Leveraging Vegas - CFB Targets: Week 9

by David Kaplen (headChopper) Last Updated 2015-11-01 18:01:09

In this article, we’ll pinpoint the week’s highest Vegas totals in college football and explore the best CFB DFS targets from there.

Each team will have its own chart, which will show projected points, pace of play, along with other important statistics, and I’ll then have detailed analysis breaking down my preferred targets.

Legend

Proj. Points – Projected points Las Vegas has set for this team.
Pace – Offensive Plays per Game.
OSRS – Offensive Simple rating System, a rating that takes into account average point differential and strength of schedule. In this scale, 0 is average.
Pass Def. Rating – A more advanced method of defining pass defense success beyond yards and TDs. In 2014, 128 rating was the average in CFB. The lower the better.

Oklahoma State @ Texas Tech

Quarterbacks: For a team with a 41-point team total according to Vegas, it’s going to be difficult to extract a good play from this lineup. Mason Rudolph is your starter but he gets vultured around the goal line by J.W. Walsh. Walsh now has six rushing touchdowns on the year to go along with six passing touchdowns in limited time. Mason Rudolph has 10 passing touchdowns on the year. Rudolph is your starter and will play the vast majority of the snaps, but come goal line time, Walsh sneaks in on him. Tough play in this situation.

Wide Receivers: Another difficult spot for this team. You have four guys that are all legitimate threats vying for the targets. David Glidden, James Washington, Brandon Shepard and Marcell Ateman have all reached the end zone this year, and all have more than 13 receptions. It’s a week-to-week crapshoot.

Running Backs: As if the rest of the team wasn’t bad enough, the running backs are a mess also. Chris Carson is your leading rusher with 339 yards and three touchdowns, but steadily hovers around the 14 to 16 carry mark. Last week against Kansas he only ran the ball nine times. It’s just a difficult team to project, and one that’s not worthy of cash game play.

Quarterbacks: Texas Tech, however, is much easier to dissect. They’re led at quarterback by Patrick Mahomes, who is undervalued this week on DraftKings with his $8100 price tag. He’s a steady playmaker that has accounted for 28 total touchdowns this year. His dual-threat ability makes him one of the premier players on the slate.

Wide Receivers: The clear leader of this corps is Jakeem Grant. He averages 8.6 targets per game and has turned that into a 75% completion percentage when thrown at. After that it’s a bit murkier. Technically, Reginald Davis is second on the team in yardage, touchdowns and receptions, but some of that has to do with the injuries to Devin Lauderdale. Lauderdale is now healthy and I would expect him to resume the number-two wide receiver role in the offense.

Running Backs: Again, this is an easy situation to view. DeAndre Washington is your lead running back and hogs the vast majority of the carries. He averages 6.7 yards per carry and has eight touchdowns on the year. Often times when the games are difficult, like this one projects to be, they turn a bit more to the running game.

Tulsa @ SMU

Quarterbacks: Dane Evans is not a good real-life quarterback. However, he is a decent play in fantasy based on volume. He has 15 passing touchdowns this year and plays on the highest-paced team in college. This is a fantastic matchup against a passing defense that yields a 162 passer rating against.

Wide Receivers: Keyarris Garrett had a phenomenal game last week with 14 receptions, 268 yards and three touchdowns. He has stepped into the number-one wide receiver spot vacated by the injury to Keevan Lucas. Joshua Atkinson also makes for a solid play as he has accumulated 12 receptions for 235 yards and one touchdown since the Lucas injury. If you’re looking for a cheap flyer to take a chance on internment, it’s Justin Hobbs, who only gets around five targets per game but has big-play ability.

Running Backs: And now we get into a very difficult position to project. Going into last week’s game it appeared Zack Langer was your running back. Apparently he is suffering from an injury though and did not play last week. That left three running back’s to spread out 24 carries amongst each other. The two quarterbacks accounted for 20 carries themselves. It’s a good match up but I just don’t think we know enough about the injury to Langer to make an informed decision on what to do with these guys.

Quarterbacks: I like Matt Davis and his dual-threat ability. In addition to some decent pass numbers, he has 443 yards and seven touchdowns on the ground this year. I think he makes for a solid play on DraftKings, but there’s a ton of value at quarterback this week.

Wide Receivers: Courtland Sutton appears to be the number-one wide receiver in this offense. He leads the team in targets by a wide margin and he’s racked up seven touchdowns on the year. After that it’s too blurry to try and pinpoint.

