was Martellus Bennett at the tight end spot as he was only owned by 5.4% of the field and had a great matchup against the Browns. The nice thing about Bennett is that you are always going to get low ownership on him when there is Rob Gronkowski on your team at the same position and when it is Tom Brady throwing you the ball that is also an added bonus. The kicker spot proved to be a valuable one this week as well as Adam Vinatieri put up 23.00 points at 10.6% ownership while the chalkier and cheaper play of Mason Crosby put up 12.00 points. Anytime you can pick the kicker that puts up 20+ points you are going to have an edge over your competition.
Position | Player | Salary | FanDuel Points | % Owned |
QB | Derek Carr | $8,100 | 22.98 | 13.9% |
RB | Theo Riddick | $6,200 | 23.20 | 5.1% |
RB | Jordan Howard | $7,200 | 23.80 | 17.6% |
WR | Amari Cooper | $7,200 | 24.80 | 17.9% |
WR | T.Y. Hilton | $7,700 | 28.10 | 15.2% |
WR | Brandon Marshall | $7,600 | 21.40 | 19.0% |
TE | Martellus Bennett | $6,300 | 27.70 | 5.4% |
K | Adam Vinatieri | $4,700 | 23.00 | 10.6% |
D | Minnesota Vikings | $4,800 | 16.00 | 35.4% |
$59,800 | 210.98 |
WHAT WORKED?
Stacking -- Going through the top 10 teams in Week 5 of the Sunday Million, stacking the QB with the teams top WR or TE occurred on all 10 teams. Derek Carr to Amari Cooper was on three stacks, Ben Roethlisberger to Sammie Coates Jr, Tom Brady to Martellus Bennett were both on three as well and the lone other team stack was Andrew Luck to T.Y. Hilton.
Saving on Sammie -- If you opted to play a Pittsburgh Steelers WR this week and had the choice of Sammie Coates Jr for $5,300 or Antonio Brown for $9,600 you would assume that Brown would score the most fantasy points. Well Brown might have been one of the safest cash game options this week it was Coates who delivered with 28.90 points at a 5.3% ownership and a very cheap salary. On the other side Brown was owned by 33.9% of the field and scored 18.30 points for nearly double the salary.
Playing the chalk at defense -- It was pretty clear through the first 4 weeks of the season that the Minnesota Vikings defense was for real and they were a big reason why the team was undefeated. They had a perfect home matchup against the Texans and scored 16.00 FanDuel points against them with an interception, 4 sacks and a punt return for a touchdown. There was no reason to look anywhere else this week at the defense position as the Vikings were priced at $4,800 and were owned by 35.4% in the Sunday Million.
WHAT FAILED?
Going Cheap at Running Back -- If you played the chalky plays in DeAndre Washington at $4,700 or Jerick McKinnon at $6,200 you were very disappointed with their lack luster fantasy performances. Washington was owned by 21.2% of the field and scored 7.7 points while McKinnon was at 13.6% ownership and scored 5.1 points. On paper leading up to the game they both looked to have elite matchups and had all the opportunity in the world to put up points but it just didn't work out as other backs in their backfield stole touches and touchdowns.
Zach Ertz and Kyle Rudolph -- Both Zach Ertz and Kyle Rudolph were in similar spots to the cheap running backs in Washington and McKinnon and looked like very safe options to plug in at TE and save a little bit of salary cap. Ertz especially had the prime TE matchup against the Lions defense and was coming off a bye week where he should have been able to put up some big numbers. Instead he as 22.3% owned in this tournament and only scored 5.20 points. Rudolph was in a similar spot being owned by 17.6% of the field and only scoring you 2.50 points. This was especially hard this week taking a low score at TE as you saw Martellus Bennett have such a huge game and was only a few hundred dollars more of your salary cap.
Finish | Score | QB | RB1 | RB2 | WR1 | WR2 | WR3 | TE | K | DEF |
1 | 210.98 | Carr | Howard | Riddick | Cooper | Hilton | Marshall | Bennett | Vinatieri | MIN |
2 | 198.10 | Roethlisberger | McCoy | Forte | Coates | Hilton | Marshall | Bennett | Vinatieri | MIN |
3 | 197.68 | Carr | Howard | West | Cooper | Hilton | Marshall | Bennett | Vinatieri | MIN |
4 | 196.74 | Brady | Howard | Gordon | Coates | Hilton | Marshall | Bennett | Sturgis | NE |
5 | 196.30 | Roethlisberger | Freeman | Riddick | Coates | Hilton | Cooper | Reed | Janikowski | MIN |
6 | 194.68 | Carr | Bell | Murray | Coates | Benjamin | Cooper | Bennett | Vinatieri | MIN |
7 | 194.30 | Roethlisberger | Elliott | Gore | Coates | Hilton | Marshall | Bennett | Tucker | MIN |
8 | 193.64 | Brady | Gordon | Riddick | Cooper | Hilton | Parker | Bennett | Vinatieri | MIN |
9 | 193.28 | Luck | Howard | Gordon | Coates | Hilton | Marshall | Bennett | Bryant | MIN |
10 | 192.64 | Brady | Elliott | Bell | Cooper | Quick | Marshall | Bennett | Janikowski | WAS |
***FanDuel's Week 6 Sunday Million will change from Week 5 as the prize pool goes from $1,500,000 down to $1,600,000 and from 70,588 entries up to 75,294 entries. The payouts at the top remain the stay very similar with first place taking home $300,000 and second place $125,000 with 18,850 out of the total 75,294 entries at least taking home $40. So far the first five weeks of the Sunday Million have been 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 6.