JM’s Player Grid 3.24

JMToWin is a high-stakes tournament champion (Thunderdome, Luxury Box, Game Changer, Wildcat, King of the Hill/Beach, Spy, etc.) who focuses on the DraftKings Main Slate

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OWS Fam ::

This is not a complete list of all the good plays on the slate

This is, instead, a look at the player pool I’ll be fishing

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The Grid ::

Bottom-Up Build

:: covered in-depth in the Angles Pod (it’s highly recommended that you listen to the breakdown of the roster in order to see the thinking behind it, and in order to understand what we’re talking about when we look at a “bottom-up build”)

Blue Chips

:: my “Tier 1” plays: the plays I feel confident leaning into across different types of builds; these players have a high ceiling and a low likelihood of price-considered failure

Build-Arounds

:: games, offenses, situations, or scenarios I’ll be looking to build around across my rosters

Building Blocks

:: unique player pairings that can be used as foundational building blocks for tournament rosters

Bonuses

:: players who don’t fit into the categories above — either Upside pieces who don’t have the floor to be Blue Chips (and are not being focused on within my game-focused builds) or players who may not have a strong shot at ceiling, but are worth keeping in mind from a “role” perspective

Beta

:: a new category for 2024! — these are players who are not going to be “featured” on my tighter builds (i.e., one could show up on a tighter build, but they are not being prioritized as such), but who I will be mixing and matching across some portion of my MME builds

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Sunday Morning Update

Bottom-Up Build

Full breakdown (of what this is, and what the thinking is behind these players) can (and should) be found in the Angles Pod (on the One Week Season podcast feed).

Bottom-Up Build
DK Salary Remaining :: $6.0K

Derek Carr
Tony Pollard
D’Andre Swift
Rashid Shaheed
Devaughn Vele
Diontae Johnson
Dallas Goedert
Jameson Williams
Bears

Join The Bottom-Up Build Contest On DraftKings!

Buy-In:

Free

Rules:

Build with a salary cap of $44k or below!

Prizes:

1st Place = 150 Edge Points + Rare Blue Name Tag in Discord
2nd Place = 75 Edge Points
3rd Place = 40 Edge Points

*1 Edge Point = $1 in DFS courses on OWS

<< Join Here >>

*must use an OWS avatar (found on your profile page) to be eligible to win

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Blue Chips

49ers Core

I originally put this together before the initial Kittle news broke. Now, Kittle is doubtful, which means “49ers Core” went from three players down to two. So let’s look at this.

A typical NFL offense produces 65 to 75 skill position player points per game (DraftKings scoring). Some offenses land in the 55-60 point range pretty often. Some offenses land in the 80-85 point range on a somewhat regular basis. If the 49ers manage even just 70 skill position player points here, it’s pretty fair to assume that Eric Saubert, Jauan Jennings, Chris Conley, and Ronnie Bell will combine for 25 or fewer of those points. All of a sudden, Mason // Aiyuk become even less about “mixing and matching them across your rosters” (the way I would have been looking at Mason // Aiyuk // Kittle), and instead start to look like a pretty viable $12.4k block to play across rosters.

Another way to look at this is to recognize that Conley/Bell are unlikely to get many touches, and Mason // Kittle // Jennings // Saubert cost $19k combined, on an offense that frequently produces 75+ skill position player points. 78 points would be 4x the salary of these four, which would mean that mixing and matching two- and even three-player combinations from this group would be +EV. Add the fact that the 49ers are top-heavy in their roster construction (paying their superstars, and otherwise collecting respected veterans as backups and role players), and you realize that someone like Saubert (eight years in the league; 38 career catches; time spent with 10 different NFL teams) may not account for much of that production either, which means that the $16.5k block of Mason + Aiyuk + Jennings is interesting. And finally, even bad NFL offenses are typically going to produce 55 DraftKings points, and if we assume that it’s unlikely more than 15 points come from backups and role players in this situation, that would still leave 40 points for Mason and Aiyuk to split. Basically, any way you cut it, one of Mason // Aiyuk is likely to soar clear of 20 DK points, and there’s a pretty good chance both of them do so. Quite frankly, you could make a case that it’s +EV to have as much as 80% of each of these players (with the math obviously meaning you would have 60% of rosters on which you have both guys); and it’s honestly pretty high-probability that at least one of these two will post a score that would help push you toward a tourney win if you had it. I don’t think Shanahan and the 49ers “completely fail” against this downtrodden Rams defense, which means I’m essentially compelled, by the numbers, to have heavy Mason/Aiyuk exposure, with a decent dose of Jennings, and even a bit of Saubert.

“Light Blue” Chips

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Build-Arounds

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Building Blocks

“Smash Smash”

Dak + CeeDee + McBride + Montgomery

Story:

“Ravens // Cowboys and Lions // Cardinals both pay off”

Why It Works:

As explored in my DFS Interpretations for the Ravens // Cowboys game :: there is potential for the optimal strategy this week to be “Play Dak and CeeDee without including a Ravens bring-back.” On this roster, we then also include two pieces that could benefit if the Lions // Cardinals game is shooting out, with McBride likely to function as a key piece of the Cardinals offense in that scenario, and with Montgomery A) having potential to score multiple touchdowns, and B) functioning as awesome leverage off more popular pieces from the Lions if he hits (i.e., he’s not just scoring points at low ownership, but is also hurting other popular players along the way).

How It Works:

If this block were to hit at the high ends of its range, you’re pretty much winning tourneys. Dak + CeeDee has true “had to have it” ceiling, while “Montgomery hitting” would not only help you, but would hurt plenty of others. McBride would be a lower-owned, high-upside sweetener, allowing you to pretty much do whatever you wanted on the rest of your roster from here.

POTENTIAL DOWNSIDE:

The story plays out differently, and you don’t get first place — which is really all that matters.

“Why Not Both?”

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Bink Machine

A look at some of the rules I’ll be applying in the Bink Machine this week.

Won’t you be Amari Nabers?

The thinking behind this rule is detailed in the Building Blocks section above. This rule says, “On 100% of Nabers rosters, play one of the other players in this pool.” I would then set my prescribed player exposure to ensure that most of these rosters have Amari as the bring-back, with a bit of Jeudy and Moore mixed in.

Bonuses

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If Building For Single-Entry // Three-Entry Max

This is my narrowest pool, which means it’s the pool likeliest to change a bit as I move deeper into builds. If it changes throughout Saturday night, I’ll add an update in this space.

If I were building for single-entry // three-entry Max, my tightened-up player pool would be:

QB ::

Dak Prescott || Lamar Jackson || Kyler Murray || Jared Goff || Derek Carr || Jalen Hurts || Sam Darnold

RB ::

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A Wrap ::

I’ll see you at the top of the leaderboards this weekend!

-JM