NFL DFS Week 11 GPP Recaps

As much as some things change constantly in the NFL, some things seem to always stay the same: the Chargers find ways to make close games when they shouldn’t, the Steelers win again to stay undefeated, Adam Thielen catches touchdowns, and Keenan Allen remains a PPR machine. Week 11 was a little bit different slate than most this season as many of the usual high-octane offences for DFS purposes weren’t on the Sunday main slate, including the Rams, Seahawks, Bills, and Chiefs. This left a lot of the usual high salary options off the table. Add to that two quarterbacks – Taysom Hill and PJ Walker – under $5K salary on DraftKings, one of which was TE eligible on Fanduel, and it was a recipe for some odd scoring and lineup correlations in winning lineups.

DraftKings

NFL $3.5M Fantasy Football Millionaire

The million-dollar winner on DraftKings was “Wynson” with a score of 222.02 points. Taysom Hill put up 25.42 points in his first start for the Saints under center with 233 pass yards and 51 yards on the ground including two rushing TDs on the way to the million-dollar win. Although Hill was run out naked, their mini stack of the Vikings/Cowboys game including Dalvin Cook, Adam Thielen, and Cee Dee Lamb was the key correlation in the lineup. Many assumed the Cowboys offence was dead and gone with the injury to Dak Prescott, but Dalton showed he was capable of moving the ball versus a mediocre defence given the weapons at his disposal. Cook (42.5%) and Allen (24.7%) were the two highest owned players in the contest and given their output, they were must haves to contend for a big pay day on Sunday.

Of their 21 entries in the contest, 15 included Taysom Hill and 11 of those were stacked with Alvin Kamara. Kamara had a very disappointing outing with only 10.5 points so “Wynson” was fortunate to get the right pieces together in the remaining four Hill lineups that were run naked.

Of their other six entries in the contest, there were 4 Herbert lineups, 1 Matt Ryan, and 1 PJ Walker. The Herbert lineups were either single stacks with Allen or double stacks with Ballage, while Ryan was double stacked with Jones and Ridley, and Walker was run out naked. Game stacking around quarterbacks was not a part of the lineup construction process.

Player	Exposure	Ownership
Taysom Hill	71.4%	17.7%
Dalvin Cook	100%	42.5%
Salvon Ahmed	19.1%	8.5%
Adam Thielen	14.3%	14.3%
Keenan Allen	42.9%	24.7%
Diontae Johnson	33.3%	14.7%
Dallas Goedert	23.8%	12.1%
CeeDee Lamb	14.3%	7.8%
Browns DST	19.1%	6.8%

Unlike most other winners of the Fantasy Football Millionaire this season, “Wynson” didn’t have a player under 5% owned in their winning lineup. Their single digit ownership pieces were Ahmed, who received much more work in the passing game this week in a game script in which Miami had to play from behind, the aforementioned CeeDee Lamb who’s talent didn’t disappear with his quarterback’s injury, and the Browns defence that had a dominant outing versus the Eagles in bad weather. Fully locking Cook in the lineup set along with a being double the field’s exposure to Hill, Ahmed, Allen, Johnson, Goedert, Lamb, and the Browns DST led to a pretty strong lineup set in Week 11.

NFL $300K Game Changer [$50K to 1st, Single Entry]

In the world of high stakes single entry contests on DraftKings, “Bales” was a big winner with a score of 191.74 points. Their “double stack and bring no one back” with Herbert, Allen, and Mike Williams versus a Jets team they were expected to blow out led to a high scoring correlation build. The Chargers offence did their part in scoring 34 points, but the Jets surprised everyone in being able to keep pace in the game. In PPR scoring, it can’t be understated how important have high volume receivers is and Allen’s 16 receptions on 17 targets set up an unbelievably strong floor to build from. It’s notable that “Bales” won while avoiding Dalvin Cook at 55.66% ownership who put up a big but not monstrous game with 29 points. Their low owned leverage plays in Mike Williams (5.2%) and Michael Pittman Jr. (5.2%) were the real difference makers in the end as many players single stacked Herbert and Allen, but Williams was the necessary piece for a big win.

Beyond simply avoiding Cook who had a good game at high ownership, “Bales” avoided high owned landmines in Jakobi Meyers (40.57%) and (Logan Thomas 28.3%) who were the second and third highest owned players in the contest that dragged a number of lineups down on the day.

Fanduel

$2M NFL Sunday Million ($500K to 1st)

On Fanduel, the big MME winner was “amazindan” with a score of 191.86 points. Their “double stack and bring no one back” with Herbert, Allen, and Mike Williams was a similar core correlation to the big winners on DraftKings. Like “Bales” single entry winner though, “amazindan” won without highly owned Dalvin Cook, instead pivoting to a much lower owned Derrick Henry at only 14.6%. Their only plays in single digit ownership were Mike Williams at 8.3% as part of a double stack and the Saints DST at 1.7% that managed to compile 8 sacks on the day versus the Falcons.

Maybe the most surprising piece of the contest was that Taysom Hill was only 68% owned in the TE position with only a $4500 salary despite him starting at quarterback on Sunday. Certainly 68% is a very high number, but given the combination of floor and ceiling versus other players at the position, Hill was nearly a lock to be the top scoring player at TE on Fanduel, let alone the best value.

Pro Spotlight

The pro spotlight this week shines on our very own “dfsteams” – Colin Drew – who came a late Tim Patrick 50-yard catch from winning the $150 3-max Power Sweep on DraftKings. As it is the $50K second prize was still a nice consolation on $450 of entries in the contest but Patrick’s garbage time 6 point catch that led “moneywheel24” to the top of the leaderboard was an unexpected late game changer. The “double stack and bring one back” from “dfsteams” with Herbert, Allen, and Williams from the Chargers with Mims coming back from the Jets at near-minimum salary led to the big afternoon. Colin also included a mini-stack with Gibson and the Washington DST on his way to a big score.

Going into Sunday, Herbert was the second-highest projected QB in the DailyRoto model, while Cook was far and away the top play at RB, and Allen an easy correlation choice with Herbert given he was the second-highest projected WR on the slate. Gibson was the third-best value at RB in the DailyRoto model and made for a nice mini-stack with the Washington DST given they were one of the better punt options at the DST position on Sunday. All in all, the combination of correlations alongside good projections made for a big profit in Week 11.

Congratulations to all the big winners in Week 11 of the 2020 NFL DFS season!