Running Backs: Actually, Matt Davis is the leading rusher on this team in all categories. If you’re looking for an actual running back to play, then I lean towards Xavier Jones, who has 382 yards and five touchdowns on the year.

USC @ California

Quarterbacks: I’ve been saying for a couple of weeks since the price drop; Cody Kessler is a phenomenal play on all sites, and since the Washington game he has been great. That holds true again this week against an incredibly weak California secondary. USC is projected at over 36 points in this game, and I believe a good portion of that will come through the air.

Wide Receivers: One of the top wide receivers in the nation is JuJu Smith-Schuster, who has accounted for 47 receptions, 901 yards and eight touchdowns through the air for the Trojans this year. He’s far and away their leading receiver with over 10 targets per game. An interesting tournament dart throw would be Adoree Jackson, who is getting more time on offense lately and has incredible big-play ability.

Running Backs: This position is much more difficult to project for USC. It’s typically a two headed split carry attack with Ronald Jones and Justin Davis. Last week the two combined for 34 carries and both were productive. However, the week before that they combined for only 13 carries and Tre Madden got nine himself. If you want to hitch your wagon to one of those guys and take a chance that he’ll get a touchdown, then I’m all for that. But realistically, these guys are off limits in cash games.

Quarterbacks: California is projected by Vegas at over 30 points in this game, and I think if they are to reach that number it’s all going to be on the shoulders of Jared Goff. He has over 2200 yards and 20 touchdowns on the season, and is one of the better quarterbacks in the nation. I would expect California to be down in this game and throwing the vast majority. Being at home helps their cause.

Wide Receivers: This is a pretty easy category to figure out also. When Jared drops back to pass, his number-one target is going to be Kenny Lawler, who has accounted for nine touchdowns this year. He takes nearly 20% of the targets in this passing game. After that I believe the only playable guy is TE Steven Anderson. He has 28 receptions on the year to go with 348 yards, but hasn’t reached the end zone yet. The other wide receivers are extremely hit or miss and they are guys I would rather avoid.

Running Backs: This is another spot to avoid for California. Daniel Lasco seems to be healthy enough to play but has only accounted for a handful of carries the last two weeks. I got burnt on him last week and he definitely is off-limits moving forward until he resumes his spot as the Number one running back in this offense. With Lasco back and the threat of USC jumping out to an early lead I think the running game in general is off-limits.

Mississippi @ Auburn

Quarterbacks: I like this game for Mississippi against a struggling Auburn defense. Chad Kelly is one of the better quarterbacks in the SEC for fantasy purposes. He throws a lot of interceptions, but we really don’t care about that for fantasy. We do care about the 2500 yards passing and 18 touchdowns to go along with four rushing touchdowns on the ground. He’s a solid play for a team projected at nearly 33 points by Vegas.

Wide Receivers: This is a one man show in my opinion. All the other guys are so hit-or-miss and just don’t really hold a candle to Laquon Treadwell. Treadwell has accounted for 27 receptions the last three weeks. He’s taking that and turned it into over 380 yards and four touchdowns. Auburn has not been a good defense at all this year, and I think Treadwell makes for a fine play Saturday.

Running Backs: This is the one sneaky spot I like in tournaments this weekend. Auburn’s rushing defense rates near the bottom of all NCAA giving up almost five yards per carry. Jaylen Walton is a home run hitting running back that averages 5.4 yards per carry and can score from any distance on the field. He leads the team with 80 carries and he is the guy I’ll be turning to for my exposure to Ole Miss’ running backs.

Quarterbacks: Ole Miss has a pretty tough defense, and I don’t know how Vegas is giving Auburn credit for over 25 points in this game, but they are. With that being said, this quarterback situation for Auburn is terrible and not one that I would touch.

Wide Receivers: Although the quarterback play has been terrible, if there’s one guy in the receiving corps that I think can do damage it’s Ricardo Louis. With the dismissal of Duke Williams, Louis has stepped up to be very productive receiver with 13 receptions over the past two games. If there is added emphasis by Ole Miss to stop the running game, then perhaps it opens up lanes for Louis in the passing game.

