Hilow is a game theory expert (courses at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and Northwestern) and tournament champion who focuses on mid/high-stakes single-entry/three-entry max

MACRO SLATE VIEW::

Optimal. That is our focus on this two-game slate. Are we tracking toward optimal, or how far off are we from projected optimal? Ownership plays a slightly different role in that equation than it normally would. More games equals more teams equals more players equals more opportunities for outlier production to exist. The opposite is also true in that there are fewer opportunities for outlier production on a slate with only two games. As for the relationship of ownership in that equation, things like injuries, blown coverages, the “oh shit” mode, and other variant acts aren’t the most likely thing to occur, but they alter the dynamic of a short slate more than anything else, meaning we would be doing ourselves a disservice by sticking solely to the likeliest scenarios. In other words, the smaller the slate, the more variance is present, and the more variance we should be actively looking to absorb into our builds. Which brings us back to ownership. Kenneth Walker is hands down the top point per dollar play on the slate. No question. But the fact that he is soaking up this much ownership should influence our decision-making process. More on this below, just wanted to get the brain primed for what is most important on this slate.

RESTRICTIVE CHALK VS EXPANSIVE CHALK::

Quick explanation :: Restrictive chalk is an expected highly owned piece that restricts the maneuverability of the remainder of your roster, while expansive chalk is an expected highly owned piece that allows for higher amounts of maneuverability on the remainder of your roster. Classifying various forms of chalk as either restrictive or expansive allows us to visualize what it means for roster construction on a given slate and how restrictive a certain player might be, meaning more of the field will look similar from a roster construction standpoint with that piece.

We’re going to amend the process here slightly on a two-game slate and only look at the top ownership expectation at each position, something that will give us a solid feel for how the field is expected to handle the Conference Championship slate.

DRAKE MAYE

RESTRICTIVE CHALK. The top three quarterbacks on this slate are all clumped together in both price and expected ownership, with the only outlier being Jarrett Stidham of the Broncos. Maye’s rushing upside gives him the slight edge in projections, although any one of the four quarterbacks could find themselves in the optimal roster Sunday evening. It then becomes more about how we play these dudes and less about which of them to play.

KENNETH WALKER

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. Walker is projecting for almost double the ownership of any other running back on the slate. The thing is, it completely checks out on paper after his exploits of this matchup in these two teams’ previous meetings, with the absence of Zach Charbonnet increasing his range of outcomes further. He is also currently projected to score 50% more fantasy points than any other back, which is truly remarkable. Suffice to say, he is a fantastic play on paper, with much of the case to be made against him simply a product of his ridiculous ownership expectation. There is always – always – merit to leaving a player expected to garner 80%+ ownership off at least some rosters.

JAXON SMITH-NJIGBA

RESTRICTIVE CHALK. JSN boasts a 0.31 TPRR, 2.38 YPRR, and 0.60 XFP/RR over his last four games, while no other Seattle pass-catcher has seen a target on more than 17% of their routes in that same sample. He is simply such a massive part of the Seattle offense, and the addition of Rashid Shaheed has done wonders to keep opposing secondaries honest, opening up the middle of the field for JSN to work free. This is another fantastic spot on paper.

HUNTER HENRY

RESTRICTIVE CHALK. Henry gets the top schematic matchup of the tight ends on the slate. That said, projections are fairly modest on the veteran tight end, barely separating from the other options on the slate. This feels like a slate likely to be decided by which tight end finds paint.

CHALK BUILD::

By The Numbers is a weekly matchup visual created using public data from NFLverse. For more understanding of each metric, use By The Numbers Guide.

