RADIO
Koby Hanson's DraftKings DFS lineup picks for Call of Duty on 6/17/21. He analyzes the COD slates and top lineup targets for eSports DFS contests.
Hello there eSports DFS enthusiasts, and welcome back to RotoBaller's coverage of Call of Duty DFS contests for DraftKings! Welcome to the final week of Stage 4 and the start of the 4th Major of the season! This is going to be critical for some of those teams that are on the edge of the Top 8 to make sure they get a spot in the Final Tournament after Stage 5. Also, we are finally back to LAN tournaments therefore all players are going to be playing in person instead of online. The players that have had experience on a LAN tournament I definitely give an advantage too but it's going to be a level playing field and I'm excited to have LAN back in Call of Duty!
This is easily one of my favorite sports to cover here at Rotoballer because I play a ton of COD myself and I like to think I'm pretty good at it as well. I have been following the COD League for about five years now and I finally get to put all this knowledge to the test! We have a great set of games ahead of us as we have the battle for LA once again as LA Thieves take on the LA Guerrillas, London Royal Ravens get the Seattle Surge, NY Subliners without Asim against Minnesota Rokkr, and last but not least Optic Chicago vs. Dallas Empire!
Today I'll be bringing you my COD DFS advice, analysis, and lineup picks for eSports DFS contests on DraftKings for Thursday, June 17th, 2021, at 3:00 PM. Feel free to follow me on Twitter @DFSKoby or find me in the slack as I am happy to engage with readers and try to answer your questions!
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Call of Duty: Major 4
Best of 5
- LA Thieves (-425) vs. LA Guerrillas (+280)
- London Royal Ravens (-135) vs. Seattle Surge (+105)
- NY Subliners (-135) vs. Minnesota Rokkr (+105)
- Optic Chicago (-200) vs. Dallas Empire (+160)
Slate Overview
Well the battle for LA comes again as this will be the third time these teams have played and Guerrillas have taken both by a 3-0 sweep. So seeing the odds is a bit worrisome but seeing how bad the LA Guerrillas have played since the beginning of stage 3 makes me think LA Thieves should come out on top of this one as they only have 2 wins in the last 12 matches and those were against Paris and Seattle. LA Thieves have a star-studded team that has a lot of experience and I do think they rebound after one of the worst performances I have seen this season against Optic. LAG's best chance of a map win is in Control as LA Thieves has been a really good SnD team and LAG didn't win a single hardpoint map in all of stage 4 so I give the edge to LA Thieves with a 3-1 win.
This one is going to be close both teams have been mediocre and have been decent in Hardpoint and horrible in both SnD and Control. Somehow Seattle put up 2 wins in Control this Stage which is crazy considering they have been the worst team in the CDL this season on Control. I'm giving Seattle the ever-so-slight edge in this match only based on the experience that they have in LAN matches which can give a big advantage whereas with London both Afro and PaulEhx have never played in a LAN match. This is going to be very close though and I wouldn't be surprised to see it go the distance. This could be a great game to target though as it might be one of the more bloody matches on the slate.
This game shouldn't be this close in the odds but with Subliners losing Asim right before the Major I think that caused them to take a big hit. With Asim out, Decemate has joined the team after leaving Seattle. This one could end up being very close, I do still give the edge to NYSL in Hardpoint though and therefore it really comes down to who wins the SnD matches. Minnesota is the better control team by far and should win that map with ease. The advantage is in favor of NYSL on SnD but with the loss of Asim that hurts a lot as he was the team-leading player in SnD on NYSL, Decemate wasn't too bad but I do think this makes SnD much closer and therefore I think this ends in a 3-1 win for NYSL or a 3-2 win for Minnesota. Either way, this should be a tight battle and should be able to rack up the kills.
Optic looked incredibly dominant in their win against LA Thieves. Dropping the fastest win this season in Control and showing they are here to play and win. The experience this team has in LAN tournaments too is insane as Scump and FormaL have been playing for so long and I do think that plays a lot into this one but on the other side Dallas has C6 who has some of the most experienced in the entire league! This is a great match to finish out Day 1 and you know I will be watching this match for sure! I give the edge to Optic in Hardpoint. Other than that SnD and Control are both dead even but since Optic lost to Seattle on Control, I'll give the edge to Dallas. I do think this one goes 4 if Optic wins SnD and 5 if Dallas wins the first SnD.
COD DFS Basics
- Like in CSGO, players receive two points for a kill and are penalized -1 for dying. Therefore, the simplest stat to look at here is K/D ratio. However, players can also earn fantasy points for planting or defusing bombs (three points each) in Search and Destroy rounds, so there are some players who we can target for other skills besides their ability to kill the opponent.
- You need to roster a team slot on both sites. Teams accrue fantasy points for games won (+4), matches won (+10), and Search and Destroy rounds won (+.5).
- Teams will be playing best-of-five matches on a rotation of various game modes. Those modes and the order in which they are played are as follows: Hardpoint, Search & Destroy, Control, Hardpoint, Search & Destroy.
- In hardpoint rounds, players with positive K/D ratios are usually the highest scorers and these rounds are often the bloodiest.
- They also have changed a game mode from Domination to Control for League play. This is going to be a lot different in gameplay as it's round-based and not the first one to 200. They play first one to 3 round wins. You win by capturing both points or killing the enemy team until they run out of their lives. One team defends and the other attacks.
