Angles hits inboxes on Thursday mornings throughout the regular season; you can also find Angles in The Scroll on Thursday afternoons.

OWS Fam!!!

(whispers) “We’re rounding into form”

Following the Binks channel the last few weeks, the OWS community is popping up more and more on the leaderboards. This isn’t a surprise. We talked a few weeks back about how four(ish) games of data is a significant sample size. Though we’re still early in the NFL season, around the one-month mark we start to see teams show their true selves. Then we get some data to back it up, and can identify trends, regression opportunities, and more. Thus, success is following, and YLTSI!

By my count in Week 5, we had at least a handful of DK Milly sweats (including a 10th place finish!), and peppered the leaderboards in other flagship contests as well. (Collectively) We are rounding into form.
 

Play the Long Game

Is there any exercise more futile in a football context than looking at a team’s schedule in the preseason and laying out W’s and L’s? Maybe NFL mock drafts? But that’s all I’ve got.

It’s a waste of time and effort to look at a team’s schedule and run through it game by game to come up with a final record, and with how the 2024 NFL season has played out thus far, this feeling of mine is more reinforced. There’s no way you pencil in the Giants for a win at Seattle and “August You” does not expect the Ravens to lose at home to the Raiders with a QB (Minshew) who is now benched three weeks later. We don’t know what injuries will take place, what coaching adjustments and changes may transpire, and what each week’s situation will look like (e.g., Giants traveling to Seattle when they are on a short week after playing the physical Lions).

Taking micro events (one game) and projecting them out as one event is a difficult exercise. It’s futile because of the variables at play. But why do we do them? Because we can more accurately predict long-term outcomes. Sticking with the Seahawks season for a moment, sure they just lost a crushing game to the Giants, who will likely be mediocre at best this season with low odds of making the playoffs. We may not have been able to predict that outcome, but we can predict that it’s likely Seattle will pull off an upset of their own at some point later this season to balance this out. We can assess the long-term prospects (generally) but the peaks and troughs along the way are harder to identify.

Another brief example of this is the Bengals season through five games. 1-4 is #notgreat. Did anyone have them losing to the Commanders AND the Patriots at home?! Nope. But, believe what you want about Cincinnati’s season-long outlook, and the smart money would say most of us could be within a few games of predicting their final record (say 8-9 to 11-6).

The point is this…stick to the long-term visions while predicting one-game samples. You have to consider the context and current point on the continuums of NFL seasons to think through what could happen in any game. We’ll always have outliers, but while the full season records should generally have some sense of normalcy (we get at least 60% or so of the same teams in the playoffs from the previous season), the week-to-week outcomes will vary.

We write and talk about angles every week on OWS. And this week we’re going to lean into that here to prime you for the week. Every one of these teams is at a point of their season (thanks for clarifying!). There’s the typical or standard expectations and then there’s at least one scenario we can call out based on what we’ve seen and what we are expecting over a longer sample. Let’s run through it!
 

Week 6: The Slate featuring the Defeateds 

The two undefeated teams left in the NFL are on a bye this week: the Chiefs and Vikings. We’re also down the Dolphins and Rams, as they rest. Off the main slate are the 49ers // Seahawks // Jaguars // Browns // Bengals // Giants // Bills // and Jets. Well, using Seattle and Cincy in the intro now feels bad. You can think through which players won’t be included in our pools here as we head into a second consecutive 10-game slate featuring….

The Baltimore Ravens (28.5) as nearly a touchdown favorites hosting their stately neighbors, from Washington DC (22.5). Lamar Jackson and Jayden Daniels will surely find themselves in side-by-side graphics on more than one occasion and the similarities seem appropriate. After watching what Baltimore has done to the Bills and Bengals defenses in back-to-back weeks, public consensus will never be higher than against Dan Quinn and the Commanders. There will be high confidence in the Ravens succeeding offensively once again, but remember that despite last week’s tournament-winning shootout, they would optimally like to win games on the ground. Washington, similarly, would like to win football games with their QB and RBs through a dynamic running game. Daniels’ pass attempts through five games: 24, 29, 23 (@ CIN), 30, 25.

Detroit (27.5) heads to Dallas (24.5) in what sets up as the likely other game to top the ownership charts this week. For more reasons than one, the Lions seem to always be potent on offense, stout against the run, and impotent in coverage, which can breed high-scoring games. The Lions have a big rest advantage coming off their bye and the health of Dallas’ defensive line looms. I’d expect much of the public here to align with Detroit, especially if Micah Parsons sits again, which seems likely. Interestingly, we haven’t had the 2023 Cowboys offensive outputs at home yet in 2024 with mostly the same personnel, so maybe this is the week. 

The Falcons (at Carolina) and Packers (vs. Arizona) come in with healthy 26.5 point totals against their foes. The Panthers seem like the ideal matchup for any QB to get right, or in Kirk Cousins’ case, continue a hot streak. The way the Bears handled Carolina last week will make it seem like Atlanta will do what they want here. Could they decide this is the get-right Bijan Robinson game? Or will they overthink and come in overconfident and get punched in the mouth by an inferior opponent? 

