The dynamic game of Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) requires much more than simply knowing the sport for which we’re entering contests to be successful. We must be adaptable, precise, and open to learning from previous endeavors, the latter of which will be the primary focus of this weekly written piece. Game Theoretic methodologies will allow us to analyze and dissect the previous week’s winner of the largest and most prestigious Guaranteed Prize Pool (GPP) tournament on DraftKings – the Millionaire Maker. These same tenets of Game Theory, which can most simply be explained as the development of decision-making processes given our own skill and knowledge, assumptions of the field based on the cumulative skill and knowledge of others playing the same game, and the rules and structure of the game itself, will allow us to further train our minds to see beyond the antiquated techniques of roster building being employed by a large portion of the field. Approaching improvement through these methods will give us insight into the anatomy of successful rosters and will help us develop repeatably profitable habit patterns for the coming weeks. We’ll start by looking at the previous week’s winning roster, extract any pertinent lessons for future utilization, and finish with a look ahead towards the coming main slate.
Winning Roster
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Lessons Learned
Concentration Reigns Supreme
There were three great examples of concentration at play on DraftKings user ShortGamerTV’s Millionaire Maker-winning roster in Week 10. The Houston Texans were to be without Nico Collins and Dameon Pierce against the Bengals, leaving Noah Brown, Tank Dell, and tight end Dalton Schultz as the primary pass-catchers and Devin Singletary to serve as the primary running back after playing on 75 percent of the team’s offensive snaps in Week 9. Both Singletary and Brown returned elite point-per-dollar performances with the increased concentration.
Amon-Ra St. Brown ranked in the top 10 in the league in targets per route run (TPRR) rate against zone coverage and against Cover-3, each of which the Chargers utilize at top-10 rates this season. This was one of those rare instances where a player’s skillset and archetype perfectly aligned with the matchup, which also came in the game with the highest game total on the slate.
Finally, new Vikings starting quarterback Joshua Dobbs has had one of the highest tight end targets rates of qualifying quarterbacks over the previous five seasons. Although Hockenson came into the contest questionable and saw a low-for-him snap rate, he saw the top TPRR rate of the week and an absurd 44.1 percent team target market share against the Saints. All three of these instances were spots for elite concentration to emerge.
The Magic of Leverage
Tony Pollard and the Cowboys D/ST were expected to be on over 50 percent of rosters in play on the Week 10 slate. This made a lot of sense considering the Cowboys were implied for the week’s highest team total, particularly after the Cowboys dismantled to the Giants by 40 points in Week 1. That said, what if the scoring were to come from the Dallas pass offense as opposed to their defense and run game? This made Dak Prescott double stacks one of the highest leverage spots on the slate when you consider expected ownership versus range of outcomes. In other words, points scored by Prescott and his pass-catchers directly took away from the expectation of their defense and Pollard, magnifying the importance of those points as they simultaneously benefited you while hurting approximately 50 percent of the field.
I get asked a lot about leverage and its meaning, with most questions regarding the subject more directly describing pivots as opposed to true leverage. The best way to keep these two theoretical methodologies straight is to think about the cause and effect of each case. A pivot is a player in the same pricing range as another player that you are betting will outscore the other. The potential for leverage generation from a pivot is borderline infinitesimal because it doesn’t influence anything else on a roster outside of a head-to-head comparison of raw points. On the other hand, leverage accomplishes more than one goal through its utilization. To visualize this premise, think of leverage through the form of an “if-then” statement, which the computer programmers and game theorists in the crowd should be familiar with. An “if-then” statement helps to establish parameters in computer programming while describing causal factors in game theory. More specifically, “if X happens, then Y is affected on influenced.” DraftKings user ShortGamerTV implemented this reasoning perfectly through the inclusion of a Prescott double stack, surging past around half of the field in the process.
Looking Ahead
Tua Tagovailoa + Tyreek Hill + Jaylen Waddle
Both leverage and concentration are valid expectations for this three-man stack in Week 11. The combination of Hill and Waddle lead the league in targets per route run between two players this season (35.9 percent for Hill and 26.8 percent for Waddle, both of which rank 16th or higher this season). Where things get highly interesting are the recent tendencies from head coach Mike McDaniel, particularly considering rookie running back De’Von Achane had his 21-day practice window opened to return from injured reserve. That is likely to draw a lot of the hype away from the pass game in this spot. Most importantly, the Dolphins are coming off their bye week after two losses in three weeks and negative pass rate over expectation (PROE) values in both losses. The bye week could have afforded McDaniel and company the opportunity to re-emphasize and aggressive pass offense that had spent most of the season in the top five in PROE before falling to seventh in Week 9.
Puka Nacua
Nacua is priced at $7,100 in Week 11 and finds himself in the most classically overlooked area of player pricing at wide receiver. Typically, the field places a high degree of emphasis on the player priced over $7,500 and the players priced below $6,000 at wide receiver, with the players that carry elite ranges of outcomes typically priced up and the value selections coming from the players priced down. That should leave Nacua with miniscule ownership in Week 11, but there are a couple things working in his favor in this spot. First, quarterback Matthew Stafford is expected to be back under center for the Rams. Second, the Seahawks are in zone coverage on over 86 percent of their defensive snaps this season (second highest rate in the league), against which Puka Nacua has seen an elite 30.0 percent targets per route run rate this season. Before we get too far, yes, that elite target rate has persisted since the return of Cooper Kupp, falling slightly from 32 percent without Kupp to 30 percent with Kupp.
Trey McBride
McBride is set up well to again see solid volume against the zone-heavy Houston defense. Wide receiver Marquise Brown is the clear and away top option for the Cardinals against man coverage this season, holding an absurd 33.3 percent targets per route run rate against the primary coverage. But against zone, things even out more in favor of the second-year tight end, which we saw transpire in Week 10 against the Falcons. Expect McBride to once again approach double-digit targets in Week 11.
