Week Nine NFL DFS Breakdown
Full slate breakdown for week nine of the NFL season
Game Links
Implied Totals
Matchups
Here’s a new one. This shows DraftKings Points Allowed Per Snap for each defense and breaks it down by position. Green means good for the defense. So the Texans have been the best defense in the league at limiting QB fantasy points. The Bears have been the worst. That’s how you’d interpret this chart.
Team Grades
Defense Plot
Offense Plot
Falcons vs. Patriots
We begin with a pretty lame one. I’m actually not beginning here; I’ve already written up four other games, but this is probably the first one you’re looking at.
We saw the Falcons turbo-bust last week with Cousins at QB. That was a difference-maker in DFS. I would imagine that they get Michael Penix Jr. ($4,800) back this week. The performance from our guy Kirk will not be making the Falcons want to go back to him.
We have a good offense in New England against a good defense in Atlanta. I’ll be showing the defense matchups data for every game. Remember that lime green means the team’s defense is bad against those players, and the more purpose it gets, the better they are.
I don’t really want to buy into this stuff too much. The Patriots have given up a lot of points to tight ends. And a lot of people will run with that, but to me, with just 7-8 games in these samples, I don’t really want to react to it.
This doesn’t feel like a game to get fantasy plays from, but we’ll take a look.
Quarterbacks
Drake Maye ($6,500) has the price up to a season-high.
He’s been one of the best QBs in the league.
You could argue on that basis that the $6,500 price is fine. But at a season-high price against one of the league’s better defenses, I don’t think it’s the right play for cash game fantasy purposes. And that’s what we’re here to talk about. I’m looking for the best few plays at each position. I don’t think Maye is one of those.
Running Backs
I’m guessing Bijan Robinson ($8,700) will get about 2% ownership this week. It’s really hard to pay that price in cash games, and especially when it’s not a smash matchup, and especially after the guy showed his floor last week. We probably shouldn’t factor in last week as much as we inevitably will. But I don’t think you need to even have that in mind to call this a bad cash play at the price.
That price should have come down to $8,100 or something, but it dropped just $100 after that insane bust against the Dolphins last week. Bijan is the #3 projected running back on the slate, but he’s way behind CMC and other viable plays in the cost-adjusted value.
No thanks on Bijan!
It looks like Rhamondre Stevenson ($5,400) could miss this game. It’s unclear for now, and the projections still have him in. If he’s out, that opens up something like 12.5 touches (that’s his average per game). The issue is that you would not expect the Patriots to suddenly gas up TreVeyon Henderson ($4,900) because they’ve shown so little faith in the guy. He has hardly seen the field and has not played well.
My guess is that the Patriots would go pretty pass-heavy if Stevenson is out. That would boost Henderson still, but it would boost Drake Maye. It will be interesting to see how the projections change if Stevenson does go out, but for now we can’t really make any calls on it. I’ll put Henderson and Maye on the list because of this development, and we’ll make a decision on it this weekend.
Pass Catchers
We also don’t know for sure if Drake London ($6,400) will return for this one. If he and Penix are back in there and seemingly at 100%, I think you could use London. The Patriots have been beaten by pass catchers, and London really dominates this pass attack when he’s in there with Penix. But the price is a bit much for me. He never projects very well when Mooney is healthy. So I won’t be going there.
Kyle Pitts ($4,200) has gotten some looks lately! Don’t loook nowww! It helped that London was out last week, obviously, but Pitts paced the team with nine targets and caught all of them for a 9-59-0 line on a 4.3 ADoT. For the season, he’s at a pretty weak 1.54 yards per route run. Even when he gets the targets, they’re not very high-value. I don’t think we use him unless London misses again. But I’m putting him on the list just in case London misses, because at that point he does project very, very nicely in a floor sense.
We also have a Q tag on Stefon Diggs ($5,700). He still practiced a bit on Wednesday, so I don’t think he’s at a real risk of missing Sunday. But we’ll see. None of these Patriots pass catchers has done much for fantasy purposes. Maye has done a good job spreading it out. It’s been tough to get confident DFS plays from this offense. We’ll come back to this spot if the Diggs injury thing does end up mattering, but for now, I’m off this offense.
Recap
I do not see much to like in this game unless some of these Q tags turn into O tags.
Panthers vs. Packers
This should be a Packers smash. The Panthers got smashed at home against the Bills last week, and now they hit the road to face another one of the league’s best teams. The Packers are a very impressive football team, and the Panthers are looking pretty rough at the current moment.