For Green Bay, they had the good fortune of a win last week against the Rams when they had an incredibly low net success rate but made up for it with chunk gains. Jordan Love has not looked great since coming back, but he should have a healthier WR room for this one. The law of averages will still say an unlucky game will follow a lucky one. Do what you will with that! The Green Bay defense is still not at full health and the Cardinals had some turnover fortune but also a solid second-half performance against the 49ers in Week 5.

Beyond these four games, some other notes:

• Philadelphia (26) hosts the Browns, who will stick with Deshaun Watson for another week. Sentiment is low, as is the expected point total for Cleveland (16). The last time we saw Philadelphia was at the mercy of the Bucs, so one would think two weeks of game planning against a possibly Myles Garrett-less Browns defense should lead to success. A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith will return, giving the Eagles their full complement of weapons.
• Tampa Bay (22) and New Orleans (19) have a divisional matchup that will feature two former University of Oklahoma QBs in Baker Mayfield and Spencer Rattler. Rattler will likely be the talk of the slate at minimum price, but whether his presence lowers or raises the overall prospects of a ripe game environment will remain to be seen. It’s Marshon Lattimore vs. Mike Evans week as well.
• The Texans and Titans are the only other two offenses expected to clear 20 points. Houston is of course down Nico Collins and at New England with Drake Maye making his first NFL start. Tennessee, on the other hand, hosts the Colts, who could be without Anthony Richardson, Jonathan Taylor, and Michael Pittman Jr. Which only means one thing: Flacco triples! (I kid).

My statement to you heading into Week 6 is simple: Think about how these games on this slate fit into the story of an NFL season. There will be unforeseen outcomes, there will be rare performances, and although we can’t predict those with certainty, we can prepare for them.

Lean into the variance, find where you agree or disagree with the “face value” of a game. And build. To. Win.

We’ll see you at the top of the leaderboards!
~Larejo

Majesstik is one of the most respected Slate Breakdown artists in DFS

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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::

This slate has been an intriguing one to watch take shape from the sidelines. Less than 24 hours ago, people were clamoring to play a fifth-round rookie quarterback in his first NFL start because the slate was so deprived of value. Fast forward to Friday evening and running back value has opened up in the form of Bucky Irving and Antonio Gibson. Furthermore, four of the top eight players in expected ownership are from a game involving two teams averaging 22.2 and 16.6 points per game this season. Yes, we speak of the Falcons and Panthers. But hey, at least the Falcons have a healthy 26.5 Vegas implied team total. Until last week’s 36-30 overtime shootout, the Falcons had scored 10 points, 22 points, 17 points, and 26 points and very clearly would prefer a more run-balanced and methodical approach on offense. Remember, Zac Robinson hails from the Sean McVay coaching tree, a lineage that is typically defined by their ability to adapt to game environments and make necessary adjustments based on their opponents.

That is a solid snapshot to describe how this slate is taking form. The state of this slate is defined by over-certainty. There are currently nine players expected to garner more than 20% ownership, with only Jake Ferguson on a team currently in the top half of the league in scoring. What about a Ravens team averaging the second most points per game this season, with the highest team total on the slate? What about true workhorse running backs (well, there are only two on this slate – Saquon Barkley and Alvin Kamara, but Kamara’s team has a 19-point Vegas implied team total)? What about the wide receiver who finished the 2023 season as the overall WR1? What about the Packers with a 26.5 Vegas implied team total at home against the Cardinals? This brings us back to the state of this slate – the field is expressing overconfidence in players and teams that should not be as highly regarded as they currently are. And it’s our job to capitalize on those transgressions. Welcome to Week 6.

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.

BIJAN ROBINSON

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. Bijan Robinson averages 13.4 carries and 3.8 targets per game while playing for an offense averaging just 59.2 plays per game, and that includes the 81 offensive plays run from scrimmage in their Week 5 overtime shootout. That means they averaged 53.75 offensive plays run from scrimmage during the first month of the season. Does that mean that Bijan’s piece of the pie remains consistent when the team is expected to run more offensive plays, as should be the case against the lowly Panthers? Well, he saw 12 carries and three targets to the six carries and three targets of Allgeier when the team ran 81 offensive plays in Week 5. I don’t know, man. It feels like the field is trying to get Bijan to workhorse status to support their Best Ball bags. Sure, the matchup and the like, but it’s actually a poor schematic matchup against a Panthers team that leads the league in Cover-3 utilization. Typically, man/gap run-blocking concepts carry higher efficiency against Cover-3 due to the static nature of the linebackers, a unit that has clearly delineated run-stopping responsibilities against zone but can be prone to attack by pulling guards and tackles in the second level (as is the case with man/gap concepts). That’s important here because Bijan has seen 57 carries behind zone concepts and just nine carries behind man/gap concepts. In other words, I don’t think it’s overly likely we see a drastic improvement in his 4.3 yards per carry thus far. But again, it is the Panthers.

BUCKY IRVING

EXPANSIVE CHALK. In stark contrast to the previous exploration with Bijan, Liam Coen has been doing a solid job of giving his backfield the best opportunity to succeed this season, tailoring run-blocking concepts to best suit the talents of Rachaad White and Bucky Irving. White has seen 32 carries behind zone concepts to 18 carries behind man/gap concepts while Irving has seen 28 carries behind man/gap concepts and 13 carries behind zone concepts. In other words, Coen is simplifying the reads for his rookie running back to great effect, as evidenced by his robust 5.6 yards per carry, 3.68 yards after contact per attempt, and 12 forced missed tackles. We’re likely to see former undrafted free agent Sean Tucker mix in a bit here, but Irving should carry the bulk of the load against a Saints team that could struggle with time of possession considering they are starting a fifth-round rookie quarterback behind an offensive line missing all three interior offensive linemen. Finally, Irving has already been entrusted with goal line duties through the first five games of his rookie season, seeing four goal line carries to the one of White.

