10 Notes: Week 7 Sneak Peek
After his Kansas City Chiefs’ 26-10 road win against the division rival Oakland Raiders, Andy Reid now has a career record of 16-2 in games immediately following a bye week.
Just let that sink in for a bit. I think RotoGrinders’ own Dean78904 best captured just how remarkable this feat is on Twitter:
I replied with, “I get it – every week in DFS, I feel like if I just had one more week, I’d kill it.” I was joking, but I do sort of understand what it’s like to be Andy Reid. In some ways. Okay, in one, really specific way, I understand what it’s like to be Andy Reid. I’ll explain.
One of the things I do for the site on the weekends is put together the weekly Replay Rundown post, which aggregates all of the GrindersLive videos into one spot. This week, there were 796 minutes and seconds of GrindersLive NFL videos in the Replay Rundown, or just over 13 hours. Every week, I make it my mission to watch all of the GrindersLive videos available at the site, and every week, I fail. I just need more time. I can usually get through a few of the Lineup Builder shows, the Experts Roundtable, and maybe I’ll knock out one or two more in podcast form (at 1.5 speed, obviously) on the drive to and from work. But still, every Saturday morning when I’m adding the videos to the Replay Rundown, there’s the nagging sense of, “How am I going to watch all of this before lineups lock?”
And that’s not even counting the Morning Grind and Daily Fantasy Fix podcasts, the new Absolutely Epic podcast, the dozens of free and incentives articles that pop up on the site throughout the week, and any original research I need to do. On Wednesday night of each week, when I sit down to write my “10 Notes” article, I open up a new Google Chrome window just for DFS research. I create tabs for Pro Football Focus’s player grades, Pro Football Reference, Football Outsiders’ DVOA rankings, StatMuse, some of the tools at RotoGrinders. Then, when I’m finished, I keep those sites up, and I also create tabs for any article I come across on Twitter throughout the week and make a mental note to read it when I’ve got just a bit more time.
As the week goes on, things get busy. And it’s something different every time. This week, grades were due at my school, which meant the mountain of student work on my desk had to reduced to nothing, which meant bringing a stack of essays home to grade. Last week, it was something else. This upcoming week, it’ll be something I don’t even know about yet.
So as I was building lineups on Saturday night, knowing that I had to at least get some sleep that night, the Chrome window remained open, most of the articles unread, a constant reminder of all the research I didn’t do this week.
I was not confident heading into Week 6.
If DFS, and sports in general, made perfect sense, this story would end with my somewhat rushed lineups yielding somewhat lackluster results, and we’d have ourselves a nice, tidy lesson about restraint with your bankroll management and limiting the amount you play on slates where you’re not confident, etc. etc. etc.
But DFS (and sports in general) often doesn’t make sense, and I’m happy to say that despite the unfinished feeling I had about my DFS research for the week by the time lineups locked, Week 6 was a profitable one for me. And before you think I’m saying this to brag, let me just say that for someone with only a few hundred dollars in play each week, being “profitable” basically means I can take the family out to a nice dinner with that week’s winnings. At Chipotle. No drinks.
So why am I telling you all this? Because I think we all have a little Andy Reid in us (as I type this, I realize that could be taken as, “We all have a miniature Andy Reid living inside us,” which is weird and funny, but not what I mean). What I mean is, anyone who thinks of DFS as more than just a hobby (and let’s face it, if you’re reading this, that’s probably you) is always going to feel like there’s just a little more research to be done, like if we just had another week, we’d kill it, just like Andy Reid is somehow able to transform into the NFL version of Phil Jackson with an extra week of preparation. I’m a firm believer in the idea that the more information you can consume, the better off you will be, and I don’t buy the arguments I sometimes hear about “over-researching.” Those arguments always seem grounded in hindsight, where it’s tempting to search for definitive reasons for a loss. “I should’ve just stuck with the lineup I built on Tuesday morning before I’d looked into any matchups, advanced stats, historical trends or other information.” Sounds silly, right?
Sometimes, a reason for a loss is simply this: DFS (and sports in general) don’t always make sense. There’s not always a linear correlation between more research leading and winning; if there were, everyone would quit their jobs to play DFS.
In other words, if you take DFS seriously, it’s easy to trick yourself into believing you have to read every article, watch every video, listen to every podcast. You just need more time. It’s easy to believe that enough is never enough, and this leads to a weekly feeling of unpreparedness. I just need a little more time, and I could build the perfect lineup that would win all the money.
