Hittin' The Nuts - SquirrelPatrol's NFL DFS Lineup Advice for Thursday Night Football (Bills vs. Dolphins)
Want to hit the nuts and take down 1st place in these massive contests posted by FanDuel and DraftKings? Who better to walk you through their favorite NFL DFS picks than SquirrelPatrol! Undoubtedly one of the best DFS players in the game, SquirrelPatrol has accumulated 100+ Live Final seats, took 2nd place in the 2023 DraftKings Fantasy Baseball World Championship for a $600,000 prize, and most recently, took down the NFL Milly Maker in Week 2 of last season.
Week 2 begins with an AFC East showdown between the Bills and the Dolphins in Miami for Thursday Night Football. Both teams picked up a win last week, and with the Dolphins playing at home, Miami is a 2.5-point favorite in a game with a total of 48.5 points. These teams finished 1st (Miami) and 4th (Buffalo) in offensive yards per game last season, and the defenses weren’t too shabby either, with the Bills allowing the 9th-fewest yards per game while the Dolphins were right behind them, allowing the 10th-fewest yards per game. These two teams have finished 1st and 2nd in the AFC East the past 2 years, so this game could be critical for the standings.
While the Dolphins offense remains relatively stable from last year, the acquisition of TE Jonnu Smith their biggest change. The Bills made major shake-ups to their receiving corps in the offseason. Stefon Diggs and Gabe Davis are gone from this team, and in their place are 2nd-round draft pick Keon Coleman, and veteran acquisitions Curtis Samuel and Mack Hollins. After Monday’s big surprise on the inactive list, we’re dealing with injury situations in the backfield for this game as well. Dolphins RB Raheem Mostert has already been declared out, and fellow Miami RB DeVon Achane is questionable. I’m currently assuming Achane will play after he was able to practice Wednesday, but be sure to follow the RotoGrinders’ NFL starting lineups page for updated depth chart information as injury news and inactives hit in case there are any more surprises.
Let’s sort through the slate and figure out what to do with our DFS lineups.
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Bills vs. Dolphins Showdown NFL DFS Lineup Advice
Primetime Game History
These teams met in Week 18 last season with the division on the line, so it’s worth taking a look at the Showdown results from that game. With Raheem Mostert on the sidelines for that game as well (along with Jaylen Waddle) Buffalo was favored by 2.5 points, and Josh Allen (22.8%) was the most popular CPT option in the DraftKings large-field contests. Achane (without Mostert) and Tyreek Hill (without Waddle) followed Allen closely with 20.6% and 19.0% CPT ownership, respectively. We often mention the value of pairing QB CPTs with at least two of their receivers in the FLEX, and this contest was a great example – the winning lineup contained Allen in the CPT spot with FOUR of his pass-catchers – Stefon Diggs, Dalton Kincaid, Khalil Shakir, and Trent Sherfield in the FLEX spots, with Hill the only Dolphin on the winning roster.
Looking at past lineups, we can see that even though we want to get different with our rosters, a highly-owned CPT can still win the contest. It’s OK to eat some chalk, even at the top spot in our rosters, as long as we can get different in the FLEX spots using sensible lineup construction and especially if we can find at least one lower-owned but high-upside option.
How I Plan to Beat the Field
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