I play around 60% of my action each week in “cash games.” Cash games refer to any contest in which roughly 50% of the field gets paid out, such as head-to-head, double up or 50/50. I try to get as much head-to-head action as I can every week and then supplement that with other cash games. I make one cash lineup for DraftKings and one for FanDuel.
Each week, I’ll review my cash-game lineups in this space. Sometimes I’ll lose, but hopefully I’ll win more often. Either way, I’ll post it here and give you my thought process.
This was the kind of cash slate I like to play. We had viable punts at QB, extremely strong RB values, and a tight pool of WRs to choose from.
Note: Unless stated otherwise, the discussion below is about DraftKings.
MY MUST PLAYS
* If you didn’t play Kyle Monangai in cash, you need to reevaluate your process. With both D’Andre Swift and Roschon Johnson out, Monangai had very little competition for backfield touches. And the Bengals came into the week dead last in our DvP metrics against running backs (by a wide margin). We don’t get chances like this at $4600 very often.
* Christian McCaffrey remains the quintessential cash game play. When he is facing the Giants and is priced below $9000, that’s a must. CMC came into the game second in the NFL in rushing attempts, AND third in targets.
* There was plenty of concern around Joe Flacco’s throwing shoulder sprain. But after digging as much as I could, I felt good about his status. The Bengals purposefully held him out of Friday’s practice to rest it. He threw on Thursday and recovered well. There was never any talk of Flacco being a game-time decision – as early as Friday, all reports said Flacco would be good to go barring a setback. At that point, there was no way I was fading Ja’Marr Chase’s 40+% target share with Flacco in a home game against the Bears.
MY WANT PLAYS
* I once again only considered two QBs for cash on DraftKings: Jaxson Dart ($5200) and Caleb Williams ($5700). We had them as the two best salary-adjusted QBs on the slate in projections. We had Caleb projected for 0.9 more points, but all the teams I saw couldn’t spare the $500. And that was fine given Dart’s rushing ability and how decimated the 49ers defense is.
* I knew my RB3 spot would come down to Tyrone Tracy ($5100) with Cam Skattebo out, or TreVeyon Henderson ($4900) with Rhamondre Stevenson out. Obviously I preferred Henderson’s talent and QB play, but I did expect Terrell Jennings to mix in on base downs. So I chose to go with Tracy, who this staff trusted for 16.4 touches/game last season. I felt good about hedging this spot – I played Henderson on FanDuel where he was an impactful $700 cheaper than Tracy.
* I would’ve loved to play Chargers (Cam Ward) or Rams (Tyler Shough) at D/ST. But I knew I wouldn’t be able to spend that much at the ever-volatile D/ST spot. So I really only looked at punting with Giants ($2400) or Falcons ($2500). My gut was to prefer Giants, but we triple-checked our Falcons projection and felt good about having them decently ahead. Drake Maye’s sack rate is quietly sky high. Shout out to projections team (again).
* I would have been fine with a ton of tight ends this week. I thought Juwan Johnson, Theo Johnson (no Dan Bellinger), George Kittle, and Brock Bowers were all fine options. Regular readers know when it’s close, I’m almost always going to spend as little as possible at the tight end spot. So I was fine going to Johnson, whose role has remained very strong despite the return of Taysom Hill/Foster Moreau. If the Rams did blow out the Saints, Tyler Shough projected to get a ton of dropbacks.
* The last 2v2 I looked at was Puka Nacua and Parker Washington vs. Rashee Rice and Jauan Jennings. There were two big questions around this for me: Would the Saints hang around long enough for Puka to find enough volume? And how healthy is Jauan Jennings?
I really struggled with this one. On one hand, passing on a $4300 Jennings against the poor Giants secondary, with Ricky Pearsall and Brandon Aiyuk out, was not ideal. On the other hand, Nacua at $8500 is always going to be an elite cash play. Given how much I liked Washington as a Travis Hunter replacement in this spot, I decided to take the risk on Puka getting there even if the game was a blowout.
Week 9 Results
Devin Singletary played exponentially more than I thought he would, making the Tyrone Tracy over TreVeyon Henderson play look really bad. Luckily Henderson didn’t bury me. On the good side, our projection on Falcons D/ST over Giants D/ST made a big difference. I think the DK team was rock solid, I would play some version of that every time on this slate.
On FanDuel, not playing Caleb Williams at just $7300 was probably a mistake. Especially since I didn’t love playing Brian Thomas Jr. in cash, and I thought the Bills would play well.
YEAR-TO-DATE RESULTS
Week 1 DraftKings: 111.32 points, won 37.0% of head-to-heads
Week 2 DraftKings: 145.40 points, won 76.5% of head-to-heads
Week 3 DraftKings: 168.68 points, won 70.6% of head-to-heads
Week 4 DraftKings: Did not play
Week 5 Draftkings: 192.22 points, won 87.5% of head-to-heads
Week 6 DraftKings: 153.92 points, won 56.8% of head-to-heads
Week 7 DraftKings: 186.04 points, won 94.9% of head-to-heads
Week 8 DraftKings: 95.48 points, won 11.4% of head-to-heads
Week 9 DraftKings: 179.04 points, won 86.8% of head-to-heads
Week 1 FanDuel: 114.22 points, won 92.3% of head-to-heads
Week 2 FanDuel: 119.00 points, won 95.2% of head-to-heads
Week 3 FanDuel: 149.42 points, won 82.6% of head-to-heads
Week 4 FanDuel: Did not play
Week 5 FanDuel: 177.7 points, won 89.4% of head-to-heads
Week 6 FanDuel: 149.62 points, won 90.1% of head-to-heads
Week 7 FanDuel: 160.44 points, won 66.7% of head-to-heads
Week 8 FanDuel: 158.18 points, won 100% of head-to-heads
Week 9 FanDuel: 120.2 points, won 42.9% of head-to-heads
* Note: Win percentages do not include ties.
