The Fantasy Grout, Week 6 - A Short Slate Study

by Luke Louison (GiantBallofOil) Last Updated 2016-10-17 01:00:38

Preseason NFL is exhausting. I tip my cap to Seth Yates.

There’s a new slate every day. The overarching strategy changes from week to week. Hardly any of the important players are household names. If you have a preconceived notion about someone, that player probably doesn’t matter. Many of the best plays are rookies, and even if you were an avid college football fan, you can’t know them all. You have only news to lean on, it’s news you have to dig for, and you have to follow it right up until lock. It’s hard.

It’s also very profitable, but that’s not the point I want to make here.

The point is that as this NFL season was approaching, I was asked to write for RotoAcademy. I wanted to do it, too. I wanted to write about the different roster construction trends that permeated the top ten of the Millionaire Maker each week. I also wanted to cover how often different levels of ownership occurred at different positions, in the top ten.

I researched all of it. I wrote some of it. I ran out of time. Preseason NFL, among other things, got in the way.

Once I realized it wasn’t going to come together in time, my thinking was that I would just give that research away for free as leads to the Fantasy Grout, in a couple RotoSchool articles. I still think I might do that, but neither of those topics are on the docket today. I spent so much time doing an autopsy on the Sunday/Monday short late from Week 5 that I thought it would make for a nice little lesson. RotoSchool is in session. Short, Sweet Slates – The Fruit Salad of DFS.

My thinking going into this slate was “This is easy.” There’s only one possible answer, or a couple at most. Whatever the answer was, I didn’t have it. Admittedly, I got it in my head that I had to be contrarian and differentiate my line-up. I played Sterling Shepard against my better judgement, and my better judgement was the right play. Another win for the chalk. I scored 109.86 and missed the cash-line with the following team.

Eli Manning – $6,000
Eddie Lacy – $5,900
Jacquizz Rodgers – $3,000
Odell Beckham – $8,500
Sterling Shepard – $5,500
Jordy Nelson – $7,900
Mike Evans – $7,500
Cameron Brate – $2,900
Buccaneers – $2,400

Purely from a player analysis standpoint, I got caught up in the fact that two of my favorite cheap tight ends for week were in this slate, Cameron Brate and Will Tye. I should have noticed that one good tight end and three JAG tight ends were available, and picked accordingly. I also loved Randall Cobb against New York. I am still a little confused how he managed to get out of my line-up.

As it was, I finished in roughly the 45% percentile in all the GPP tournaments I entered. Here are those tournaments:

Let’s start with an unfocused lens, and zoom in. There are four quarterbacks. Four defenses. Four tight end options, for these particular four teams anyway. If we assume that we’re going to play a wide receiver in the flex, that leaves two running backs slots, and if we include the two Packers RBs, three Giants, two Panthers, and the Buccaneer, that’s 28 possible running back combinations. Then, if we assume three Packers wide receivers, three Giants, one Panther, and one Buccaneer are in play, that leaves eight players for four slots, which is 70 combinations. (8-choose-4, no replacement. Shout-out to Mrs. Delany!)

What does that leave? 4 × 4 × 4 × 28 × 70, or 125,440 combinations. Mass, mass, mass multi-entry.

Now, it’s true that some of these don’t fit, salary-wise. Also, that would mean, you were considering Derek Anderson. I mean, even Derek Anderson’s mom was like “Eli IS facing a funnel defense.” No Anderson leaves 94,080 combinations. Were you really considering Starks or Perkins? For Game of Thrones and drunk-food, yes and yes. For DFS, no. 50,400 left. If you were for sure playing Nelson, as 82% of you did in the Flea Flicker, we drop down to 25,200 combinations remaining. It’s worth noting that both the winning line-up and the optimal line-up (discussed below) didn’t play Nelson.

What did we learn from this, besides a refresher on permutations and combinations? That there were a lot of possibilities. Okay. Not much. Onward.

Here was the optimal line-up. Ownership percentages are from the Flea Flicker.