Mike Johnson (MJohnson86) has racked up over $500,000 in DFS profit as an NFL tournament player with success in all styles of contests

Strategy Ideas and Things To Consider for Sunday’s 2-game Slate:

Overview ::

It is important to understand the big picture of these teams both in terms of their inner workings and their perceptions entering this week::

• Patriots – New England won a low scoring defensive battle with the Chargers in the Wild Card round and then battled it out once again with the Texans in last week’s Divisional matchup. While the scoreboard shows 28 points for New England last week, which on the surface suggests they had things working, the reality is that their offense had massive struggles against one of the league’s best defenses. The Patriots turned the ball over three times and allowed five sacks, while averaging a putrid 3.9 yards per play for the game. This week they go on the road to face a Denver defense that is also one of the toughest in the league on a down to down basis, with a solid run defense and one of the stronger secondaries in the league.
• Broncos – Denver survived an instant classic in the Divisional Round with an overtime victory over the Bills. The Broncos did some great things, but they also benefited from timely calls and a lot of Buffalo mistakes. After surviving that close call, they found out that starting QB Bo Nix broke his ankle and is done for the season. This leaves veteran Jarrett Stidham as their starter for their first AFC Championship game since 2015. The Patriots defense is allowing only 3.4 yards per play through two playoff games and will present a tall task for Stidham and head coach Sean Payton. 
• Rams – The Rams have been an outstanding offense throughout the season, but went into a shell and struggled for large portions of both playoff games so far. Carolina and Chicago each kept the Los Angeles offense in check to varying degrees and Los Angeles won each game by only a field goal. Los Angeles beat Seattle the first time they faced each other and led the entire game before blowing a fourth quarter lead in December. The Rams are too strong to get blown out (they are 14-5 and have been tied or had the lead in the 4th quarter of all five losses) and are unlikely to blow out a very good Seattle team playing at home, leading to a situation where this will very likely be a tight game that comes down to the last possession or two.
• Seahawks – Seattle dominated the overmatched and decimated 49ers in the Divisional round, but lost RB Zach Charbonnet to a torn ACL in the first half. The Seahawks passing offense has been low-volume, but high-efficiency throughout the season as Seattle leaned on their RB duo of Charbonnet and Kenneth Walker III. I don’t think the Seahawks will give Walker 30+ touches, and I also don’t expect them to lean heavily on their remaining backups to spell Walker. This dynamic leads to a situation where I expect Seattle’s pass rate to spike in this matchup and makes them a really interesting team to build around on this slate.

QB Thoughts ::

• On a two-game slate, we have four QB options. Each roster can only play one, so from a “baseline” standpoint we would expect 25% ownership for each. Sometimes there are spots that stand out so much that someone will get up near 50% and become “chalk”. Likewise, sometimes there is a spot or player that looks so bad relative to the rest that they will be below 10% owned and qualify as “contrarian”. On this slate (and most 2-game slates), QB ownership is likely to be relatively flat, with everyone between 15 and 35% owned. 
• Stafford and Maye are likely to be the two highest owned QBs, which is funny from the lens of the fact that they are facing two of the best pass defenses in the league. Mainly this is a result of the fact that the slate’s pricing is so loose that simply playing the top projected QBs is fairly easy.
• Rushing from QBs on a small slate always has the potential to play a huge factor in how what becomes “optimal”. From that lens, Stafford and Stidham provide almost zero rushing upside and Darnold provides just slightly more than zero, while Maye provides (by far) the most potential to add points from his legs. Stidham could help you win a tournament without carrying many players with him due to his salary and the way Denver spreads things around, while Maye could do the same in a scenario where he rushes for 30 or 40 yards and scores once or twice on the ground. Meanwhile, Stafford and Darnold are probably best to be stacked with two or three teammates.