DRAKE LONDON

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. Drake London’s season-high in receiving yardage prior to the Week 5 shootout with the Saints stood at just 67 yards. In fact, do you know how many games London has in his two-plus-year career with 100 yards and a score? One. Week 5 was the first time in his career that London has surpassed 100 yards through the air and scored. As far as role and route structure, London is almost directly comparable to Michael Pittman (three games in his four plus year career with 100 yards and a score), and you know we are not typically giddy to play Michael Pittman here at OWS. Just saying.

JAKE FERGUSON

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. There are very few tight ends on this slate (or any slate in 2024?) that can put the slate out of reach. Jake Ferguson is one of them (likely joined by only Brock Bowers, Trey McBride, and Sam LaPorta in Week 6). Except the field likely will not play this man correctly this week. For Ferguson to put the slate out of reach (the entire reason we would pay $5,000 in salary for his services), he would need to surpass 100 yards through the air with a score or score multiple touchdowns. If he is doing either of those things, the chances that Dak Prescott is the optimal quarterback on the slate increase immensely. It’s a two-for-one package through a theoretical framework, and yet, the field likely isn’t going to treat him as such. In other words, we should pair Ferguson with Dak at a 100% frequency any time Ferguson finds his way onto our rosters this week.

DIONTAE JOHNSON

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. Diontae Johnson ranks fifth in targets (45), 12^th in target share (27.3%), 13^th in targets per route run (29.2%), and first in red zone targets (10, only two receptions – lol) and red zone target share (50%). The matchup is far from perfect against a Falcons team allowing just 6.2 yards per pass attempt (sixth) and 187.4 pass yards per game (eighth), but the role is absolutely locked in.

TONY POLLARD

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. Tony Pollard is a fine play, that’s really the best way to describe him this week. He has as good a shot as any back on this slate to see 20-22 running back opportunities. The biggest problem I see is that he has very few paths to more volume than that due to the presence of Tyjae Spears. Even so, Pollard has a path to 100 yards and a score on the ground with enough pass game involvement to offset the need for multiple touchdowns. But that’s exactly what he’ll need to return a GPP-viable score against the Colts.

CHRIS GODWIN

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. Chris Godwin has gotten to a price where a standard nine-target, six-reception game for 70 yards and a score is not going to get the job done for fantasy purposes. The matchup is fine on paper, and the Buccaneers should be afforded additional offensive plays run from scrimmage due to the state of the Saints, but it’s a tough sell for me considering a 6.0 aDOT and moderate 24.8 targets per route run rate.

CHUBA HUBBARD

NEITHER RESTRICTIVE NOR EXPANSIVE CHALK. In a vacuum, I prefer Chuba Hubbard to Diontae Johnson for multiple reasons. The pure on-paper matchup is better for Hubbard, he has a clearer path to consistent volume in this offense, and we might be looking at Hubbard differently this week had he managed three additional yards in Week 5 to push his streak of 100 yards on the ground and a touchdown to three straight games (receiving touchdown in Week 3 against the Raiders). He has also averaged 4.5 targets per game over the previous four games, giving him enough pass game involvement to offset the need for multiple scores.

ANTONIO GIBSON

EXPANSIVE CHALK. We’re really excited to play a chalk running back on the team with the lowest Vegas implied team total on the slate? Remember, the highest correlative functions between running backs and fantasy production are volume (he should have it here) and touchdowns (probably not).

CHALK BUILD::

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

Andy Dalton
Chuba Hubbard
Bijan Robinson
Diontae Johnson
Adonai Mitchell
Jalen Tolbert
Dalton Schultz
Tre Tucker
Buccaneers

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

Ravens

Lamar Jackson + Isaiah Likely costs $12.3k. In Week 1, they combined for 59.5 DK points.

Lamar Jackson + Derrick Henry costs $15.8k. In Week 3, they combined for 59.4 DK points, and in Week 4, they combined for 63.5.

Lamar Jackson + Zay Flowers costs $14.3k. In Week 5, they combined for 59.4 DK points.

Not only is the Washington defense attackable, but the Washington offense ranks top-five in pretty much every important offensive category. What this means for your weekend? :: there’s a good chance the Ravens A) stay aggressive for much of this game, and B) perform well once again. If you don’t have the pieces from this offense that hit, someone else in the tournament you’re in probably WILL have those pieces…which means you should think about positioning yourself to be the roster that HAS these pieces, so that others are left chasing you.

Individually ::

• Lamar Jackson = Light Blue
• Derrick Henry = Light Blue
• Zay Flowers = Tier 1 Bonus
• Isaiah Likely = Tier 1/2 Bonus border
• Mark Andrews = Tier 1/2 Bonus border

But collectively, this offense sets up as a Blue Chip option for me this week.