But we don’t get more time. Because we’re not Andy Reid. So the best thing we can do is try to be efficient in our researching, and remember that even in weeks that don’t follow a bye, Andy Reid still has a winning record.
All this happened, more or less…
Recapping noteworthy happenings from Week 6.
1. The correct answer was LeSean McCoy. The question was, “Which of the high-end RBs in elite spots is going go ‘go off’?” McCoy ran for 140 yards and found pay dirt three times, which means that, over the past three weeks, the 49ers defense has allowed Ezekiel Elliott, David Johnson, and LeSean McCoy to rush for 541 yards and eight touchdowns. All good backs, but…wow.
2. The other correct answer was “Le’Veon Bell, DeMarco Murray, and Jordan Howard, kind of.” The other question was, “Which of the high-end running backs in elite spots is going to bust?” The prevailing thought process about Week 6 was that, with so little separating the elite group of RBs, choosing the “right” combo of backs could make or break your week. While none of Bell, Murray, or Howard put up total duds – each of them either put up 100 total yards or scored a touchdown – they all fell far short of expectations.
3. Ezekiel Elliott proved that either a.) he’s matchup proof, or b.) Green Bay’s reputation as “the best run defense in the league” was artificially inflated as a result of their facing guys like T.J. Yeldon, Theo Riddick, and Orleans Darkwa. Before Week 6, Green Bay had allowed a total of 171 yards and 2.0 yards per carry to opposing backs. Elliott gashed the Packers for 157 yards on 17 carries, or 9.2 yards per carry. At some point, we have to start considering Elliott to be in the same class as guys like Le’Veon Bell, David Johnson, and DeMarco Murray, because we know Dallas is going to continue feeding Elliott the ball. I mean, it’s all the guy wants…
2. Odell Beckham, Jr., one week after everyone was sure he would break out, broke out. His 222-yard, two-touchdown performance was his seventh game of of 30+ fantasy points since coming into the league in 2014, which is more than any other player during that span (Antonio Bryant is second on the list with six 30-point games at FanDuel). He also proposed to a net.
3. Golden Tate, several weeks after everyone gave up on him ever breaking out, broke out. There were short passes, there were long passes, there was laughing, there was crying, there was stealing a cheerleader’s pom-poms…it was all there. In the end, Tate racked up 165 yards and his first touchdown of the season. Tate had 134 total yards in Weeks 1-5. His average depth-of-target was still 5.6 yards, which ranked 72nd among WRs who played at least 25 percent of their teams’ snaps. Some things never change.
4. In the same game, Kenny Britt made this one-handed catch:
7. Just a few weeks after Matt Ryan torched the Panthers defense for 503 yards and four touchdowns, Drew Brees matched him in touchdowns and nearly matched him in yardage (467 yards, 4 TDs). It was Brees’s 15th career 400-yard game, and he passed Peyton Manning for most such games in NFL history.
8. Dak Prescott interception-less streak ended in the third quarter of the Cowboys Week 6 game against the Packers, but not before he passed Tom Brady for most consecutive passes without an interception to start a career, with 176.
9. If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to see it, did it really make a sound? I don’t know, and I don’t care. But if Jay Ajayi puts up a Ricky Williams-esque line of 204 yards and two touchdowns and nobody in DFS rosters him, does it really matter? If you’re confused by the Ricky Williams reference, the former running back and current entrepreneur was the last Dolphin to exceed 200 rushing yards and two touchdowns in a game (he did it twice in consecutive weeks in December, 2002).
10. Ben Roethlisberger was diagnosed with a torn meniscus and will need surgery. The Landry Jones Era (Part II) begins in Week 7.
Looking ahead to Week 7…
1. On Thursday Night Football, the Bears travel to Lambeau Field to take on the Packers. This means that Cam Meredith, who freed up enough salary to allow us to roster two of the elite RBs in Week 6, and who is still priced egregiously low at DraftKings ($4700) will be off limits, unless you’re playing the Thursday-Monday slate. Since it’s pretty likely that most people playing that slate will try to fit Meredith in, any advantage you might get in cash games becomes pretty negligible. The same goes for Brian Hoyer, who would be an excellent play at just $5900 on DraftKings against a Packers team that has been vulnerable through the air. Kind of a shame.
