NFL Projected Ownership Analysis: Week 7

by Chris Gimino (ChrisGimino) Last Updated 2016-10-25 00:16:55

One thing that can easily get lost in the daily grind is that DFS is a game against other players, and not exclusively a contest to make the most accurate predictions.

Obviously we want to be very good at understanding what is likely to happen, but we cannot get so sure of our ability to predict player performance that we forget the true goal of the contest. That goal is to defeat all of our opponents. This article is designed to help you achieve that goal.

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Week 6 in Review

Week 6 Hits

Week 6 was an improvement in overall performance from Week 5 with a CORREL value of .9094. Le’Veon bell was a disappointment to many rosters last weekend, but if you faded him in favor of McCoy or Lamar Miller you were very happy to see his 40% ownership go down in flames. Randall Cobb was a late mover in the projections that we caught and projected accurately. Turns out it was Ty Montgomery who was the true benefactor of the situation, but many thought Cobb would be the one to see the uptick. Russell Wilson came home with a percentage nearly identical to our projection. I thought he could have been higher but the weather held him down to under 10% as predicted. We thought the Bills would be chalky due to pairings with LeSean Mccoy, and we were on the money there. Coby Fleener was cheap, and he turned out to be one of the most profitable exposures to the high total game with Carolina last Sunday. You can’t get much closer than we did on his number.

Week 6 Misses

Weather may have impacted some of our projection for Amari Cooper more than anticipated. That certainly isn’t the only reason we missed, but the negative press could not have helped. Kelvin Benjamin was too expensive and coming off some subpar performances. We should have done a better job spotting that as a potential miss and not focused so much on the favorable game environment. T.Y. Hilton played on Sunday Night Football against a perceived tough defense. Perhaps we overvalued recency bias and his extreme workload when handicapping his ownership. Jimmy Graham was wildly popular, and unlike Amari Cooper, he was cheap. The weather wasn’t enough to push his percentage down as I suspected it might. We were too delicate with Delanie Walker last week against a weak opponent. His teammate DeMarco Murray was popular, and the projections incorrectly assumed this would keep him under 10%.

Week 7 Analysis

A QUICK NOTE ON OUR OWNERSHIP PROJECTIONS: I use both the standalone Ownership Projection Page and the new and improved Player Projections Page to help me write this article and build lineups each week. I create a projection for every player on the slate each week as a part of our premium content, and I highly encourage you to check it out. See below. All kinds of valuable information is now available FOR FREE on the Player Projection page, and if you subscribe to NFL premium, you can also see my “pOWN%” column for that site and sport.

Quarterback

It is more than fair to project Matt Ryan as one of the highest-owned QBs this week. He is coming off a streak of efficient games and has four 300+ yard games this season (including a 500 yard game). His team is at home in a domed environment with one of the highest projected game totals on the week. The Falcons defense ranks low in DVOA metrics, which will encourage the field to view this as a potential shootout spot. Expert consensus on RotoGrinders has him at number 1, which is an opinion echoed by the expert community at large. Ownership on Thursday lock sites that publish indicated that the field is very much in favor of Ryan this coming Sunday. He should be the highest-owned on both sites. Not far behind him will be Tom Brady. Brady has an intangible value beyond the metrics that one could point to such as Vegas, projections, etc. He’ll almost always be high owned if he’s in a favorable spot and roster construction allows it. He’s built up that kind of reputation in 17 years of winning. He’s also got the recency bias factor working in his favor, as he has come back strong from his suspension as predicted. Finally, we saw him rekindle his connection with Gronk last week. Both the public money and some DFS sharp money will be on that connection to repeat again this week vs. the Steelers.

My Favorite QB Ownership Value of the Week

The Lions are the proud owners of Football Outsiders’ worst-ranked defense. We saw Case Keenum look like Joe Montana out there last week, having his way with a Swiss cheese secondary and ineffective linebacker corps. The quarterback and tight end are the two positions most likely to capitalize on the Lions D, according to multiple resources I have examined this week. One of those sources is video tape with my own two eyes, as I have witnessed the Lions allow a league-leading 17 TDs this season to QBs, and that includes guys like Marcus Mariota, Brian Hoyer, Carson Wentz, and Case Keenum. This is clearly a situation where myriad options at the QB position will cause this fantastic matchup to get overlooked. Cousins may not be the highest-scoring QB this week, but if he approaches the leader, his $5,900 price tag could put you in position to take down a big prize. I like his chances given the premium matchup and low projected ownership around 4-6%.

Running Back

There just aren’t many running backs to pay up for this week. Thanks to the flex spot on DraftKings, I suspect we will see massive ownership on DeMarco Murray in his fantastic matchup against the Colts. Indianapolis is the worst at defending the run according to Football Outsiders’ Rush DVOA metric. Conversely, the Titans offensive line is ranked sixth in adjusted line yards which is very favorable for the run game. The matchup is extremely visible to the public at this point, as Lamar Miller gashed this defense on a national broadcast this past Sunday night. Factor in the Titans status as almost a TD home favorites, and we have some very tangible reasons to suspect a big game from Murray. Players of all skill levels are going to trip over themselves to jam him into their lineups, which coincidentally have some extra money to spend thanks to Jaquizz Rodgers, Mike Gillislee, and a few other low-priced options at TE. Rodgers will be taking the vast majority of carries for a Tampa Bay team that loudly declared their intention to run it come hell or high water the last time we saw them. Quizz got 30 carries vs. Carolina, and will now get the benefit of facing the fastest-paced team in the league. More pace = more opportunity in the case of the Bucs, and the field will be all over this value on both sites.