As explored in my DFS Interpretation for this game :: Washington pieces (McLaurin, running backs, cheap pass catchers) can be considered opposite Baltimore pieces, but the next tourney-winner from this offense will be the first, and the Ravens have a track record over the last couple seasons of crushing high-end competition (see their blowout wins over the 49ers, Lions, and Bills over the last two seasons as examples). Terry McLaurin would probably be on the Tier 1/2 Bonus border for me if isolating him from this game environment, whereas no one else on the Commanders would really make my list.

With all the Lamar exposure I expect to have, I’ll also have some trail bets on Jayden Daniels.

“Light Blue” Chips

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Build-Arounds

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Building Blocks

“Fast Lane”

Dak + Lamb + Tolbert And/Or Ferguson

Story:

“This game shoots out”

Why It Works:

This is a ‘pick a lane’ game, in that it could play out a variety of ways, and each roster you build this week has to account for one of the ways in which this game could play out. Said differently :: In many scenarios, at least one high-end score will emerge from this game. In many others, multiple high-end scores will emerge from this game. Rosters that choose not to attack this game in any way are picking a lane that says, “Tournament-winning rosters won’t feature players from Lions // Cowboys this week.” And the wild thing about this game is that that’s a viable way for things to play out as well.

I’ll have some rosters that ignore this game completely.

But I’ll also have rosters that build around a scenario of this game genuinely shooting out.

Last season, CeeDee and Dak (carrying a combined price tag this week of $15.3k) had games in which they hit for combined scores of 61.7 // 63.5 // 63.9 // 68.5 // 76.1 // 84.4. Wild. Even more wild, however, is that in five of those six games, you could have added either Jake Ferguson or Brandin Cooks (now Tolbert’s role) and remained on a 4x salary pace ($20.3k; scores of 83.1 // 85.5 // 85.6 // 90.8 // 119.7) — and the one time the $20.3k block fell short of 4x was a 77.9 score that would have kept you on a 192-point pace.

How It Works:

If this block were to hit, this would mean a lot of points in this game. Depending on how the rest of the slate shapes up, this could easily mean that rosters NOT built around this game are out of the running on the weekend. This would, of course, leave you competing against only a small percentage of remaining rosters, so rosters with this starting point shouldn’t worry too much about “differentiation” elsewhere.

POTENTIAL DOWNSIDE:

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

“Zoom Zoom”

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Bink Machine

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

Keep It Simple, Stupid

The Ravens are likely to produce at least one tourney-winner this week, and could easily produce two or three solid, price-considered scores. This rule says, “On 92% of rosters, play at least one player from this pool.”

(Note :: I have individual exposure prescribed to each of these players as well, with Likely // Andrews capped in the teens, and with Flowers capped in the 20s. In other words: This rule isn’t risking something like 30% Mark Andrews, or 50% Isaiah Likely. Henry will be my primary piece from this group.)

Zoom Zoom

See the “Zoom Zoom” block above.

This rule says, “On at least 30% of Amon-Ra St. Brown rosters, play Jahmyr Gibbs.”

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 ::

Lamar Jackson (possibly with a tighter-build Daniels roster) || Dak Prescott (possibly with some Goff) || possibly Spencer Rattler // Andy Dalton || possibly Love // Kyler (or I may just save this for large-field play)

RB ::

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A Wrap ::

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

-JM

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

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Welcome back to my (Mjohnson86) Player Grid. I am changing up the format of my Player Grid this year to be more direct about the players I like at each position and keep myself from casting too wide of a net. We have plenty of strategy talk and full game write-ups on every game here at OWS, this year I’m going to use this article to give direct answers on who I think the best tournament plays are each week. Also, note that just because a player isn’t on here doesn’t mean they are a bad play, I’m just intentionally trying to limit the players I list to about 3 QBs, 5 to 7 RBs, 6 to 8 WRs, and 2 or 3 TEs and that means that some plays don’t make the cut – we can’t play everyone. Feel free to drop me feedback in Discord or on Twitter about the new format and if you like this better or last year’s. Enjoy!!

This is a list of players that stand out to me at each position from using my “Checking the Boxes” criteria outlined in my course you can find in our Marketplace. This list is a starting point, from which I build out lineups using game theory and roster construction concepts with the mindset being to find the best plays with big ceilings. Low ownership is a bonus, but not a must. 

(Side note:: You’ll notice at the bottom of this article that Fanduel will have its own Player Grid this year)

Draftkings Player Grid

Quarterback ::

• Lamar Jackson – Sometimes things don’t have to be difficult. Lamar has been lighting up the NFL this season and has a great matchup and game environment this week.
• Dak Prescott – The Cowboys are likely to throw the ball often in this one as their most efficient means of moving the ball and have the potential for elevated play volume and scoring. Dak has a great chance to throw the ball 40+ times with excellent stacking partners to choose from.
• Kirk Cousins – The Falcons offense is hitting its stride and facing a floundering Panthers defense. Cousins is coming off a career game and the coaching staff has to be feeling very comfortable with cutting him loose at this point.
• Salary Savers: Deshaun Watson, Spencer Rattler, Will Levis, Andy Dalton

Running Back :: 