Aaron Rodgers – 17.86 – $7,700 – 53.2%
Jacquizz Rodgers – 20.90 – $3,000 – 8.5%
Cameron Artis-Payne – 20.50 – $3,300 – 41.9%
Randall Cobb – 22.80 – $6,200 – 28.0%
Mike Evans – 20.90 – $7,500 – 57.8%
Davante Adams – 19.50 – $3,900 – 13.7%
Odell Beckham Jr. – 16.60 – $8,500 – 63.2%
Greg Olsen – 30.10 – $6,300 – 49.3%
Buccaneers – 9.00 – $2,400 – 25.1%
– TOTALS – 178.16 – $48,800

Now, we can really get to learning. If we know the optimal is 178 and the generic cash-line is at 123, that means we have 55 points of wiggle room. Everyone’s line-up should fit into a space that has a 55-point margin for error, right? No.

It starts with Greg Olsen. It might not always be Greg Olsen. In the Week 4 Primetime slate, it was Ben Roethlisberger. In Week 2, Diggs. The guy that makes or breaks the slate. The difference between Olsen’s 30.1 and the next closest tight end’s 5.7 was nearly half of your cash-line “wiggle room.” For the 51% of the tournament that faded Olsen, they also likely faded profit. I know from experience, dude, if you know what I mean.

It’s worth noting that if a player separates from his positional player pool, at tiny ownership percentage, the effect isn’t nearly as lethal. You won’t take down the tournament fading a player like that, but you won’t be taken down either.

On a short-but-sweet slate, just think of fruit. Whatever you do, don’t miss out on the fruit that dwarfs the rest, the watermelon of performances.

The other thing that crushes your profitability is hitting a landmine at a position where many good options existed. At RB, where there were two 20s, if you were one of the 21% who took a 1.1 from Orleans “Lights Off, Beads On” Darkwa, you lost 19 of 55 points of cash-line margin. Paul Perkins was nearly as punitive. Likewise, a 3.4 from Sterling Shepard at 42.3% or a 0.0 from Victor Cruz at 24%, when the fourth best WR had 16.6 and the top was nearly 23, was a Short Slate Whammy.

Just as you never want to miss out on a watermelon, the biggest of performances, you also never want to get stuck with a tiny, wrinkly one. Avoid the mushy grapes.

If you made your salad correctly, you played Olsen and avoided Darkwa, Perkins, Shepard, and Cruz. You then had 3,600 line-up possibilities (4 QB x 4 DST x 15 RB combos {6 backs, 2 spots} x 15 WR combos {6 WRs, 4 spots}). Every single one was within 5 points of the cash-line. Eliminate Derek Anderson as well, and you’ve got 2,700 profitable line-ups. Sweet, sweet profit.

Of course, it might not be perfectly transparent who is the watermelon and who are the mushy grapes of the slate, but as you’re building your line-up, always consider those two things: Am a fading a player who could win the week, ownership and score-wise? Am I getting too cute with someone who is a potential landmine? If the answer is “Yes” to either question, toss your fruit salad, and start over.

The Fantasy Grout

You know the drill. Vámanos!

$6,500-or-less – Quarterback
$5,500-or-less – Running Back
$5,000-or-less – Wide Receiver
$4,000-or-less – Tight End

YADA, YADA

As I pointed out in my recap article, Stuff Happened, Martellus Bennett’s four scores and two 100-yard games (ago) are buoying tight end stats. It’s not just him, as the top handful of tight ends possess volume upside that the Dwayne Allens and Will Tyes of the fantasy world can only dream to have. It leaves you in a unique spot that, to me, warrants a complete Stars OR Scrubs approach.

If you want to not just hit value, but have a high ceiling at every position, pay up at tight end. You’ll need to rely more on the $3,500 wide receivers, $4,500 running backs, and cheap defenses, but your tight end may be able to make up for misses in those spots. Or, you pay way down at tight end. The $2,500 price floor is a roster cheat code, which allows you more high floor, high ceiling players across your line-up. Try to bink a touchdown from your fat guy, and win all the bucks with the eight other slots.

Zach Ertz, $4,000 AT WAS – Yes, I’m already not following my own advice. It was the prior paragraph! Pay attention, Mr. of Oil.

Rules are rules, which means I can’t recommend Walker, Kelce, or Graham, as I’d like. Also, even with the burn from Ertz’s flame-out still pink and puffy, I’m willing to face the fire again. Being in pattern on 32 of 36 pass plays can and will lead to big days, even if it didn’t last Sunday.