Quarterbacks
Jordan Love ($6,100) has not been on the QB list at all this year. I’m guessing he won’t end up there this week, either. But they did unleash him a bit last week.
The Packers ran a season-high 9% PROE% against the Steelers. Love chucked it a season-high 38 times and piled up 360 yards and three touchdowns. I’m not sure we should be betting on that being a new thing for the Packers. I think the game being against Aaron Rodgers and getting Christian Watson back and having Josh Jacobs not 100% had a lot to do with that. They were also just shredding the Steelers’ defense and playing from behind in the second and third quarters.
Carolina is not a great defense, but they don’t appear to be near the bottom of the list in the NFL this year, either. So it’s not the worst spot for Love, and I do think you can use him in tournaments, but he’s never really been a cash play and I don’t view it as a good move this week against a team that’s unlikely to push the Packers offense much at all.
On the other side, I believe we’ll see Andy Dalton ($4,300) again. He somehow scored 4.1 DraftKings points last week on 59 snaps. He threw it 24 times for 175 yards and an interception without any rushing or any touchdowns. It’s possible that it will be Bryce Young ($5,300) under center, which is even worse since he’s $1,000 more. There’s no reason to play bad players against this very good Packers defense.
Running Backs
Josh Jacobs ($7,700) is expensive, and he gave up a lot of work to Emanuel Wilson last week.
→ Jacobs: 34 snaps, 13-33-1, 3-12-0
→ Wilson: 26 snaps, 11-651-0, 3-26-0
That’s a bit alarming, but you wouldn’t imagine that it sticks. I think it was just a one-week thing to give Jacobs a little bit more rest because he hasn’t been fully healthy. But I also think it’s enough not to want to use him in cash this week.
The Panthers split the work again last week. Over these last two games with both guys healthy:
→ Hubbard ($5,300): 26-65-1, 2-24-0
→ Dowdle ($5,800): 25-133-0, 1-17-0
You can see the insane difference there. Dowdle has averaged 5.3 yards per carry the last two weeks, while Hubbard is at 2.5. I’m not sure why the Panthers would keep splitting this the way they are, but maybe they have their reasons. It’s easy to fade both guys.
Pass Catchers
Tetairoa McMillan ($5,800) is very good. He went 7-99-0 on 10 targets last week. So he took more than half the yardage through the air. If the Panthers had a decent QB and would use Dowdle and McMillan, they’d have some chances. But the QB play is awful and this is their toughest matchup of the year.
With Watson back last week, it looked like this:
It was the Tucker Kraft ($5,700) show. He’s been incredible this year and showed it on Sunday Night Football. They just kinda dump it off to him (1.9 ADoT) and let him rumble down the field. But at $5,700 in a spot where we think the Packers will have a lower volume pass day, I don’t see how you can play him in a cash lineup.
Christian Watson ($4,400) had a nice return, although it was on just four targets. He ran 22 routes (team high was Doubs at 32), and the targets were pretty spread out between him, Doubs, and Golden. The high ADoT gives him a nice ceiling, but I don’t see much floor.
I don’t think there are going to be any plays from this game.
Recap
The Packers should dominate this one. The Panthers are off the board against this elite defense, and the Packers are hard to pick from because they spread so much of the work out. If there’s a play, it would be Josh Jacobs as a big home favorite. But I’m a little too worried about his health and all the work that Wilson got last week.
Bears vs. Bengals
We have a 52.5-point total in this one! It’s wild what getting simply a half-competent QB into this Bengals offense has done. In the last two games, since Flacco has become acclimated with his new team, the Bengals are #3 in the league in yards per play at 6.6 (Indy at 7.6, Philly at 7.5).
Flacco has a 6.3 YPA with a +0.19 EPA and a 7:0 TD:INT in his three games. He’s been very good. How stupid does Jake Browning have to feel right now? Sheesh!
So this is a priority game for fantasy purposes.
Quarterbacks
Caleb Williams ($5,700) against the aforementioned Joe Flacco ($5,600). Williams is down to a .07 EPA and a 7.2 YPA with a 9:4 TD:INT. After his hot start to the season, his production has been pretty poor.
This
The Bengals’ defense has been more beatable with running backs than quarterbacks, but it’s still a very good spot for Williams and the Bears. We do know that he has that 25+ point ceiling with his willingness to throw the ball down the field and run with the ball from time to time. He’s a fine tournament play, but he’s not for cash.
