Welcome to Week 2 and a look at tournament play on SuperDraft. SuperDraft is a relatively new site that is making an aggressive push in the DFS space, and what I’m especially excited about is their Week 2 tournament is $250k, the same size as Week 1. We often see sites shrink their tourneys as the season goes on, and maybe SuperDraft will, but not yet!
Before you read this article, you should read my NFL SuperDraft Primer to get a basic understanding of the site, how it’s different from Draftkings and Fanduel, and the strategy elements that come into play. If you haven’t signed up yet, you can get $100 free with a minimum $100 deposit!! (Promo Code :: OWS)
First, all the normal NFL strategy about stacking and correlation still applies. It definitely makes sense to strongly consider pairing your QB with a receiver. Game stacks are entirely viable here. The good news is, you don’t have to change your entire approach to be successful on SuperDraft. All you have to do is change your mentality of player selection, since the multiplier introduces so many different strategy dynamics, as the primer goes over.
With that, let’s take a look at Week 2. I’m not going to go game by game here (we have the Edge for that!), but rather, position by position, trying to spot where I think there are good opportunities to leverage attractive scoring multipliers.
Last week we saw the SuperDraft tourney won by a roster with Jalen Hurts, who I called out as my favorite QB play. The top lineups were generally not filled with “top QBs” despite Patrick Mahomes and Kyler Murray putting up huge games; their multipliers just weren’t attractive enough. Quarterback scoring generally tends to be fairly clustered, which means the odds of a higher-multiplier QB putting up the best score is just so high on SuperDraft.
I wouldn’t argue with you if you wanted to use Dak or Herbert despite low multipliers, as that’s the best game environment on the slate. But personally, my QB pool isn’t going to start until we get to Hurts, who once again has an awfully enticing 1.3x multiplier. I’m also interested in Matt Ryan (1.35x), Jameis Winston (1.35x), Joe Burrow (1.4x), Baker Mayfield (1.4k), Trevor Lawrence (1.5x), Tua Tagovailoa (1.55x), and Mac Jones (1.65x). It’s worth noting there is a non-zero chance that we get news that Justin Fields will take over in Chicago after Andy Dalton’s predictably terrible Week 1 performance, and if that comes to pass, he’s a fantastic option at a 1.7x multiplier against the soft defense of the Bengals. In cash, I’ll probably stick to one of the “safer” QBs, but in tournaments, I want to take shots at ceiling with the higher-multiplier guys.
At running back, I think there’s a defensible argument for playing one lower-multiplier guy, as the real elite studs like Christian McCaffrey, Dalvin Cook, Derrick Henry, and Alvin Kamara possess 30+ point ceilings even without a multiplier. I’ll have modest exposure to them, but I’m generally targeting upside via multipliers. Nick Chubb as a massive home favorite with the best adjusted line yards matchup of the week is somewhat interesting at 1.2x, but I’m more interested in the next tier. Austin Ekeler (1.35x), Joe Mixon (1.4x), Chris Carson (1.4x), Jonathan Taylor (1.35x), Miles Sanders (1.45x), Najee Harris (1.45x), Damien Harris (1.55x), Darrell Henderson (1.55x), and Chase Edmonds (1.65x) are the bulk of my running back pool. Najee is especially attractive after handling every running back touch in Week 1, but you can make strong cases for any of these guys. 100 rushing yards and a touchdown on SuperDraft is worth 18 points, which gets any of these into the mid-20s at least, so these are ceilings I feel completely comfortable targeting in tournaments over the elite backs.
As with other sites I want to correlate here, as even my high-multiplier QBs will most likely be bringing someone with them if they hit. The format here is a little strange though. Because of the multiplier system, we could see a quarterback having a big game without a receiver, or (even more easily) vice versa. And because of the variance inherent in the receiver position, it’s especially likely that the highest scoring receivers will come from the higher-multiplier group. If I was running Josh Allen, I’d probably be more inclined to pair him with Cole Beasley or Manny Sanders than I would with Stefon Diggs (but if I wanted to use a Diggs pairing, I’d make sure every other player on the roster had a high multiplier).
There are several stud receivers in good spots who could feasibly put up 30+ points even with low multipliers: Ridley, Jefferson, Diggs, Allen, Metcalf, AJ Brown, Thielen, Evans, Cooper, and Robinson all fall into this bucket for me. I don’t want a tremendous amount of exposure, but I think they’re worth at least considering as you try to balance your safer plays with your higher-variance options.
Once we get up past the 1.25x level, I’m looking at Tyler Lockett (1.25x), Diontae Johnson (1.3x), Chris Godwin (1.3x), Jarvis Landry (1.35x), Brandin Cooks (1.4x), Ceedee Lamb (1.4x), D.J Chark (1.4x), Corey Davis (1.45x), Antonio Brown (1.45x), Ja’Marr Chase (1.45x), Devonta Smith (1.5x), Tee Higgins (1.5x), Mike Williams (1.6x) and Russell Gage (1.6x) as all-around robust plays. Lamb is my favorite here as a full-time player in the highest-total game of the week with a highly attractive multiplier, followed by Mike Williams.
Wide receiver also brings us some extremely high-multiplier, high-risk plays. Guys like Cedrick Wilson (1.75x), KJ Hamler (1.75x), Van Jefferson (1.75x), Jalen Reagor (1.8x), Donovan Peoples-Jones (1.8x), and Marquez Callaway (1.8x) all fall into this bucket for me, with Callaway being my overall favorite from this group.
Last week, I mentioned how I was completely comfortable just playing Travis Kelce at tight end despite a 1x multiplier because his floor/ceiling combination was unrivaled. This week, you could make a case that Darren Waller deserves the same treatment. Maybe this is just me being biased, but I’m not quite ready to put Waller on the same level as Kelce just yet (this could be a mistake…), and while I’m happy to use a lot of him, tight end is also an attractive place to fill in some QB stacks. Kyle Pitts (1.4x) with Ryan, Mike Gesicki (1.3x) with Tua look attractive for stacks. Jared Cook at 1.6x gets you strong multiplier exposure to the DAL/LAC game. But I think my favorite overall tight end of the week is Tyler Higbee at 1.5x. Higbee played 100% of the snaps last week and saw six targets. His role is extremely secure, and while I think he’s a solid all-around play, he would also see a significant boost if Darius Leonard (who didn’t practice Thursday) is ruled out for this game.
One challenge with adjusting to SuperDraft is that we get so used to thinking about targeting game environments on other sites, and that isn’t always as surefire of a thing on SD. The Cowboys // Chargers game is going to attract a ton of ownership on other sites (rightly so), but most of the plays, including the QBs, are low-multiplier options on SuperDraft, which means that game would have to REALLY explode for guys like Prescott, Herbert, Allen, or Cooper to put up tourney-winning scores. It’s possible, of course, but I don’t view it as likely.
One thing I’m going to be paying close attention to these first few weeks is where the ownership is going. If people are hopping over to SuperDraft and just building stacks of the same game environments that they’re targeting on Draftkings or Fanduel, we’ll see guys like Dak, Herbert, Amari, and Allen be significantly over-owned relative to their likelihood of putting up tourney-winning scores. If that’s the case, the smart way to play would be to avoid those types of plays entirely and just hope they drag down large portions of the field. Or, we may see people adjust and take on TOO much risk by ignoring those types of elite-but-low-multiplier plays entirely, which would leave them as viable guys to include in player pools. My guess is it’s the former, as from Week 1 we saw a lot of ownership on players with 1.1x or lower multipliers.