- There is a sweep bonus this year as teams and players both can get a 20 point player sweep and a 5 point team sweep. In the chance, they do sweep they also get granted a bonus of 20 points for not playing hardpoint and a bonus of 5 points for not playing the final Search and Destroy map. So that adds up in a sweep to a total of 45 extra points which are going to be very crucial this year.
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COD DFS Captain Considerations
Dashy: Dashy has looked much better in stage 4 than he did in Stage 3. He has had 100 DKP or better in 4 of the 5, stage 4 games with the one game below was Atlanta sweeping them. This game should be very much close and in the last match against Dallas it resulted in a sweep and Dashy had one of the best games in his pro career where he had a 71 kill game in 3 maps with a 2.15 K/D. That is absolutely insane and with him improving recently I really like Dashy in this spot and especially I feel like we are getting him at a slight discount compared to what he has been at this season. 9,200$ feels very cheap for Dashy. During Stage 4, Dashy has averaged a 1.31 K/D in Hardpoint, a .99 in SnD, and a 1.03 in Control.
Mack: 8,600? Seriously? One slightly off his game against Toronto and his price gets dropped 600-1,200$. That's insane. Mack has been one of the best players during stage 4 Mack has an insane K/D in hardpoint right now at 1.44 with almost 30 kills per 10 minutes. The next closest player on his team has 24 and that's Hydra. We are getting a great player at such a discount and if he can continue this momentum from Stage 4 into the Major we could be looking at a cheaper captain play that can explode and break a slate. Especially with this match more than likely getting both hardpoint maps, Mack could be looking at a 90+ kill day. In 6 of his last 7 games, he has had 96 DKP or better, and 4 of those he had 130 or better. Even when they got swept in their last game against Toronto he had 55 kills and still managed 83 DKP. I don't see them getting swept though, and Mack is by far one of my favorite captain plays.
Other captain plays: Hydra, Octane, Shotzzy, Kenny, Envoy
COD DFS Value Plays
Clayster: Clayster has not been kind to me this year, he continues to fail me but this might be the cheapest he has been all season long and it's hard to pass up with such a great matchup in front of him and his team needs him to step up in such a crucial time with Asim not being able to make it to the tournament. 7,800$ is cheap and other than his 59 DKP loss against Toronto he has scored 94 DKP or better in the rest of stage 4 which I will take at his price and him being really the best spot for value on this slate. A cheap captain might be the way to go as the bottom half of the player pool has been awful recently. Clayster's K/D has dropped slightly since the beginning of the season but he is still scoring well and I'm not expecting a very high-scoring game out of him. At least a 90 DKP day and ill be satisfied with Clayster.
Afro: The lack of value on this slate is atrocious, so I'm taking the closest game we have on the slate and forcing a player who is doing well. Afro since joining the team has not been very impressive up until his last game out where he played LA Guerrillas and dropped a massive 138 DKP with a +23 K/D differential. He gets another bottom-of-the-league team in Seattle and if the trend continues with Afro against bottom-of-the-league opponents, he could be in for a nice day as well. This game should be close and because all the other games have resulted in losses for London this could be a spot that could end up being in favor of London and Afro ends up being a solid spot. His K/D hasn't been too bad as he has a team-leading 1.04 K/D in Hardpoint, a .98 K/D in SnD, and a .94 in Control. He isn't a great option but on a slate with so little value, you have to pick and choose your spots.
Other value plays: Classic(PUNT), TJHaly, Alexx,
COD DFS Stacks
Optic Chicago: Optic is probably in the safest spot here and I really do think with the combined experience in a LAN setting this is going to play in their favor a lot. Other than a rough loss against Seattle they have won 6 of their last 8 and the other two losses were against Atlanta(No.1) and Toronto(No. 2) teams in the league. That includes a 3-0 sweep over Dallas in the last stages Major. I think this one is going to be slightly closer though as the difference between Felo and Vivid is quite a bit and I think that helps Dallas a bit but I do think Optic comes out on top of this one. Dashy and Envoy are the best options but also a pretty expensive option. FormaL started to round out into better form towards the end of Stage 4 so I do like him at his price. Scump is a toss-up but I do give him a slight boost due to it being on LAN. So I don't mind him at 8k if don't have the 400$ left over to get to FormaL.
NYSL: Although Asim is out for NYSL, Decemate is not a bad option and did fairly well in his games while playing for Seattle. Mack and Hydra are currently on another level and I'm just not loving the way Minnesota is playing. I do think they lose on Control as Subliners have struggled in Control over the last two stages and that happens to be where Minnesota thrives at. So I do think this one ends up being at least a 4 game match. This does however help Hydra and Mack who excel in Hardpoint and can score extremely well in 4 game matches because of that. Plus with Clayster having some of the most experience in a LAN setting I do think this gives the team a slight boost. It doesn't look like Decemate will be added to the player pool so I like Mack, Hydra, Clayster in that order. DO NOT PLAY ASIM!
Other Team Plays: LA Thieves, London/Seattle(GPP game stack), Dallas Empire (Large GPPs)
Summary
- TLDR: LA Thieves 3-1, Seattle Surge 3-2, NYSL 3-1, Optic 3-1
- LAT: Kenny, Slasher
- LAG: SiLLY
- Seattle Surge: Octane, Gunless, Classic(Punt/lots of LAN experience)
- London Ravens: PaulEhx, Afro
- NY Subliners: All Players (ASIM OUT)
- Minnesota Rokkr: Attach, Priestahh
- Optic: All Players
- Dallas Empire: Shotzzy, Vivid
More eSports DFS Analysis
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