2. It’ll be very interesting to hear discussion about Odell Beckham, Jr. in his matchup against the Rams. The Rams had a respectable pass defense DVOA entering Week 6 (ranked 10th), but they’ve been weak against speedy, dynamic receivers like Beckham, giving up big games to Tyler Locket (4 catches, 99 yards), John Brown (10 catches, 144 yards), and now, Golden Tate (8 catches, 165 yards, 1 TD). If you’re playing a slate that includes the Sunday morning game in London, Beckham should be popular. If not, the player who should draw all of the attention is…
3. Julio Jones, fresh off his 139-yard, one-touchdown performance against Richard Sherman. Since 2015, only one receiver has exceeded 139 yards against Seattle (and it was Markus Wheaton, of all people, with a 201-yard game in November, 2015). Now, he faces a banged-up Chargers secondary in game that has shootout written all over it. Antonio Brown will be catching passes from Landry Jones instead of Big Ben, which should make Jones the chalk high-end receiver of Week 7.
4. The Cleveland Browns have allowed three passing touchdowns in four straight games. Andy Dalton has been solid if not spectacular this season, and he’s performed well against the Browns, putting up 454 yards, five touchdowns, and no interceptions in his last two games against Cleveland. At just $6000 on DraftKings, he could be a cheap cash game QB people talk themselves into as the week moves along.
5. The other cheap cash game QB option that jumps out is Kirk Cousins, as he faces a Lions team that ranked 31st in pass defense DVOA entering Week 6. I’m not nearly smart enough to understand everything that goes into DVOA, but I’m pretty sure that giving up 321 yards and three TDs (not to mention a rushing TD) to Case Keenum won’t make your DVOA ranking go up. One slight reason for concern (and it may not matter in a matchup this good) is that Cousins has historically been a far better QB at home than on the road, as evidenced by the 13-point differential between his home and road passer ratings (97.4 at home, 84.6 away).
6. The Chiefs are -6.5 home favorites against a Saints team that ranked 30th in rush defense DVOA entering Week 6 and allowed three rushing touchdowns to Carolina on Sunday. So, play the Chiefs running backs. But which one? Spencer Ware received 24 carries to Jamaal Charles nine in Week 6, and he was effective, amassing 131 yards and scoring a touchdown. Ware seems like the safer play, as the Chiefs do seem committed to him. This should be one of the more interesting storylines to follow leading up to Week 7.
7. Todd Gurley has nine targets in the last two weeks, which trails only Le’Veon Bell, James White, Giovani Bernard, Jalen Richard, and Kyle Juszczyk among running backs. His 75 receiving yards rank fifth among RBs during that span, behind only Bell, Tevin Coleman, White, Bernard, and Duke Johnson. Gurley is in a tough matchup against the Giants (ranked 10th in rush defense DVOA entering Week 6), but if we can rely on 30-40 receiving yards per game, his floor is raised significantly.
8. There are three players in the NFL with over 280 yards and an average yards per carry above 5.5 over the past two weeks: Ezekiel Elliott, LeSean McCoy, and…Matt Jones. Jones was surprisingly effective against a tough Eagles defense on Sunday, needing just 16 carries to reach 135 yards on the ground. In Week 7, he faces a Lions team that ranked 28th in rush defense DVOA entering Week 6 despite having not allowed a rushing touchdown to a running back this season.
9. Other than Jones, it seems like the value is going to be difficult to come by in Week 7. Terrance West ($4800) has a nice price tag, but he faces a stingy Jets run defense (ranked third in run defense DVOA entering Week 6). The same goes for Jerick McKinnon ($4300 at DK) against the Eagles (seventh in run defense DVOA), in addition to the fact that there’s lingering resentment about his terrible Week 5 effort. Even if he’s healthy, Sammie Coates ($5100) has a major QB downgrade. Cam Meredith ($4700) is only available on the Thursday-Monday slate. John Brown ($4900) faces Seattle. Value will open up, as it always does, but the early outlook is that the high-floor bargain plays are scarce in Week 7.
10. My best guess at the plays that will become chalky as the week moves along: Tom Brady, Kirk Cousins, DeMarco Murray, Melvin Gordon, Julio Jones, Hunter Henry, Bengals D/ST.
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Thanks for reading! All stats from this article were pulled from Pro Football Reference, StatMuse, Pro Football Focus, Football Outsiders, NFL.com, and FootballGuys.com.
Be sure to check out “10 Definitely Interesting, Possibly Helpful Notes” for NFL Week 7, which will be published on Thursday. Good luck this week!