• Bijan Robinson – Bijan was $7,700 in Week 1 against the Steelers and is now $6,600 in Week 6 against the Panthers. Considering how much worse the Panthers have proven to be than the Steelers, the context of this should not be lost on us. 
• Bucky Irving – The Bucs offense made Rachaad White a high-end fantasy asset in 2023 despite his utter lack of efficiency. Irving has outplayed White this season and will have the backfield to himself in Week 6 at a modest salary.
• Jahmyr Gibbs // David Montgomery – The Lions have the best offensive line in the league and are facing a depleted defense that has been absolutely shredded by strong opposing running games. This profiles as a game where both of these guys give us a very usable tournament score or one of them absolutely goes off. Read my DFS+ Interpretation of this game for the full scope of this situation.
• Austin Ekeler – I am assuming that Brian Robinson Jr. is NOT going to play this week. Ekeler should play 60 to 75% of the snaps and the Commanders may play from behind for the first time since Week 1. Ekeler could soak up a lot of targets, play at the goal line, and touch the ball around 20 times in a potential shootout.
• Chuba Hubbard – Hubbard has played outstanding football this season and is the workhorse for the Panthers. He has produced in their competitive games and in the games they fell behind since Andy Dalton took over.
• Salary Savers: Antonio Gibson, Tyler Allgeier, Jaylen Warren

Wide Receiver :: 

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Sonic is a Milly Maker winner and large-field tournament mastermind who focuses on mass-multi-entry play

INCOMING!!!

We’re gonna need to stay flexible this week. In a season already defined by copious amounts of injuries, Week 6 might just come down to reacting to news that wasn’t even covered during the Saturday night barrage of Schefty Bombs. As I type, there are unresolved situations with the Colts, Raiders, and Panthers (among others) that could flip the slate on its ear. When things get chaotic, it’s all about who can pivot fastest and find the edge while everyone else scrambles.

I’m not sure if this is an actual emergency or just a drill, but I’ll have my if/then statements ready, just in case. Either way, I’ll be playing the lotteries on both DraftKings and FanDuel, so things are gonna get weird. But hey, what else is new?

These are contrarian moves I will be mixing into my rosters to differentiate from the masses. Many will miss, but if they hit, we’ll lap the field. 

Secondary Core-Relations

We’re always hunting for those high-ceiling combinations to add to our existing game stacks. It’s better to aim at getting four things right instead of trying to hit a nine-way parlay. I’ll lean on a handful of core secondary stacks that will be finessed into lineups whenever feasible.

A.J. Brown/David Njoku

At 2.5% pOWN, A.J. Brown is exactly the kind of slate-breaking upside we want to target. He’ll need the game script to cooperate, which means the Eagles will have to be pushed by the floundering Browns offense. But with Njoku (projected at <2% ownership), there’s a sneaky path for Cleveland to lean on their long-lost tight end screen game—especially with their struggles in traditional drop-back passing. Get the ball out quickly, let Njoku bulldoze a few defenders, and suddenly we’ve got a game on our hands that keeps Brown’s ceiling very much in play.

We’re not exactly creating leverage here, since no one’s flocking to the skill players in this game. But both Brown and Njoku are capable of winning their position outright on any given week, and there’s a ton of value in that.

Sam LaPorta/KaVontae Turpin

LaPorta was the apple of Jared Goff’s eye in the red zone last year, but Jameson Williams’ emergence has put a bit of a damper on their connection. If Dallas can force the Lions into a pass-heavy game script, there’s a good chance LaPorta and Goff rekindle their bromance. The risk is that Detroit spreads the ball around to all their receivers, or the Cowboys offense sputters, leading to a slow-paced, Lions-dominated game. But with LaPorta sitting at just 2.5% pOWN and offering upside at a onesie position, I’ve got to admit—I’m getting butterflies.

Turpin offers salary relief and sneaky upside at 2% projected ownership. With the Cowboys likely struggling to run the ball, and defenses keying in on CeeDee Lamb and Jalen Tolbert, Dak Prescott might have to get Turpin the ball in space and hope he’s able to make plays.

Ja’Marr Chase/Darius Slayton (FanDuel)

The low-owned FD late-game hammer. LFG! Chase is sitting at just 3% pOWN, while Slayton is even lower at 0.9%, stepping up as the Giants big-play threat with rookie Malik Nabers sidelined by a concussion. Both defenses have been generous in handing out fantasy points to opposing wideouts, making this duo a sneaky way to rack up points late. I want these two repping my 120 PMR when Carrie Underwood prances out there singing that Joan Jett cover that’s getting more annoying by the week.

Other Secondary Stacks I Like:

Tank Dell (4.8% pOWN) and Ja’Lynn Polk (1% pOWN)

Xavier Hutchinson (1.2% pOWN) and Hunter Henry (.9% pOWN)

I’ll mix and match these into my otherwise chalky builds in hopes that Drake Maye stays alive long enough to push the Texans into a back-and-forth affair.

LOWER-OWNED TREASURES

Running Back

Papy is a full-time DFS player, with a focus on high-stakes tourneys, and with hundreds of thousands in lifetime profit

The Board

• This week has a top two tier of games in DET/DAL (52.5) and WASH/BAL (51.5). They stand out as the two best spots for expected points.
• The next tier is also two games, both with upper-middle totals in AZ/GB (47), and ATL/CAR (47). They present clear paths to points but are still a notch below the two best game environments.
• The middle tier has two games that just barely qualify for middle tier status with CLE/PHL (42.5) and IND/TEN (43).
• The bottom tier has four games TB/NO (41.5), HOU/NE (37.5) LAC/DEN (35.5), and PIT/LV (36.5).