After all, these games, his final four of last season, are still in Ertz’s range:

5-for-98 on 7 targets
8-for-78, TD, on 13 targets
13-for-122, on 17 targets
9-for-152, on 9 targets

On an unrelated note, when he asks for a pastry at team breakfast, I hope a lineman socks him in the arm, stating “Ertz donut.” Some things just need to happen.

Tanner McEvoy, $3,000 VS ATL – Just kidding! McEvoy is only startable in leagues where the touchdowns only count if the receiver and quarterback both played the same position at the same college.

He’s actually the chalk in that league.

I think he might be 100% owned.

#On

Tyler Lockett, $3,600 VS ATL – This one is a little fetish-y. You have to be into playing dudes with partially torn PCLs. I am.

I’m also into receivers against the team that’s allowed the most receiving touchdowns, unhealthy guys getting the bye week at just the right time to get healthy, and calling relationship “Hall Passes,” PCLs (Personal Cheat Licenses). I’m weird, I guess.

Sammie Coates, $4,700 AT MIA – “While supplies last,” is really a trick. No one is really worried about depleting their supply. If they were, they would have replenished the stock, in the time it took to produce the commercial. They say “while supplies last” to create urgency, to create a bandwagon effect. It really is a masterstroke by marketing firms, this subliminal advertising, dressed up as a warning. Don Draper would be proud.

I really mean it though. Get Coates while he lasts, because there’s evidence he won’t be available to this article very soon. It’s true that Eli Rogers is coming back, which may force some rejiggering who plays where, for how many snaps. What coach would rejigger this off the field, though?

The great part about Miami benching Byron Maxwell, only to go back to him because of Xavien Howard’s knee injury, is that not only is he still bad, but now they’ve broken his spirit!

Snaps against Byron Maxwell! Get ‘em while supplies last!

NOTE – Coates has missed two straight practices and is unlikely to extend his streak of consecutive games with a 40+ yard catch if he’s inactive.

Zach Zenner, $3,000 VS STL – There’s something very appropriate in the last running available to the Lions having the initials “ZZ”.

Theo Riddick, $5,300 VS STL – Let’s hope Zenner isn’t the only one left. Riddick hasn’t practiced yet this week, but coaches maintain he can still possibly play. The Rams have been gashed on a per carry basis this year.

Editor’s Note: Theo Riddick has been ruled OUT for Week 6.

C. Hyde – 3.82, C. Michael – 6.00, C. Sims – 4.23, D. Johnson – 4.88, L. McCoy – 8.33

It’d be nice to get a crack at that “defense,” for a Grout price.

James White, $4,100 VS CIN – … he said with no confidence at all.

If you paint by numbers, paint in the pass catching back on a PPR site, now that Brady has returned.

Marcus Mariota, $6,100 VS CLE

With all this consternation about climate change, you’d think people would pay more attention to the fact that DraftKings quarterback pricing is sinking into the Grout. Here are the number of quarterbacks unavailable to us, with the number of teams on bye in parenthesis.

Week 1 – 18 (0), Week 2 – 14 (0), Week 3 – 12 (0), Week 4 – 8 (2: Rodgers, Wentz), Week 5 – 10 (4: Smith, Brees, Wilson, Bortles), Week 6 – 8 (2: Bradford, Winston)

Look out below!

Anyway, we finally saw it. 7-for-60 and a score on the ground. With the Titans’ Exotic Smashmouth there to draw in defenses and to pad pass yard totals with (basically) rushes, Mariota’s pass stats have a strong tail-wind. If he regularly supplements those numbers with his legs, he’ll be unstoppable.

And, if all that doesn’t happen this week, he’s still facing the Browns at home, so … yeah.

TIGHT END

Charles Clay, $2,900 VS SF – I remember Week 5 of last year vividly. I was all-in on Clay. He had just had 14 receptions for nearly 200 yards on 20 targets over the preceding two weeks, and in Week 5, he had the lowly Titans on the schedule. Paydirt! … Nah. Just dirt. 1-for-7 on 3 targets. Totally not bitter though.

With that fully in mind, paying under $3K at tight end turns the rest of your line-up build into a first-class flight.

With Watkins on the shelf and The Rod not able to throw and catch it, Clay’s role has expanded. He’s hauled in five balls in back to back games, and unlike the blubbery tight ends you typically find at this price range, Clay is an athletic, former full back who can get down the field. “His mama named him ’Clay,’ I’m gonna recommend ‘Clay’.”