My Favorite RB Ownership Value of the Week

I really hate writing up players that I am not fond of, but I can’t ignore the opportunity that Melvin Gordon is getting as compared to his ownership. He is the type of player I want to use when 1) He has multiple outs to fantasy production that includes the passing game 2) He is in a favorable matchup with a high total 3) He will be lower owned. We get that combination this week. The Chargers project to be trailing according to Vegas, and that spells an uptick in opportunity in the passing game. His matchup with the Falcons is favorable and the game total is high. The Falcons rank 28th in DVOA in terms of receiving by the RB position and have allowed the sixth most fantasy points to the RB position on both sites. I am currently projecting him between 6% and 9% owned. I think this presents an excellent way to differentiate your roster construction without sacrificing upside at all. He’s an excellent GPP option for Week 7.

Wide Receiver

Ohhhhhh yes. We have two of the game’s most amazing talents in excellent matchups with predictably high ownership projections. Julio is against a depleted San Diego secondary, and users can easily afford him on both sites. I don’t quite have the energy to write an extended piece on why suspected super-human Julio Jones will be high owned, so I’ll just say this: He’ll be high owned…Trust me. As far as Mike Evans is concerned, his target projection is driving a high fantasy points projection and points-per-dollar value for him. He’s facing a San Francisco team that typically elevates their opponent’s play count. The potential volume alone is attracting DFS owners to him as a play this week. We can also factor in massive touting from every outlet, and his status as a cash game favorite as reasons to project him as a high-owned player. Evans is second in the RotoGrinders expert consensus rankings at the moment. His ownership on Thursday lock games was through the roof. The tea leaves are telling me that Evans will eclipse 30% in ownership this week, and I currently have him projected that way on both sites.

My Favorite WR Ownership Value of the Week

Target volume. We know Brandon Marshall is going to get it most weeks. We know Baltimore is ranked first against the run, and that the Jets will likely have to throw to produce. We know Matt Forte looks old and ineffective. We know Baltimore Ravens OLB Terrell Suggs didn’t practice all week. We know OLB Elvis Dumervil didn’t practice again and won’t play. We know CB Shareece Wright didn’t practice again and that CB Jimmy Smith was limited. We know the Ravens rank 25th against the WR1, and that Marshall has 11 red zone targets this season. We know an awful lot of things that tell us this game is going to feature a lot of passing from both sides of the ball without a huge threat from the pass rush. To me, this spells a recipe for excellent fantasy production. Yes…we also know Geno Smith is the QB for Marshall, but Geno can’t be any worse than Ryan Fitzpatrick was. This leads to me the last thing we know that excites more than anything: We know Brandon Marshall is projected for less than 10% ownership. By now, we should all know what to do when this is the case. Roster him.

Tight End

After a career high in yardage last week, it’s pretty obvious that Gronk is feeling much better. Given the available salary provided by this week’s value plays, users are going to want to spend it on something awesome. Something awesome in this case could be Rob Gronkowski. Recency bias, high projections, a high Vegas team total, and endless touting should help elevate his ownership to the tippy top of the chart this week. His upside is unmatched by anyone else at the position, and his matchup against the Steelers sans Big Ben is surprisingly juicy. He was in my value section last week, and you may end up being a week too late to the Gronk party if you didn’t take him in Week 6. Nonetheless, he will be very popular in Week 7 and I can’t present a very good argument against him. He’s a rare generational talent and he’s basically in play until further notice.

My Favorite TE Ownership Value of the Week

The Jaguars offense has been lackluster thanks to the bumbling regression of Blake Bortles. It’s not that he’s really been that bad, but he’s just not showing improvement the way you’d like to see. Some NFL minds I trust have also noted Bortles’ poor mechanics as a reason for his timing issues in the passing game. Even with these noted struggles, the Jaguars tandem of Bortles and Allen Robinson should be somewhat popular this week according to my projections. People are looking at the Raiders and their 28th-ranked pass defense as a spot to attack. I think this is a fine idea, but I’d much rather do it at the TE spot with a very low-owned Julius Thomas. The Raiders rank 26th in DVOA against the TE, and have allowed the eighth-most DK points to the position despite only giving up just 43 targets and three TDs. If you’re in the mood to pivot off the chalk, Julius Thomas will give you leverage in multiple ways.

Defense

The New England Patriots are way too cheap on both sites. Their matchup with Landry Jones and the Steelers will NOT scare anybody away, and in fact will do the opposite. DFS players will rush to roster the Patriots and attack the Steelers paltry team implied total. The public is saavy enough to see the discount, and will default to New England… feeling very comfortable in the process. This has led me to attach a very high number on both sites, and we should expect their actual ownership to be above 20 on FanDuel for sure. The Bengals get the weekly tout as the team facing the Browns. Terrelle Pryor may be out, and that would all but seal the deal on elevated ownership for the Bengals. The public will lean on the expert community, who has the Bengals rated very highly this week. They are currently #1 on the RotoGrinders expert rankings, and this has been seen throughout the advice landscape. The Bengals should get into the double digits this week as a result.

My Favorite DST Ownership Value of the Week

The Dolphins allow a lot of pressure and rank dead last in Football Outsiders’ adjusted sack rate metric. Pair that up with the Bills D-line being ranked #1 in the defensive version of that metric, and we’ve got the biggest mismatch possible. I expect the Bills to get after Ryan Tannehill in a big way, and that kind of activity is what I’m looking for when I select a defense. I want to feel confident that the quarterback won’t have time to operate on his terms, and leave room for potential mistakes such as sacks, fumbles, and interceptions. With the Bills defense improving steadily in overall efficiency, I am a big fan of using them in this spot on Sunday. They won’t be that low owned, but certainly won’t see the digits we will get from New England and Cincinnati.