Pawn – WR Ja’Lynn Polk ($3,600)

It’s the start of a new era in Boston with Drake Maye ($5,000) making the first start of his career. Maye is probably an upgrade over Brissett after he looked “good enough” in the preseason. Polk played 100% of the snaps last week, and you must imagine the Patriots are going to give him a chance to be their number one WR after they spent the 37^th pick on him in April’s draft. What better time than to feature him than Maye’s first start? It’s not as if Polk hasn’t been involved the past two weeks. He’s seen 6 and 7 targets, but he just hasn’t done anything with them. The change at QB could be the change Polk needs, and it’s difficult to find a guy who could see 8-10 targets priced like a punt. He’s also currently projected to draw almost no ownership, which is strange because there is an abundance of value on this slate. I’m going to use Polk as a one-off salary saver in a variety of different lineups.

Knight – RB Bucky Irving ($5,400)

The Greatest “Cheat Sheet” In DFS

Each week in The Oracle, OWS team members will take on the key strategy questions from that week’s slate :: sharing their thoughts on how they plan to approach these critical elements from a roster-construction, game theory, and leverage perspective.

Week 6 Topics

1. Top Dog – Part II

2. Unique Slate

3. KYT (Know Your Tout) – Part II

4. Value Plays

5. “That was so obvious, how did I not see it?”

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1. Top Dog – Part II

The Question ::

Last week I asked which of the four top projected game environments we thought was most likely to be the “must-have” game on the slate. My three esteemed colleagues all said BAL/CIN, while I said ARI/SF *IF* 49ers LB Fred Warner missed the game, but BAL/CIN if he played. After The Oracle was published, Warner returned to practice and was cleared to play meaning that our group was in unison across the board about the top spot to attack – and we were right in, a BIG way!! 

This week we have a similar situation as there once again appear to be four games that stand out from the rest on this week’s slate::

1. Commanders at Ravens – Jayden Daniels and Lamar Jackson are probably the two most exciting QBs in the league right now and both defenses have had their share of struggles this year.
2. Cardinals at Packers – Two very good offenses with upper-echelon QBs and explosive skill players around them. 
3. Falcons at Panthers – The Panthers defense has been awful and the Falcons offense is hitting its stride, while Carolina’s offense may be just good enough to keep up.
4. Lions at Cowboys – Two relatively high powered offenses whose strengths matchup well with the opposing defense’s path of least resistance.

Considering this is once again a somewhat smaller slate and scoring across the league continues to be modest in many spots, finding a game that truly takes off can quickly become a “must” on a main slate. Which of these four spots do you think is most likely to end up as that game?

The Answers ::

JM >>

Washington // Baltimore — with primary focus on the Baltimore side — is the highest-confidence bet of the bunch to me. Simplifying my thoughts here :: it’s very, very likely that the Ravens put up points here, which means that some strong-to-elite scores are highly likely to emerge from the Baltimore side of the ball.

But while Baltimore is the offense “likeliest to crack 30 points,” I see the Lions // Cowboys game as the matchup that has the clearest shot at truly being “the game you had to have.” Dak Prescott already has games this year of 39, 42, and 51 pass attempts, and the Lions face the third highest opponent pass play rate in the league. The Dallas offense has yet to “click” this year, and there are clear avenues to this game environment underwhelming; but there are also clear pathways to this developing into “the game you had to build around,” making it one of my favorite spots to target this week.

It won’t be surprising to me if 70% or more of my quarterback exposure on the week comes from these two games.

Xandamere >>

While I think BAL/WAS could certainly take off, I’m a little wary of the skill position players in that game. In fact, we have yet to see a single pass catcher put up a game you’d be thrilled to have on a roster outside of Isaiah Likely in Week 1. Oddly, both primary running backs have put up solid games, and of course the quarterbacks are studs…I think my exposure to this game will be quarterbacks that don’t force pass catcher pairings but rather encourage correlation via boosts in my optimizer (i.e. “if Lamar Jackson, boost Zay Flowers/Mark Andrews/Isaiah Likely/Rashod Bateman by 15%”).

For me it’s DET/DAL. I think Dak has a comparable ceiling to Lamar and Daniels and he has some very nice stacking partners and only Jake Ferguson has really swung into chalk territory in our ownership projections, while on the Detroit side it feels like people don’t know who to play out of their embarrassment of riches of offensive players and so they just aren’t really playing anyone besides a bit of Amon-Ra St. Brown. Detroit is certainly hard to figure out where the big plays will come from in a given week (they’re really becoming very 49ers-like in that way), but that just gives us access to big ceilings in a great game environment at very low ownership…yes please.

