Cracking FanDuel: Week 10

Photo: USA Today Sports

Footballguys has partnered with FanDuel and as part of that deal, I will be penning a weekly piece that tries to cover some of the finer points on beating their contests. This article will usually appear on Saturdays and not include the early Thursday games.

My approach to FanDuel's Daily Games

In salary cap games where other companies are determining prices, I like to see where their thoughts differ substantially from my projections. My value chart below matches up my projections against FanDuel's prices:

Some explanation of my Excel manipulation is in order:

• Everything is sorted by position
• I have converted my projections to FanDuel Fantasy Points. These figures appear in the FP column.
• The Price column reflects FanDuel's Week 10 Price
• The Points per $K column reflects the expected points per $1,000 of salary allocated (the higher the value the better).
• H-Value represents our own proprietary formula that matches price and expected fantasy points (the higher the value the better).
• I have highlighted player's names (in green) that should be strong considerations for your lineups. They generally reflect the most bang for the buck at their respective positions. Players in yellow also are worth consideration when building your roster.

Situations that stand out to me this week.

• Green Bay is an 11 point home favorite over the "struggling" Detroit Lions. Actually the term dysfunctional might be a better word to describe the Detroit Lions. Virtually everyone in charge has been let go in the front office except for HC Jim Caldwell. Yes this is the same Jim Caldwell who once coached a Super Bowl and was seen multiple times in that game not even donning a headset. I am going to go out on a limb and guess play-calling is not his strength. Green Bay on the other hand looked good playing against a tough Carolina defense in a close loss last week. It's rare the Packers lose two games in a row, yet alone three. I am expecting Detroit to get slaughtered in this one. I like almost every Packer in this game, but the three I will have in virtually all my cash lineups are RB James Starks ($6,000), WR Randall Cobb ($7,700), and the Green Bay defense ($4,900). Starks has supplanted a hurt (and overweight) Eddie Lacy. Starks managed 8 targets last week and is ridiculously under-priced in a game where he also should have a role as the clock killer. Cobb draws very soft coverage (6th round draft pick Quandre Diggs) that he should be able to exploit at will. As the Detroit offensive mistakes mount (and the Lions are forced to play catch-up), QB Matt Stafford and WR Calvin Johnson could be expected to shoulder most of the load late and in garbage time. They make for an interesting under-owned GPP stack. Fade this game at your own peril. There is a lot of fantasy goodness.
   
• You can get cute at QB or you can just play Tom Brady. I prefer playing Tom in my cash lineups. The Patriots are averaging 339 yards and 2.8 TDs in the air per game this season. Over the last 4 weeks, the Giants are yielding 315 yards and 2.2 TDs through the air. What makes this matchup so great for the Patriots passing attack is that the Giants are dead last in the league with just 9 sacks. When Brady has time, great things happen. About the only thing working against Brady here is that the Giants are also awful against the run (yielding 157 yards on the ground per game over the last 4 games). RB LeGarrette Blount ($6,900) makes for a great contrarian play in GPPs as he should hold low ownership. Las Vegas has this as the highest scoring game of the week at 54 1/2 points. I prefer to just play Brady and stack the rest of my lineup with value plays, but TE Gronkowski ($8,000) and PK Gostowski ($5,100) also are excellent choices. Julian Edelman has a tough matchup on paper, but he appears to be mostly matchup-resistant.
   
• As great as Drew Brees has looked the last few weeks, the Saints defense is making a strong case that they can't stop anyone. Las Vegas is predicting a shootout possibility in the NO/WAS game with an under/over at 50 and NO favored by 1 on the road. Kirk Cousins ($6,500) makes for an interesting counter to a Brady-led roster allowing one to spend up elsewhere.
   
• At Wide receiver, this looks to be a value week concentrating on situations with exploitable matchups. The Ravens have yielded 7 TDs to WRs in the last three games. With Hurns a little banged up, I think Allen Robinson is set up for a huge day. I will be playing him and Cobb (mentioned above) everywhere.

Sample Roster 1 ($60K) - Projected Points = 131.1

• QB Tom Brady, NE - $9,100
• RB James Starks, GB - $6,000
• RB DeAngelo Willaims, PIT - $7,600
• TE Jordan Reed, WAS - $5,800
• WR Allen Robinson, JAC - $7,500
• WR Randall Cobb, GB - $7,700
• WR Michael Crabtree, OAK - $6,400
• TD Green Bay Packers - $4,900
• PK Mason Crosby, GB - $5,000

Sample Roster 2 ($60K) - Projected Points = 130.3

• QB Kirk Cousins, WAS - $6,500
• RB James Starks, GB - $6,000
• RB DeAngelo Willaims, PIT - $7,600
• TE Rob Gronkowski, NE - $8,000
• WR Allen Robinson, JAC - $7,500
• WR Demaryius Thomas, DEN - $7,900
• WR Michael Crabtree, OAK - $6,400
• TD Green Bay Packers - $4,900
• PK Stephen Gostkowski, NE - $5,100