Week 13: DraftKings Optimal Lineup

by Derek Farnsworth (Notorious) Last Updated 2014-12-05 06:51:08

What a crazy week in the NFL. We typically see the scoring come down a bit at this time of the year as the weather gets colder and the offensive production slows down a bit. That wasn’t the case in Week 13, as this may have been the highest scoring fantasy week of the season. The Optimal Lineup on DraftKings put up a whopping 322.62 points. To put that into perspective, the Optimal Lineup has scored in the range of 240 to 260 over the last few weeks. Let’s take a look at the lineup and see what we can learn.

Week 13 DraftKings Optimal Lineup

The Ryan Fitzpatrick/DeAndre Hopkins pairing was one that took down a lot of tournaments this week. While Fitzpatrick was regarded as one of the better value plays at the QB position, no one expected him to throw for two TDs against the Titans, who have the league’s worst run defense. The Titans clearly geared up for Arian Foster and it came back to haunt them as Fitzpatrick shredded them through the air.

Other than Hopkins, the only other contrarian play in this lineup was Donte Moncrief and the case could have been made for him, as he was facing one of the worst secondaries in the NFL. For a listing of contrarian plays each week, check out RotoGrinders’ NFL Contrarian Corner. You typically don’t see two wideouts from the same team (Fleener and Moncrief) on a winning lineup unless they air paired with their QB. This week was the exception.

In terms of GPP strategy, once again the Optimal Lineup was filled exclusively with players that scored at least 25 fantasy points. While Le’Veon Bell did make the cut, there wasn’t another player on the lineup that was more expensive than $7,200. This proves once again that targeting the mid-range players that have a lot of upside is a viable GPP strategy. You need big production out of every single position. Only target the minimum-salary players if you think they have 25+ fantasy point upside.

Noto’s Week 13 Lineup

It was another good, but not great week for yours truly. I continue to cash in 50/50 contests, but fail to finish in the top 10-20%, which is required to cash in tournaments. This could have been one of those big weeks, but unfortunately I had two dud performances. It’s never great when the biggest fantasy disappointment happens to be in your lineup. This week, that honor belonged to Jimmy Graham. He and Gronkowski were basically options 1A and 1B at tight end heading into the week. He was expected to be a big part of the game plan in what was expected to be a shootout against the Steelers. The old adage of “any given Sunday” came into play here, as Graham finished with zero catches on zero targets.

The other letdown in my lineup was John Brown. The thought process behind the pick was solid, so even in hindsight I can’t say that I made the wrong decision. I had Mike Wallace locked into that spot, but once Larry Fitzgerald was ruled out, I utilized the late-swap feature on DraftKings and switched to Brown. He had a terrific matchup against the Falcons, who own one of the worst pass defenses in the NFL. In the end, he could only muster up a 2 catch, 40 yard performance. All in all, it was still a profitable week, but one that left me wanting more. Luckily, there are still four more weeks of regular season NFL action.