General Rule for Creating Showdown/MVP Lineups
- Correlate with your Captain/MVP - Make sure you are creating a roster that makes sense with your 1.5x player.
- On DraftKings, lean RB/WR in the captain. Though QB can finish as the optimal captain, it’s often overused by the field relative to its success rate. When you are using a QB in the captain, I like to use a lot of his pass-catchers. Because the likely scenario if a QB ends up as the captain on DK is he spread his touchdowns around to multiple receivers and not one skill player had a ceiling game.
- On FanDuel the MVP spot doesn’t cost you 1.5x salary which means you’re just trying to get the highest scoring player in that spot. Contrary to DK, it’s often the QB because of the scoring system. I would lean QB/RB on FD, but there are always exceptions to the rule.
- Leave salary on the table - I’m not just talking about a few hundred. Don’t be afraid to leave a few thousand on the table. In a slate that has an extremely limited number of viable options, there is a much greater chance for lineup duplication. It may not seem like much of an issue, but it can decimate your expected value to put in lineups that are going to split with 500 other people.
- Multi-enter if you can. Single-game slates have so much variance that the first play of the game can take you completely out of contention if you only have one lineup. It’s best to build a bunch of lineups (you don’t have to max enter) that concentrates on different game scripts and a handful of different correlated captains.
- DST and Kickers, while not very exciting usually offer a solid floor for cheap. Especially in game scripts that go under expected point totals. I would only use at most two per lineup.
- When creating single-game lineups, the most important part is creating correlated lineups according to a projected game script, and not pinpointing the exact five or six players who will score the most fantasy points on the slate.
Captain/MVP
Davante Adams getting the massive 30+% target share of the Packers offense makes him what should be the highest owned captain on the slate. I think it’s still okay to roster him in the captain spot as long as you deploy one of the unique strategies listed above. Because Adams commands such a huge target share, it’s often hard for Aaron Rodgers to hit the optimal lineup in the captain spot given the nature of fantasy scoring. Rodgers can wind up in the captain spot with a rushing touchdown and spreading the ball around to multiple receivers. My favorite cheap option to get unique in the captain spot is Marquez Valdes-Scantling. He saw eight targets last week and Rodgers just missed him on a deep ball that would have put him over the bonus and given him a touchdown. If that connected he’d be rostered with much more fervor this week. If there aren’t any dart throws that produce a solid fantasy stat line, you may need a middling value play in the captain spot.
On the Buccaneers’ side, it’s a bit more unpredictable who will receive the bulk of Tom Brady’s targets and he’s actually been spreading the ball around enough that no one has really been having monster stat lines. So contrary to the strategy with the Packers’ offense, I think it makes more sense to slot Brady in tp the captain spot with a few receivers in the flex. Mike Evans has been the biggest end zone threat, but there have been games that he doesn’t do much outside of his end zone targets. Chris Godwin is probably my favorite pass-catcher from this side of the ball. He runs routes in Brady’s favorite area of the field, the short-to-intermediate. Godwin has nine targets per game over his last four and is fairly inexpensive. Leonard Fournette is a solid way to get unique in the captain spot. There is definitely a path to him scoring twice and if the game is rather dull outside of Fournette’s 1-yard plunges, he could very well end up as the optimal captain.
Flex
Aaron Jones is going to be over-owned as a captain relative to his chances of actually ending up as the optimal captain. I don’t mind throwing him in a flex spot, but the Packers just don’t give him enough looks for me to be interested in rostering him heavily or in the captain spot. I’d rather pivot and get unique with a guy like Jamaal Williams. Williams saw almost the same amount of carries in the divisional round and even saw carries in the red zone. Ownership won’t be too high on Williams. Jones obviously has a greater chance of outsourcing Williams, but the price difference combined with ownership difference makes me lean Williams of this duo.
The ancillary pass-catchers for the Packers aren’t very appealing because of the stranglehold Adams has on the target share. As I mentioned previously, MVS is my favorite because I think he’ll catch less ownership than Robert Tonyan and Allen Lazard. Though if you are mass multi-entering, I’d sprinkle in those two as well. Lazard also saw eight targets in the divisional round and unlike MVS, connected on one of his deep shots for a long touchdown. If you are rostering Rodgers as the captain with the idea he’ll spread it around you can roster multiple of these ancillary players with Rodgers and Adams, but if you have Adams in the captain, I would limit it one.
Ronald Jones is a pivot from the Buccaneers passing game as he is a touchdown-dependent one-dimensional running back. I’m not personally too interested in him, but could see you inserting him into lineups that don’t have Tom Brady or a top Bucs receiver on the notion that if Jones lucks into some goal-line touchdown variance, he detracts from the Bucs’ passing game ceiling
With Antonio Brown sidelined, we can get some of our dart throws from the Buccaneers pass-catchers. Last week I played the max amount I could on Cameron Brates’s receiving yards prop bet. It was incredibly low, and he had been coming off two straight weeks of running more routes than Gronk. Rob Gronkowski still sees his share of end zone targets, but Brate has been working the middle of the field like a magician and he is my favorite contrarian play. He’s priced higher than Gronk on this slate so I think he will get dwarfed relative to ownership. Scotty Miller could also see extended run with Brown out. Brady has taken a few deep shots to Miller throughout the season and one connection could put him into optimals at his price.
I can see this game being more of a slugfest than expected, which would require a bit more DST and Kicker in your player pool. In my mass multi-entering, reserving a portion of your lineups as “slugfest” lineups will be unique right off the bat.
Lineup Starters
Captain/MVP: Davante Adams
Flex: Aaron Rodgers, MVS, Cameron Brate
Captain/MVP: Davante Adams
Flex: Aaron Rodgers, Robert Tonyan, Chris Godwin
Captain/MVP: Aaron Rodgers
Flex: Davante Adams, Allen Lazard, Scotty Miller
Captain/MVP: MVS
Flex: Aaron Rodgers, Tom Brady, Cameron Brate
Captain/MVP: Tom Brady
Flex: Mike Evans, Rob Gronkowski, Davante Adams
Captain/MVP: Leonard Fournette
Flex: Tom Brady, Davante Adams, Mason Crosby