RB Thoughts ::

• Kenneth Walker III and Kyren Williams are coming off massive games where they were easily the top performers at the position on the weekend and each led their respective day’s two game slate in scoring. Now Walker is in a workhorse role with Zach Charbonnet done for the season and Kyren is in a tougher matchup and still splitting work with Blake Corum to some extent. Walker will probably be the highest owned player on the slate, and understandably so. 
• RJ Harvey’s workload probably gets a boost with Bo Nix out of the picture, but his efficiency will also likely take a hit. Considering the fact that he has already been an inefficient runner for most of the season this makes him a relatively high risk / high reward option on this slate. 
• The Patriots backfield has been a 60/40 split in recent weeks with Rhamondre Stevenson on the high end. The matchup here is tough, but not impossible to overcome. To me the more interesting option is Henderson at a lower salary and a fraction of the ownership, while seemingly having the skill set to break off a huge play that flips the slate.
• Blake Corum is once again lurking and has the capability of turning a slate upside down if things were to break a certain way. 

WR Thoughts ::

• The wide receiver position is a wild one this week as it has such massive changes in tiers in terms of expectations and certainty. 
• The top tier is obviously Puka Nacua and Jaxon Smith-Njigba, who spent the season as the best receivers in the game and each had massive games the last time these teams played. On a two game slate with no other players priced above $6,500 it is pretty straightforward to say that these are elite options who are relatively easy to fit on your rosters. Even in the first matchup between these teams, which was a lower scoring defensive battle, JSN had 22.5 DK points and Puka had 14.5 without either of them scoring a touchdown. Both will be massive “chalk”, but I’m not sure that’s how we should be thinking about it. Rather, we should think in terms of does our roster have zero, one, or two of them. 
• If you don’t play either of them, you can literally fit the highest remaining salary players across the board for your lineup if you play the cheapest defense (Denver). This means that if you play neither of them (both will be over 60% owned), it is basically like a preseason slate where there is no salary cap as you can play any combination of eight players you want. From that lens, if heading down this path then the optimal approach is probably to leave a significant amount of salary on the table. While there will be a very small amount of rosters who have neither of JSN or Puka, those that don’t play either of them will all look very similar as most people will use almost all of their salary since they are taking such a leap of faith to fade both studs, they will seek as much certainty as possible the rest of the way. From a game theory standpoint, on rosters with neither of JSN or Puka I think leaving between $1,500 and $2,500 in salary on the table makes a lot of sense. 
• JSN has under 15 PPR points in only four games this season, while Puka has been under that mark in only three games. The likelihood of both being held under that number in such a big spot is very low, and the likelihood of three or four other receivers on this slate reaching 20-ish points is also very low. If making a roster with neither JSN or Puka, it would definitely be a 3-RB roster as the path to them not being optimal seems most likely to be from touchdowns coming on the ground rather than both of them are just shut down entirely. 
• I think it is fine to play one or both of them, with no real deep thoughts on how to build around them. It is unlikely that this slate plays out in a way where both of them are not in the optimal lineup just because of how salaries and matchups are lining up. 
• The next “tier” appears to be Davante Adams, Stefon Diggs, and Courtland Sutton. Adams was dominant and had an outstanding connection with Matthew Stafford for much of the season, but has not looked the same since his late season hamstring issue and has struggled in the playoffs. He has a tough matchup on the perimeter with an elite Seattle secondary. He had only one catch (for a touchdown) in Week 11 against Seattle, and did not play in Week 16. Diggs plays a low snap count for a WR1 and has a very difficult matchup, while Sutton is facing a very good secondary and shutdown CB Christian Gonzalez, while dealing with a backup QB. It wouldn’t be shocking for any of these three to post a dud here, but all three have the talent and role to make a 20-point outing well within reach. I see two likely outcomes from this group. The first is that one of these three will post a game in the 18 to 22-point range, one will be in the low double digits, and one will post a “dud”. The other is that all three will post scores somewhere in the 10 to 15-point range, which would be a spot where none of them are winning or losing a tournament for you. 
• This tier will have a huge impact on the slate for multiple reasons. Aside from the obvious issue of it being a small slate and any big performance carries a ton of weight, the production of these three will also negatively correlate with the other tiers. A big game from Adams likely hurts Puka’s chances of being in the optimal lineup at his salary, while the NE/DEN game doesn’t seem likely to have a ton of offensive production, so Diggs and Sutton posting solid games reduces the chances of their cheap receiving counterparts posting “had to have it” scores at cheap prices. On the flip side, any of these guys  who posts a “dud” increases the likelihood of someone else (LAR TE, DEN WR, NE WR) sneaking in a usable score at a low salary that changes the slate.
• The final tier is “everyone else”. Seattle should throw more, which makes Kupp and Shaheed super interesting. Denver legitimately has four receivers AFTER Sutton who are capable of posting a score you need to win. New England has four guys after Diggs who will play meaningful amounts in a tough matchup. I probably won’t try to mess with the Patriots, but Seattle and Denver both seem like spots where a secondary receiver posting a game of 15+ points is very possible (if not likely). If you play any of the “other” Rams WRs, you are hoping for an injury AND them falling way behind.
• Cooper Kupp is one of my favorite WRs on the slate at his salary. He looked terrific last week and played a high snap rate and caught every target, but the game script didn’t require much in the second half. 
• Sean Payton loves Lil’Jordan Humphrey. I’m not sure why, but it doesn’t matter, he just does. Assuming Troy Franklin is out, what would make the most sense would be for the Broncos to use Sutton, Pat Bryant, and Marvin Mims Jr. as their primary three receivers on almost every 11-personnel snap, but they won’t. Mims had a huge game last week, but had not seen over 50% snaps since Week 7 prior to that. One of the biggest questions of the slate is whether Payton puts that genie back in the bottle with Bryant returning from a concussion. 