Hilow >>

To me, it’s the late-game hammer in the Lions at Cowboys. I don’t think the general field is paying enough attention to the fact that the Cowboys led the league in scoring per game at home in 2023 with a robust 36.8 points per game in the friendly confines of Jerry’s World. Even with the team scoring just 19 and 25 points at home this season against the Saints and Ravens, Dak Prescott has averaged 336 passing yards per game at home. I also don’t think the field is viewing CeeDee Lamb the way they did last season after he has failed to surpass 100 yards through the air in all five games to this point in the season. That said, the Lions have struggled to contain slot-hybrid wide receivers after allowing 11 targets to Jaxon Smith-Njigba in Week 4, a 7-117-1 line to Chris Godwin in Week 2, and 14-110-1 line to Cooper Kupp (remember him?) in Week 1. The other problem I foresee the field having with this spot is who to play (or not play) from the Lions, lowering the total expected interest in this game environment. I honestly don’t think you need to force a bring-back from the Lions in this spot due to the unconcentrated nature of their offense, but directed shots can be taken on both pieces of their backfield in game environment bets. 

Mike >>

The Lions and Cowboys stand out to me as the Lions have such a clear path of least resistance in the way in which they want to base their offensive attack – on the ground. This creates a situation where they should be able to sustain drives and should also open up an extremely efficient passing game with chances for deep shots. It is easy to be aggressive on 2nd and 2 after a big eight yard chunk run on first down when you can be very confident in picking up the 3rd and 2 if your deep shot falls incomplete. Just a situation where so much is opened up and the Lions offense has an extremely high chance of success. Prior to their bye, we saw the Lions play in a high scoring and uptempo game against the Seahawks and I think we could see something similar from that spot. While I think DET/DAL is the game most likely to be a wild one, the salaries and condensed usage on ATL/CAR also makes that a game with clear paths to standing out.

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2. Unique Slate

The Question ::

Bringing back a weekly staple of The Oracle, what makes this slate particularly unique?

The Answers ::

Thanks for hanging out with us in The Oracle this week

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

The Props Insider team has helped the OWS Fam profit over $35,000 the last 2 years!! And the best part…

WE ALL GET TO WIN AT THE SAME TIME!

To get all the bets each week, subscribe with a Week, Month, or Year long Subscription

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Within the Scroll each week, we will share our early week bets and the thesis behind them. Our hopes are that this article will help the OWS Fam become better prop bettors as we teach you to fish.

Caution: Odds in the prop’s streets move fast, and it is likely these odds will have changed by the time you read this. With that in mind, we have left a “good to” mark to help you decide if the bet is for you.

(Feel free to DM Xandamere or JReasy on Discord with any feedback)

Marvin Harrison Jr (ARI) UNDER 4.5 receptions

He’s going to have a great career but so far his catch rate is under 50%. He also has a date with a solid Packers pass defense that’s expected to see top cornerback Jaire Alexander return – Arizona has also been a very low volume pass offense with just 138 total pass attempts in 5 games.

The bet is good to: -114

Theo Johnson (NYG) UNDER 26.5 receiving yards

He’s a rookie tight end in an at best so-so passing offense who has 13 targets in 5 games. Yeah, Nabers is out, but this feels like a dramatic overreaction to him having 1 good game – meanwhile he had 2 catches for 31 yards in the other 4 games combined.

The bet is good to: -120

Keenan Allen (CHI) UNDER 47.5 receiving yards

Keenan has not been super involved in this passing offense – he has 81 total receiving yards in 3 games. The matchup here is good, but it was also really good against the Rams and Panthers and he flopped against them. He’s being used in a very short area role which means he has to rack up a bunch of volume to hit. With how bad the Jags have been, I could see Chicago’s defense just controlling this game as they often have been and limiting Bears offensive play volume (Caleb has under 30 pass attempts in all of the Bears wins so far).

The bet is good to: -125

Larejo is a mid-stakes tournament mastermind who specializes in outmaneuvering 150-max players with a small number of entries

Based on some commentary I’ve seen in Discord over the past few weeks, I feel it’s appropriate now in Week 6 to drop a reminder for anybody new here, as to how to use and leverage this article. Willing to Lose came into existence on OWS four seasons ago to complement the content you read on The Scroll. Every article on OWS has a purpose, and before you get to this article in this space, it’s by design that you’ve already established a strong feel for where to place your money this weekend. That’s what all the preceding content is for (and if you don’t feel this way, scroll back up!).

By the time you drop into my hands here in WTL, my job is to get you to think about a path (or three) that you may have not considered yet. However, as time has progressed, I am learning how scary it can be to publish this article and then read some of Hilow and JM’s stuff and realize we’re all on similar trajectories! But I digress. When JM decided to trust me to write this every week, it was with a simple goal in mind: to provide low-owned paths to upside that could take down large-field GPPs. I wanted to reiterate this because I want you to know where I am coming from each week. I don’t play a ton of volume on a given weekend, but I do try to build consistently in my own way. Sometimes that requires being stubborn, sometimes naive, and sometimes ignorant. My commitment to my rosters is to build with confidence and build my way. I don’t care if there are 1,000,000 entries in a given tournament because I know that if I am thinking for myself (rightly after reading the NFL Edge, listening to pods, etc.) so my lineups are almost always going to be unique. I implore you to do the same. We want you to read everything on OWS every week. Full stop. It would be wonderful if you did that. But it’s with the intent of taking ALL the information you just absorbed, and then for YOU to go off and build what YOU think a tournament-winning lineup will look like. And WTL should be about 5% of that total information. Now let’s jump into that special 5%…

Kyler Murray + Marvin Harrison Jr. + Jayden Reed (+ ‘the backs’)

Prich has won over $300k the past 3 years and has found an edge in understanding the field biases and more importantly his own biases when building rosters.