Flacco finds himself lined up against a very, very beatable pass defense. Old Joe has scored 19, 29, and 24 fantasy points in his three starts. A 25-point score would be perfectly fine at his cost. I’m not sure how much ceiling he has above that, but the floor does seem solid because the dude is just out there chucking it, and chucking it to very good players. He’s thrown the ball 44, 47, and 34 times in his three Bengals starts. He has eight touchdowns (seven throwing, one rushing) in these three games. You have a very good shot at a 20-point game from Flacco here, and that puts him on the list.
Running Backs
We have two soft run defenses as well. And we have a couple of capable starting running backs. So it’s a spot to examine.
Chase Brown ($5,900) has benefited from the QB change. In these last three:
→ 9-42-0, 2-7-0
→ 11-108-0, 4-2-(-8)
→ 12-73-1, 3-32-1
He took his first trip above 15 fantasy points last week, and it was a splash game up to 25 points. However, he’s not been an elite volume player. The Bengals are pass-heavy. That’s less of a problem than the fact that Samaje Perine has 31 carries in the last three games plus nine targets. Brown has played 109 snaps while Perine has taken 81. He’s really cutting into Brown’s work. That makes it tough to play Brown even in this juicy game environment. I’ll put him on the list, but I’m not going out of my way to get him.
D’Andre Swift ($6,100) and Kyle Monangai ($4,600) are also splitting the work. Swift has 101 snaps in the last three games, with Kyle grabbing 77. Swift has carried it 44 times with six targets, Monangai has 25 attempts and four targets. And they’ve both been efficient with yards per carry marks above five. This is a good rush attack against a bad rush defense, but can we go there since they’re splitting the work? It seems like that is our problem on both sides!
The answer to me is that we can’t go here in cash games. But you can play the lead backs in tournaments, as we have this large 106 shootout score.
Pass Catchers
NFL DFS can be pretty easy sometimes. Ja’Marr Chase ($8,400) projects as the #1 projection and #1 value at wide receiver. He had a somewhat disappointing game last week as the touchdowns all went elsewhere. But he still saw 19 targets… 19. His 12-91-0 result kept his price from exploding into the $9K range, and now we have another too-low tag on the guy. Here are the NFL xFP leaders since Flacco took over in Cincinnati:
xFP Since Week 6
Ja’Marr Chase 88
Christian McCaffrey 65
Ladd McConkey 58
De’Von Achane 54
Kimani Vidal 53
Chase laps the field, and he double-laps the field by the time you’re down to the #3 guy. I’m not sure how we can build a lineup without Chase in it. The projection is 14 targets and 104 yards. This game is probably the best of the week for fantasy purposes, so we absolutely want the (by far) best fantasy player in the best game at a reasonable price.
Tee Higgins ($5,900) is back in the conversation. He has 20 targets in the last three games with a 12-202-2 line on a 13.5 ADoT. He’s a bit touchdown dependent, though. Burrow was pretty evenly distributing targets to these two big dogs, but Flacco has focused much more on Chase. That keeps Higgins as a tourney-only play for me. I think you can play Flacco with both of them in a tournament and then come back with Swift and a Bears pass catcher.
Rome Odunze ($6,600) is the JA player grading model’s #13 wide receiver. He’s seen 54 targets in seven games. He’s gone above 100 yards twice and has scored five touchdowns. But the floor is pretty poor with Caleb Williams at QB. He’s scored single-digit points twice.
I don’t think the Odunze bust is likely in this spot. The Bengals are a fantastic team to be against. Their pass rate, offensive success, and bad defense create a ton of opportunities for opponents. The price on Odunze is heavy, though. I love his ceiling in this spot, but I don’t think the floor + salary combination will get me on him for cash.
There’s a punt option here in Olamide Zaccheaux ($3,300). He is not good, but does have 17 targets in the last three games for an 11-66-0 line on a 5.4 ADoT. If the Bears are going to throw it 35+ times, he’ll likely get 6-7 targets. A 5-50-0 line isn’t a killer at his price. I’m not going to do that, but it’s something to put on the list just because the projection is going to be somewhat decent.
Recap
This is a game to get a piece or two from. The only play I’m locking in is Chase, but depending on how the rest of the QB slate looks, I could see myself being on Flacco. I would also build a ton of game stacks in this one if building a ton of lineups. Williams, Brown, Swift, Higgins, and Odunze are in play in those builds.