TE Thoughts ::

• AJ Barner is my favorite tight end of the weekend as I expect a higher pass rate for the Seahawks and don’t really love any of the other options. 
• Hunter Henry has double digit points in six of his last eight games, but went over 15 only once. He is a pretty solid bet for a good game here, but doesn’t seem likely to post a huge one. Ultimately his viability comes down to how the rest of the position does. If he scores his usual 10 to 15 points, the question becomes, does one of the other options match it at a lower salary or does the rest of the position fail and make it worth paying up for him? Obviously he could post a bigger game here with the Broncos secondary potentially smothering the Patriots WRs, but in terms of “most likely” outcomes it would seem that whether we want to play Henry or not relies a lot on what the other players do.
• The Rams are a great offense and play several tight ends. Colby Parkinson, Tyler Higbee, and Terrence Ferguson combined for 14 targets last week. Parkinson is the primary option and most involved in the offense, while Higbee is a trusted veteran and Ferguson has the potential to be a matchup nightmare, while the team seems to be looking for ways to scheme him the ball recently. Any of them posting a game that matters is squarely in the range of outcomes, although it’s highly unlikely that more than one does.

Positional Rankings ::

(My favorite plays on the slate at each position when considering all elements, including salary/ownership)

RB ::

1. Kenneth Walker III
2. Kyren Williams
3. TreVeyon Henderson
4. Rhamondre Stevenson
5. RJ Harvey

WR ::

1. Puka Nacua
2. Jaxon Smith-Njigba
3. Courtland Sutton
4. Davante Adams
5. Cooper Kupp
6. Stefon Diggs
7. Rashid Shaheed
8. Kayshon Boutte
9. Pat Bryant
10. Troy Franklin

TE ::

1. AJ Barner
2. Hunter Henry
3. Colby Parkinson
4. Evan Engram
5. Tyler Higbee

SHORT SLATE-ONLY OPTIONS ::

• Here are a few cheaper options that I’ll be considering on this slate that can help you make a unique lineup, but you wouldn’t be playing on the Main Slate::
  • Blake Corum
  • Lil’Jordan Humphrey
  • Marvin Mims Jr.
  • Terrence Ferguson

Good luck and see you in the lobby at 3:00 pm ET Sunday!!

-Mike (MJohnson86)