WIDE RECEIVER

John Brown, $4,500 VS NYJ – You didn’t think we’d go the whole article without hearing from @ScottBarrett, did you?

I’m not going to say he’s revolutionary in noting fast guys have an advantage on slow guys, but he did quantify it. Also, citing Revis’s speed as “RIP” … #rekt.

I don’t really know how I feel about the Arizona WR usage pattern. In Week 5, Fitzgerald scored twice on 8 of the 19 total WR targets, while John Brown got only four in a dud. In Week 4, it was Brown that erupted, putting up a 10-for-144 game on 13 targets, earning dinkpuppy a shout. Meanwhile, Fitzgerald only tallied a modest 5 for 62 on 7 targets. Week 3? One went 6 for 70 on 11 targets while the other went 7 for 60 on 12 targets. Does it matter which was which? Weeks 1 & 2 were both Fitzgerald games.

The truth is that when you’re on this much speed, sometimes you just don’t know how to feel.

Cameron Meredith, $4,100 VS JAC – I don’t put a lot of stock in numbers “versus WR2s”. Every team deploys their receiving corps differently. So, if you have a grain of salt, take it with these numbers allowed by Jacksonville to “WR2s”. Heck. Why don’t you splurge and have two!

Week 1 – Davante Adams – 7 targets, 3 receptions, 50 yards, TD
Week 1 – Randall Cobb – 8 targets, 6 receptions, 57 yards
Week 2 – Tyrell Williams – 6 targets, 3 receptions, 61 yards, TD
Week 3 – Steve Smith Sr. – 11 targets, 8 receptions, 87 yards
Week 4 – Phillip Dorsett – 3 targets, 1 reception, 64 yards, TD

Here’s the thing though. If you read those stats aloud to yourself, how loudly did you read them? Whatever your answer was, it wasn’t loud enough. Not when we’re now referring to Cam Meredith and THIS VOLUME! Bears WR2 Targets by Week:

Week 1 – 7 targets (White)
Week 2 – 6 targets (White)
Week 3 – 14 targets (White)
Week 4 – 14 targets (White + Meredith)
Week 5 – 12 targets (Meredith)

If that’s too much volume, you’re too old.

RUNNING BACK

Ryan Mathews, $4,900 AT WAS – The Eagles use a multi-headed monster in the backfield. The good news is that two of the heads, Kenjon Barner and Wendell Smallwood, got one snap a piece last week. While it might be disconcerting to see Darren Sproles led Mathews in snaps 34-25, just know they use Mathews when he’s in there. He got 11 carries and 5 targets to Sproles’s 5 carries and 4 targets.

By the way, we’re only going through all this trouble because Washington is the rock worst in YPC allowed to RBs. Run, Ryan, Run.

Giovani Bernard, $4,600 AT NE – You won’t catch me frivolously recommending Bengals backs. No one understands their usage. Trying to do so is a fool’s errand. Today, though, I’m just that fool.

The Bengals played Bernard 53 offensive snaps to Jeremy Hill’s 15 last week. That was, in part, because Hill got banged up, but also due to the Cowboys going up big, early. To expect the Bengals to trail again, as 9-point dogs in New England, is hardly foolish. As of this writing, it looks like Hill is going to play, albeit at less than 100%, but to say his effectiveness might go down is akin to this.

Let’s play Bernard, just this once. If it doesn’t work this time, never again. You know, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, why am I trying to figure out the Bengals backfield.

QUARTERBACK

Carson Palmer, $6,000 VS NYJ

The Jets are bad mkay….

Completion Percentage Allowed – Last
Pass Yards Per Game Allowed – 2nd-to-Last
Pass Yards Per Attempt Allowed – Last
Pass Touchdowns Allowed – 4th-to-Last

And, frankly, I don’t think Palmer has been that bad, at least from a fantasy perspective. In Week 4, he had 288 and a score, while missing out on the last two come-from-behind series thanks to a concussion. In Week 3, he was bad. Also, this is a spade.

In Weeks 1 and 2, he combined for 575 yards, 5 scores, and no picks. The only road game of the four was the spade, and he plays at home this week. Oh, and that home, they don’t call it Groundizona.

MY GROUT FOR A SHOUT

And then, out of the blue! Bye God, that’s Michael Thomas, for $4,300 against the Panthers jobber secondary. That’s enough. These men have families!