NFL DFS Strategy: DraftKings Week 2 Tournament Recap

September 21, 2021

Mark Kieffer goes through DraftKings NFL Week 2 Tournament lineup results and breaks down lineup construction to help us become better GPP players.

This is the third installment of my NFL DFS Strategy Series. I will be writing a weekly article highlighting tips and general strategies to help you with your NFL DFS Tournaments, too! You can catch the first one here on bankroll management, contest selection, and goals and the second one here

Thanks for taking the time to read this NFL DFS strategy piece! If you're here, it's likely because you want to be a better DFS player and learn more about how to be a sustainable DFS player who doesn't have to deposit more money in their account every week. I hope to help you do that through this series!

Below are the top lineups in various contests I played in, and I will use this series to identify trends and happenings in GPPs on DraftKings. I will examine which strategies were present in this article and try to determine whether or not there are any new emerging strategies we should be trying.

Week 2 DraftKings Milly Maker ($20 entry, $1,021,053 to first)

265,944 entries into this thing. Here's how the top lineup fared:

Another week, another QB-RB-Receiver stack. Last week, the winning stack was Burrow-Mixon-Higgins and this week the winning stack is Brady-Fournette-Gronk. Similar to last week, there was no bring-back player here either. This player also hit on Kupp, Lockett, and Henry as one-offs. I love the Brady stack. Tampa Bay was the team most likely to score a ton of points (even more than Dallas and L.A.) and no one was talking about rostering them. Brady was my most rostered quarterback this week as well, however I stacked with WRs and had bring backs, didn't play Kupp, Lockett, or Henry in the same lineup, and I lost money while this person took home over $1M on a single entry! You gotta love it!

When I look at most of the top entries, I see a lot more pairings (QB + Pass Catcher) and not many bring-backs. I think two in the top ten had a full stack. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues. Is it better to take a quarterback and a wide receiver with a high target share and just find those high-volume plays throughout?

The other thing, is I talked about in my first article how a player will be priced up and then their price will slip and be forgotten about. The same thing can go with how popular someone is. We all know Derrick Henry is a stud. But he was only 7% owned because of his performance in Week 1. Whenever there is a certified stud that no one is talking about, it is always a good idea to have that stud in at least one lineup. I am disappointed in myself that I lived so much in the $6k range with my running backs and did not go up to Henry. Even if he would have flopped this week, it's a great play process-wise.

$1.75M Playaction ($100k to First)

This was a $3 buy-in, 691,660 entry tournament with $100k to first place. This lineup did not have a stack, but similar to the Milly Maker, it featured Brady-Henry-Lockett-Kupp. I liked the Ekeler pivot off of the passing game which was expected to be very popular. To be honest, I think this person got a bit lucky with Ruggs and the Bears Defense but you gotta get lucky to take down such a large prize against such a large number of entrants. The same thing can be said for Renfrow. The Steelers have what is considered to be a good defense. To roster two pass catchers against them, I am not sure if it was a price thing or if this person thought that perhaps there could be some cheap volume to make the top end of the lineup work. Either way it worked out and this person is $100k richer.

Similar to the Milly-Maker, I am not seeing a lot of full stacks and even less bring-backs. The team that got fourth in this tournament did have a Brady-Gronk-Evans stack with a Calvin Ridley bring-back. Most either had a Brady-Gronk pairing, or Brady with a bunch of one offs that hit.

$300k Red Zone ($50 Single Entry - $50,000 to first)

There are a lot of advantages to playing a higher amount of money. First, the rake is less. This tournament's rake is about 12%, which is less than the 15-16% that the Playaction above had. Second, sometimes you don't need a crazy high score to win. The winning entry in this scored 221 points compared to the 236 and 237 in the wins above. Obviously, play what you can afford, and generally, the min-cash pay lines are higher in the higher stakes games, but sometimes the top end is less because you only have to beat 6800 people instead of hundreds of thousands of people.

Similar to a lot of the top lineups, we see a pairing followed by one-offs. Tyrod Taylor and Brandin Cooks were there but no one from Cleveland was in the lineup. This person had Henry, Lockett, and Gronk, along with a defense that did well, and they get the $50,000 while the rest of us second guess ourselves all week (just kidding).  We see Renfrow again, in what feels like a min-priced, "let me put in a started and hope they get 10 points" move that worked out well.

My Own Results

I believe in transparency, so am going to talk a little bit about my play in GPPs as well in Week 2.

I did not have a good week in DFS this week. This is the first time in a long time that I did not have a single tournament lineup that cashed. I had some cash game action that prevented me from losing it all but overall it was very disappointing.

My best lineup was this one:

When you see only one player with flames and two with snowflakes, and the person says it's their top lineup, you know it was a bad week for them. I was hoping Pittsburgh would be higher scoring and I thought Beasley would be in for more like a seven or eight catch day. I played a QB-WR-WR stack with Waller as the bring-back. I saw all those targets for Waller and figured he'd get a lot of volume, even at a high price. On a point per dollar basis, Waller was not considered a good play this week, but I love playing those types of players sometimes because in a GPP I am chasing the upside and not the median projection. We know Waller can go off for over 100 yards and multiple touchdowns any game, and in a tournament, I am paying for the ceiling.

This was my worst tournament lineup this week:

I got Wilson and Lockett right and that's about it in this one! My process for this one was to stack up Seattle in what I thought would be a shoot-out. A.J. Brown is the top receiver in Tennessee and thought he'd receive the most volume. I thought the Cardinals would get pressure on Cousins throughout the day and the other pieces are what I could fit in for the price. Not much else to say about this one other than it wasn't good.

Final Thoughts

The first thought is lineup construction. I am still going to generally stick to full stacks for now, but am going to consider scenarios where the WR1 has a high percentage of target share to only do the pairing between the quarterback and the receiver. I may also experiment with not having a bring-back player, especially in smaller tournaments. I likely in the Milly will still do full-stack and bring back because in order to win you really need everyone to go to the moon.

The other thought is: bankroll management, bankroll management, bankroll management. How sure were you that the Cowboys and Chargers would go to the moon? See how that turned out? 93% of the field generally didn't think Derrick Henry was roster-able this week. Tom Brady was slept on too much. This isn't a flex but a mere admission that there is always more that we don't know than do know. I was a little frustrated last night but that's part of playing DFS.

If we stick to leverage situations, manage our money wisely, and stick with the downs, we will give ourselves the opportunity to experience the ups! Now that it's Monday, I am focused on getting ready for Week 3.

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