Battle Royale 15.23

Lex is a matchup researcher who focuses his play on Underdog’s Battle Royale contest

Welcome to Week 15!

If you are new to this contest or just want to get a bigger picture of the first two years of the contest, here is my review of the top Battle Royale rosters in 2021 and 2022.

Keeping with the new format change, I am highlighting the stacks I will be targeting this week in drafts, as that is arguably the most important decision for each roster. I’ll also provide some thoughts on other players I’m interested in, and then finish by updating some trending stats for the main contest. Let’s get started!

The reason we are always preaching “scroll down” is because once ADP forms early in the week, not much changes outside of a couple of guys that are usually related to midweek injury/role news. So, that means many people are drafting the “same way,” falling into similar buckets of player combinations, leaving guys outside that top 36 far less owned relative to those above them for not much more reason than a slightly higher projection. Every week there are some underowned guys that are available at the end of drafts that can help you win a tournament, as the 6-person drafting means you aren’t having to find $3k DraftKings priced players just to be unique.

Looking at Week 15

With the three Saturday games this week, and lots of QB injuries going around, there are some offenses that stand significantly above the rest on this slate. SF and LAR players should be targeted on every team in their smash matchups, MIA’s offense might get even more concentrated due to injuries, and DAL @ BUF carries the highest total of the slate. WR has a much more significant drop off this week compared to RB, so I will be prioritizing the elite WRs over the highly drafted RBs in most drafts.

Stacks I’m Targeting:

Matthew Stafford + Cooper Kupp, Puka Nacua, Kyren Williams:

• One of the more concentrated offenses in the league in terms of knowing where the fantasy points are going to be scored, and they get a dream matchup this week against a reeling defense. All three are taken in the first two rounds, with Kupp and Williams going in the first, which means this offense is far from overlooked. However, Stafford is still carrying a 5th-round ADP, making stacks with these players very achievable and with significant upside. Now that the TD variance is finally going in Stafford’s favor, he’s scored 23+ fantasy points in three straight games. While the pairing makes more sense with the receivers, stacking him with Williams is something fewer people will do and yet has still shown big success as recently as two weeks ago; trying to capture all the touchdowns and hope one or multiple come through the air. WAS has allowed 8 teams to score over 30 points against them, and this Rams offense is healthy and humming.

Brock Purdy + 49ers:

• Once again, this offense churns out fantasy production like none other and now faces an extremely vulnerable Cardinals defense that they already put up a big score on earlier this year. SF has scored 35+ points on the Cardinals in three straight games, and they‘ve scored 27+ points in the 5 games since their Bye. The ADP has caught up, as all four of the 49ers skill players are taken in the top 13 skill players. Deebo Samuel is coming off back-to-back 30-point scores, but the matchup is great for everyone here and I want exposure to all four of them, sometimes even together. Another offense that’s not going overlooked at all, but can still be part of a unique roster by how you draft at the other spots. Purdy can be stacked with all four guys comfortably, but he’s not as cheap as the QB2 on the week.

Others to Target:

Alvin Kamara vs NYG:

• The Giants have been generous to opposing backfields all year, and Chris Olave is currently questionable with an ankle injury. Carr is already prone to dropping it off frequently to AK, and without Olave he would be expected to see even more targets than usual given the state of the NOR WR room. Taysom Hill missing would make this play stronger due to TD expectation, but with so few weapons left healthy on this offense, AK’s volume in a positive matchup makes him a really strong play after all the elite WRs come off the board.

Derrick Henry vs HOU:

• HOU is tracking to be without their starting QB and WRs on the road, and Henry’s best games almost always come in games TEN is able to control and hand him the ball 25+ times. The matchup is neutral, but the volume expectation is large and he comes heavily discounted in just the 4th round of drafts right now. Shooting for upside and taking him across a Stroud stack is viable, as Henry has had many big games in HOU-TEN shootouts during the Watson days, but Stroud appears more doubtful than questionable at this point, leaning me to target him as more of a one-off.

Jaylen Waddle vs NYJ:

• Waddle has seen a usage bump this year in the games in which Achane has not played, especially because Mike McDaniel makes a concerted effort to engineer touches for his best players. Tyreek Hill is expected to play on a hurt ankle but will still likely see more primary attention from the Jets best coverage players. Waddle hit this defense for 8 receptions for 114 yards a couple of weeks ago and now gets the Jets defense traveling down to warmer Miami for a chance to burn them again. Waddle has fallen all the way to the end of drafts on a slate in which WR depth takes a major hit after the top-level guys, making him a guy I will look to add more of as the week progresses.

Notable Stats

These are some notable stats from rosters appearing in the top 5 of the contest so far this season.

1st place performance:

• 35 of the 50 teams had at least one flex player score 30+ half-PPR fantasy points
• 21 of the 50 teams had all flex players score at least 20+ half-PPR fantasy points
• 46 of the 50 teams had all flex players score at least 15+ half-PPR fantasy points

Stacking and Correlation:

• 29 of 50 had a QB paired with just one teammate
  • WR (22), TE (5), RB (2)
• 7 of 50 had a QB stacked with two teammates
  • WR-RB (4), WR-WR (2), WR-TE (1)
• 5 of those 36 QB stacks had a runback (Opposing player)
• 49 of 50 had at least one game correlation
• 15 of 50 had two different game correlations

FLEX usage:

• 164 of 250 top-5 rosters have had two RBs, meaning they chose RB at FLEX over WR and TE.
• 85 of the other top 5 rosters all used WR at FLEX, meaning there’s only been one instance of double-TE to ever finish top-5 (2023 W7: Kelce/Andrews). 

Hope this helps you get started with the contest and ship that first place! Good luck everyone!