Welcome to this edition of the DraftKings NFL DFS Edge Check! This week we are going to be using the Contest Simulations over at Paydirtdfs.com to take a look at each position and highlight some of the most undervalued options based on the sim results. This process involves utilizing ownership projections and projection distributions and simulating contest outcomes to better understand how valuable a player really is in different field sizes.
We are going to break down the top overall edges which gives us plays to focus on. If you want to see the players that appear to be overvalued that will hurt you in GPPs, check out the full Contest Sims on the site. If you use the code DKNATION at checkout on a monthly subscription you’ll get 25% off your first month!
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QB Edge Distributions
There are some really interesting results here that I think speak to the slate as a whole.
First off, the highest positive edges offered at QB go to Geno Smith and Bo Nix. They have edges of 11.14% and 10.10%, respectively, which are the only two double-digit numbers we will see. Geno Smith finds his upside by being on the team with the highest pass rate above expectation, while Bo Nix happens to have a top-five rushing marketshare based on a 14% designed rush rate. While Nix is expected to get some ownership this week due to matchup, Paydirt has Geno Smith projected at 5% ownership in GPPs.
The other thing that sticks out about Geno and Nix is that they are both really cheap, and I think that is an important aspect of the contest sims this week. There is not a lot of terrific value to be had, and it’s going to lead to cheaper QBs gaining prioritization over the raw points guys with high medians.
The other two solid positive edges offered at QB are Jordan Love and Lamar Jackson, who come in at +6.08% and +4.63%, respectively. Those four QBs should be where you start the majority of your lineups.
RB Edge Distributions
The top five RBs in the contest sims in regard to positive edge offered are all in a similar boat and offer very similar upside. If you head over to The ROO and models over at Paydirt and check out the RB specific tables, you’ll find that each of these RBs project for between 16-20 fantasy points and offer strong values. Kareem Hunt, De’Von Achane, and Kareem Hunt all show up in the top 10 in 4x rate, a measure in the ROO that tells us how often they have 4x their salary in fantasy points. The other similarity here is that all of them have decent ownership, but are still well below the highest owned at the position.
Of these five, I have the most interest in De’Von Achane and D’Andre Swift. While neither of these backs demand the vast majority of the RB workload for their teams, they both have considerable upside in the receiving work they maintain (both average around a 14% targetshare) and get strong game environments. The 19.80% and 22.40% exposure rates in winning lineups from the contest sims are really strong rates and the prices in the mid-tier help to afford the expensive TE and WR options we want access to this week.
WR Edge Distributions
As usual when we look at the WRs from the contest sims, we are going to see a trend: If a QB is looking like a positive edge, their WRs will follow suit. We definitely see that with Devaughn Vele and Jake Bobo this week, as well as with Zay Flowers to a smaller extent.
Vele is looking like a pretty considerable value on the slate based on his rapport with Bo Nix and his bargain price tag. While Vele hasn’t been anything super impressive, he does have some strong baselines. His TPRR sits at a 20% on the year and he does have a strong aDOT of around 11.5 in the last two weeks since he returned from injury. His projected ownership is far too low at just 7%, as his exposure in winning lineups from this set of contest sims is nearly 6x higher. If you are starting your lineups with Bo Nix, you are going to want to look to pair him with Vele for a full value bomb.
Kalif Raymond is joining the ranks here simply because Jameson Williams is suspended for the next couple of games. It’s fair to assume that either him or Tim Patrick are going to get a nice boost in production, and the contest sims prefer the lower owned of the two.
A name that is not on this list but that I wanted to mention is Cedric Tillman. He is another value WR in the low 3k range that saw a big jump in opportunity last week with the loss of Deshaun Watson and Amari Cooper. While it’s fair to say that we shouldn’t expect him to continue putting up a 20%/30% split of the targets/air yards, I do think that he could provide 12-15 PPR points pretty easily and make a lot of lineups work similarly to how the contest sims view Vele.
TE Edge Distributions
Zach Ertz, or as I call him Ol’ Reliable, falls down the edge list this week in lieu of some more expensive friends. The general trend for week 8 has been pay down at QB and WR and pay up everywhere else, and TE is no exception.
The top positive edge offered at the tight end position is David Njoku with a mark of +8.11%. He is closely followed up by Evan Engram with an edge offering of 7.84%. Both of these guys project for modestly-low ownership in the 4-6% range and have exposure rates of more than double their respective projections. Njoku is an especially easy option, as he only got a slight price bump up from last week after posting target shares of 32% and 28% along with 32 PPR points and gets a huge QB performance increase with no more Deshaun Watson.
Overall Thoughts on the Sims
This week heavily focused on a couple of things: Where can you save at QB and where can you spend on RB/TE. There are no real value TEs like we have had for the last handful of weeks, and that is forcing the burden of salary relief into other spots. Because of this, we are seeing a premium from the contest sims on cheap QBs and their stacking partners to unlock the stud ceilings at RB, WR, and TE.
If you end up spending up at QB you run into a bottleneck at RB, which causes a lot of problems with the pricing this week. Especially with how good the spots are for the stud WRs, you really need to allocate there. In fact, models are liking using pairings like Chase/Higgins and Hill/Waddle with a Nix/Vele base which feels weird at first but makes sense once you think about why.
With all of that said, this is going to be a week where people make a lot of mistakes because of heuristics that work with normal value options. Don’t be scared to play a bit weird this week and unlock upside through things like QB+1s and double-TE builds.
Good luck and go grab some trophies. And remember, If you use the code DKNATION at checkout on a monthly subscription you’ll get 25% off your first month!
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I am a promoter at DraftKings and am also an avid fan and user (my username is Multichem) and may sometimes play on my personal account in the games that I offer advice on. Although I have expressed my personal view on the games and strategies above, they do not necessarily reflect the view(s) of DraftKings and do not constitute a representation that any particular strategy will guarantee success. All customers should use their own skill and judgment in building lineups. I may also deploy different players and strategies than what I recommend above. I am not an employee of DraftKings and do not have access to any non-public information.