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 another week where the best plays also happened to be the most expensive plays. I typically don’t like these setups, as it forces us to play some really thin cheap stuff.
Note: Unless stated otherwise, the discussion below is about DraftKings.
MY MUST PLAYS
* The 49ers were without Mike Evans, Deebo Samuel, Ricky Pearsall, and De’Zhaun Stribling. Christian McCaffrey is always a great cash play due to his elite dual-threat skillset, but this was an especially great spot for him to rack up catches. The $7600 tag on full-PPR DraftKings was far too cheap.
* Matthew Golden has pulled roughly even with Christian Watson this season. Now he got the dream spot – against the Lions elite offense and terrible pass defense in the dome and was only $6000. We had Lions defense inflating opposing WR baseline expectation by 5.3%.
* Bijan Robinson wouldn’t have been a “must” if Brian Robinson was active. He would’ve just been a “want.” But with Brian out, the few extra touches we could project for Bijan made a difference. I also expected the Falcons to play well here – it was a very difficult spot for the 49ers with all their injuries, and coming east for a 1pm ET start.
MY WANT PLAYS
* I could’ve considered Jordan Love a “must.” But I don’t want to get too tied up at quarterback, especially pocket passers like Love. If someone showed up with CJ Stroud, or Bo Nix, or Tyler Huntley I wouldn’t have liked it… but I would’ve understood. That said, the spot for Love at just $6000 was incredible. I really wanted to get to him.
* The last 1v1 I looked at was George Kittle vs. Woody Marks in the flex. Normally, I would always play RB over TE int his spot. But the Kittle situation was unique thanks to the aforementioned 49ers injuries. And although I felt very good about Marks’ workload with both David Montgomery and Jahwar Jordan out, we know the Texans run game has been broken for years. And we saw Marks in this role last year fail on a weekly basis. So I stuck with our projection (we had Kittle 1.3 DK points clear). Note that Braelon Allen was $200 more than Kittle, I could not have played him on this team.
* Given I wanted to play CMC, Bijan, expensive TE, mid-range QB… I knew I had to save money somewhere. I thought about Savion Williams, but he was $200 more than Ted Hurst and $100 more than Cade Otton. Given Emeka Egbuka was out and Baker Mayfield was back, I thought it was a fine spot for really cheap volume. Hurst and Otton cost a combined $6100. I certainly didn’t like then, but WR was so weak again that I did not expect to get burned too badly.
* The WR position was so brutal. I only had four on my list I even thought were in play for cash and fit the slate. One of those was Amon-Ra St. Brown, who was just $7800 in the slate’s best game environment. Note that ARSB was our top salary-adjusted value at the WR position by a solid margin. He was also on the Buy Leone model, which looks at players who have underperformed their opportunity recently, and are good bets to pop soon.
* I wasn’t going to sweat D/ST on this slate. I would’ve loved to play Titans against Deshaun Watson, Browns against Cam Ward, or Jets against Malik Willis. I also thought Vikings against Daniel Jones and Texans against JJ McCarthy were strong. But as always, I was fine playing the cheapest viable option.. That was Dolphins D/ST ($2300) against Geno Smith.
Week 7 Results
The Bucs gamescript was a disaster for Cade Otton and Ted Hurst. The Panthers were so bad that Baker Mayfield attempted just 11 passes all day, and won the game 43-13. Given the way that went, I was fortunate to get a big game from a moderately-owned Amon-Ra St. Brown to salvage the day.
Bijan Robinson underperforming for the second straight week has been expensive for me. But if you told me Brian Robinson was out and the Falcons beat the Niners 29-20, I’d play an $8500 Bijan every time.
YEAR-TO-DATE RESULTS
Week 1 DraftKings: 159.94 points, won 82.2% of head-to-heads
Week 2 Draftkings: 154.76 points, won 81.1% of head-to-heads
Week 3 DraftKings: 163.30 points, won 73.9% of head-to-heads
Week 4 DraftKings: 104.38 points, won 41.1% of head-to-heads
Week 5 DraftKings: 158.96 points, won 79.5% of head-to-heads
Week 6 DraftKings: 125.60 points, won 48.5% of head-to-heads
Week 7 DraftKings: 114.06 points, won 50.8% of head-to-heads
Week 1 FanDuel: Did not play due to site functionality
Week 2 FanDuel: 125.86 points, won 66.7% of head-to-heads
Week 3 FanDuel: 140.36 points, won 82.6% of head-to-heads
Week 4 FanDuel: 137.68 points, won 78.9% of head-to-heads
Week 5 FanDuel: 151.16 points, won 92.3% of head-to-heads
Week 6 FanDuel: 112.08 points, won 87.5% of head-to-heads
Week 7 FanDuel: 96.06 points, won 30.8% of head-to-heads
* Note: Win percentages do not include ties.