Most of my friends, relatives, and even acquaintances have learned of my prowess for Daily Fantasy Sports. They know I have had a few six-digit and a host of five-digit wins that everyone dreams of when they build their lineups. The other day a friend who lives in another state came to visit. Shortly after the normal greetings and check-ins about life, he hits me with, “I was a Saquon Barkley TD away from showing you a 15k win!” But, in the process of the Showdown he was playing, he fell from 1st to 78th place and took home a modest prize. He wanted so badly to show me his screenshots of a big win. 

Most of us who play DFS regularly have had this happen to us. Getting close is something I am confident 90% of DFS players have achieved and we probably all remember those moments. I was locked into 50k once until a relief pitcher allowed a two-out single in the 9th that eventually led to a Will Smith 2-run HR in a game the Dodgers were already up big. Another Dodger, Freddie Freeman, hit a two-out double in the 9th this past summer to “cheat” me out of another 17.5k. The point is, that taking first place is hard and we need to find ways to capitalize on the opportunities we have.

In Week 5, I was all over the Burrow/Chase stacks, but I purposely did not add Higgins to the stack in my SE and 3max builds, relying on data I had scoured through about the possibility of that stack hitting. My slow-thinking mind had crunched the numbers and figured out what the best plays were, and I built lineups only considering the data that led me to what I perceived were the “best” plays. 

Thinking Fast and Slow

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

This article is specifically designed to give you some ideas on ways that we can use strategy to jump ahead of the field on Fanduel. Touchdowns play an even bigger role on Fanduel than on Draftkings because receptions are only worth half a point, while on DK receptions are worth a full point. Touchdowns used to be an even bigger deal before (this year, FD added bonuses for yardage totals – more on this below), but it’s still something we need to focus on because of the reception difference and how they price their players. Touchdowns have a high degree of variance and since they carry so much weight on Fanduel, this article will focus on ways each week that we can leverage that variance to jump ahead of the field when things don’t go exactly as expected as far as who crosses the imaginary line while holding the football.

Week 6

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

Strategy Ideas and Things To Consider

Finding An Edge

The whole idea behind this piece of content is that it is unique. Specific content and strategies for the “non-main slate” contests are very rare in the DFS industry, and most players who enter them are casual players or doing so on a whim after their main slate entries have had things go wrong and they want something to root for or to chase their losses during the late games. Edges are getting harder and harder to find in DFS as information gets better, projections get sharper, and the field gets more experienced. These smaller slates present a clear opportunity for an advantage for those that focus on them, as most players will just take their thoughts from the main slate and approach these lineups the same way – without considering how much having seven to nine fewer games (depending on the week) changes the strategy. The biggest win of my career came on an “Afternoon Only” slate in January of 2021 and I hope to share some of my insights on the format to help you attack this niche corner of NFL DFS.

Ownership Strategy

• Ownership will be higher for pretty much every player on “short slates” just because there are fewer players to choose from. This will be especially true for “chalky” players from the main slate.
• This means getting these players right is even more vital than on a main slate. There are fewer alternatives to choose from, so if they have a big game and you aren’t on them, it is much harder to find other ways to make up those points.
• This also means it is easier for lower owned players to pay off, as there are fewer players at their position that they need to have “fail” for them to be worth the risk.
• Correlation is even more important than on the main slate because the useful fantasy games that pay off for the slate are likely to be clumped up from the same games. I always make lineups with a game stack (QB + at least one pass catcher + at least one opponent) and then one or two “mini-correlations” from other games.

Week 6 Overview

We have another four game afternoon slate with a clear line in the sand between the two higher expectation game environments (DET/DAL and ATL/CAR) and the games with lower expectations (PIT/LV and LAC/DEN). There is a high degree of confidence in LAC/DEN being a game focused on ball control and also a high degree of confidence that DET/DAL is going to feature a good deal of yards and points. The middle games are the ones with larger ranges of outcomes. The PIT/LV game could be an ugly slugfest if the Raiders take care of the ball but also has the potential for either QB (especially O’Connell) to make mistakes that dig their team a big hole, while the ATL/CAR has the ingredients for a shootout if things break right, but we could also see the Panthers fail to show up and/or the Falcons go into a shell with a lead.

QB Strategy

Quarterback is always an important position but that importance goes to another level on these small slates. There are two main reasons for this. First, on average, quarterbacks obviously score the most points of any position and we can only start one of them. Second, as noted above, correlation is even more important as the slates get smaller and there are fewer scoring opportunities to go around. By choosing the right quarterback, you are also increasing the chances that you are right at two other positions. Again, the shorter slate condenses the scoring across all lineups, making each position more vital to separating and giving yourself a chance to win. This is why quarterback strategy has its own section:

DFS Labs – MNF – Xandamere & Cheeseman

Angles – JM

DFS Labs DK – Papy & Cheeseman

Block Party – JM & Peter Overzet

Searching for Ceiling – Hilow & Rich Hribar

Solo Ship – JM & Squirrel Patrol

DFS Labs 6.4 DK – StatATL & Cheeseman

DFS Labs 6.3 FD – Mike Johnson & Maximus

DFS Labs 6.2 DK – Hilow & Cheeseman

Week 5 Roster Review