Running Backs: The most feasible way for Auburn score is typically on the ground. They’ve got their hands full in this game, though, as Ole Miss ranked top 15 in the nation in run defense in most metrics. Peyton Barber is easily the leading runner on this team with 172 carries. The next closest guy only has 33 carries. He’s also reached the end zone a whopping 12 times, a lot of which came last week in overtime. He’s not a guy I’m going to be playing this week against a tough run defense, but then again, I said that last week and he scored four touchdowns.

Oklahoma @ Kansas

Quarterbacks: I think a lot of people in fantasy got burnt last week by Baker Mayfield and his revenge game. It turned out to be all running backs scoring touchdowns for Oklahoma. This is the type of scenario where you can make a lot of money jumping on Mayfield this week. I think he’ll be low-owned based on the game last week and the matchup this week against an inferior team. However sometimes that’s when a quarterback like Mayfield explodes for big game.

Wide Receivers: Yeah, I’ve had about enough of Sterling Shepard to last me the year. Just when you think he’s about to turn the corner and be the stud wide receiver he has been in the past, he just puts up another dud of the game. He’s just too inconsistent for my taste right now. With 32 receptions and five touchdowns on the year I wouldn’t blame anyone for taking a chance on him, but he’s just not a play this week for me. Dede Westbrook is the second leading receiver on the team with 29 receptions for 450 yards and he’s worth a flyer in GPPs if you want to pair them with Mayfield.

Running Backs: Clearly this is where a lot of people are going to look for the Oklahoma offense this week. Perine busted out last week with 23 carries for 201 yards and four touchdowns. That was far-and-away his best game of the year, and I believe a lot of people are going to try to piggyback that this week. It’s a great matchup for him against a terrible Kansas defense. I believe the signs point to another solid game out of him, but also remember the last good game he had this year against Tulsa he followed up with performances of 65 yards 36 yards and 56 yards rushing.

Quarterbacks: Nothing to see here, moving along.

Wide Receivers: This game has a monster total on it because Oklahoma is projected at 52 points by themselves. Kansas just isn’t a good offense and this is a pretty solid defense. There’s just not many guys I even feel vaguely good about taking a chance on and GPPs.

Running Backs: See quarterbacks.

South Carolina @ Texas A&M

Quarterbacks: Perry Orth appears to be the starter now for South Carolina. He looks like he’s healthy again and is coming off a 272 yard, one-touchdown performance against a tough Vanderbilt defense. I think for the cost, if you want to punt your quarterback, you could play Orth this week.

Wide Receivers: This is the interesting spot to me. Coming into the year I would have placed Pharoh Cooper in the top five for fantasy purposes in the nation. He was terrible for the majority of the year under Steve Spurrier. These last three weeks however though he has turned it around. He has 23 receptions, 367 yards and two touchdowns. The majority of that is coming after Spurrier left. Also in those three games he’s faced 2 extremely difficult defenses in Missouri and LSU. I believe perhaps it’s time to get him back on the radar as a WR1.

Running Backs: After missing three games with injury, Brandon Wilds came back against Vanderbilt and carried the ball 24 times for 119 yards. This is more in line with what we thought we would see from him early in the year but that never materialized. That was his first game without Spurrier as the coach. Perhaps the new coaching staff is going to turn more to Brandon Wilds than the Steve Spurrier led offense did. Against an aggressive defense that likes to get up field quickly, running backs have been known to exploit Texas A&M.

Quarterbacks: Texas A&M has a 36-point team total against South Carolina this weekend. They are projected to score points. However I think the quarterback spot is a tad bit iffy for Texas A&M. Coming off terrible games the last two weeks, in which he’s thrown four interceptions, Kyle Allen is in danger of losing significant playing time to Kyler Murray. This is probably a situation I want to avoid.

Wide Receivers: What I do know about this passing game, is that whoever is under center is going to get the ball in the hands of the dynamic playmaker, Christian Kirk. Kirk has 41 receptions this year for 625 yards and four touchdowns. He’s also the added threat in the return game to get you bonus points in that aspect. I think he makes for solid play against South Carolina. After that, Josh Reynolds and Ricky Seals Jones are tied with 24 receptions apiece in this offense, and it has been Jones that has been better of late. I still prefer Josh Reynolds, but I think that either one of them could make for a solid tournament play this weekend.

Running Backs: The only name you need to know is Tra Carson for Texas A&M in the running game. He has 122 carries this year and the next closest running back only has 20. If Texas A&M gets it going on the ground it’s going to be Carson who does the damage. But be warned that it is a pass first offense so most of the time he takes a backseat.