Daily Fantasy Sports: NFL Strategy Guide and DFS Tips
Daily Fantasy Sports games have grown at an exponential pace and continue to gain popularity. To win or cash in FanDuel games requires one to have a vast knowledge of the sport and the ability to analyze the immense amount of data and the tendencies of your opponent.
If you’re just starting out, I recommend trying a few free contests until you can get the hang of it. Once you’re comfortable, I suggest playing some cash games to build a larger bankroll. Now, let’s get into some basics, strategies, and insight on how you can cash in NFL DFS contests.
DFS Contest Selection
Contest selection is a very important aspect for anyone that partakes in DFS. It’s also one that many DFS players don’t master until they’ve lost a significant portion of their bankroll. Let’s start by breaking down the two types of contests, cash games, and tournaments.
Cash Games
A cash game is one that the DFS player can double, triple, or quintuple their entry fee. There is no life-changing money to be one in a single contest but there is money to be made here, patience is vital. In general, the score needed to win in a cash game contest is lower than that of a tournament. Cash game contests can range in entries from head-to-head to several thousand entrants.
Tournaments
This is what draws most people to Daily Fantasy sports, the chance at winning some life-changing money while only having to risk a few dollars. The reality is however that a minuscule percent of us will but that won’t stop us from trying. A tournament payout structure is top-heavy, with between 35%-45% of the prize money going to the top ten finishers. This leads to a lot of all-or-nothing weeks but you would only need one win to carry you through a season. A tournament can range in entries from a few hundred to several hundred thousand.
Within each of the above types of contests, there are two options:
Single-Entry
A single-entry contest allows each DFS player to enter only one line-up in that contest. I highly recommend single-entry contests to those just starting to play DFS games.
Multi-Entry
Allow users to enter up to 150 different lineups in a single contest.
Roster Construction
When building a lineup on FanDuel each player is assigned a salary. Every team will have the same amount of salary available to them to construct their roster. This is the first obstacle a new DFS player will encounter. Your favorite player may have a salary of $9,000, but you must determine if that player will provide enough points to justify his salary.
Each week there will be players who will be considered a value. A value player is someone that is expected to exceed his projections and is at a lower cost. A well-constructed lineup on most occasions will consist of players with varying salaries.
Creating a lineup is different for both a cash game and a tournament. In a cash game, we typically need players with a high floor or higher weekly average of fantasy points. However, in a tournament, we need to have high-ceiling players, who are players that have the opportunity to score a large amount of points on any given week. Oftentimes, these are known as boom or bust players for fantasy football purposes.
No matter which contest you decide to play in, there will be the same basic lineup. You’ll be starting one quarterback, two running backs, three wide receivers, one tight end, and one Flex player (RB, WR, or TE).
Player Selection
There are countless ways to analyze which players you’ll be selecting for your team. Here are a few of the ways you can use to make this determination:
Matchup analysis- Each team has its strengths and weaknesses on both the offensive and defensive side of the football. If a team passes the ball at a 70% rate overall and when in the red zone they pass at an even higher rate than unless their running back is elite he may not be a good choice. That goes for the opposite as well.
Injuries
Paying attention to each team’s final injury report, which generally comes out about an hour and a half before kickoff, is vital. Winning in DFS is all about finding an edge over your opponent and exploiting it. Sometimes a player’s injury is significant enough that it will drastically impact his performance. In the event a starter is ruled out the new starter will, in most cases, have a lower salary. This allows you to utilize the savings on another player or position.
Game Location
Another area to research is how a player performs at home in comparison to on the road. If a team traveled across or even outside of the country this could impact some players or the team as a whole.
Best DFS Strategies
Stacking
Stacking is when you choose multiple players from the same team. Some examples of stacks would be a quarterback with any number of their wide receivers or tight end. Another common stack is pairing a running back with the same team’s defense. An example might be taking a cheaper quarterback such as Kirk Cousins and stacking him with a stud wide receiver in Justin Jefferson.
You can also utilize our free fantasy football tools to get week-to-week insight into which players have the best and worst matchups. Additionally, these tools can help you succeed in either fantasy leagues or in your DFS contests.
Correlation
Correlation occurs when the performance of one player directly impacts another player’s performance. This is common when stacking a quarterback with a wide receiver from the same team. We could go a step further and add the opposing team’s WR1 since there is data that shows when the quarterback and wide receiver from one team do well the wide receiver from the opponent has a higher chance of doing well. This could be because they’ll need to pass to remain in the game. While this doesn’t occur 100% of the time, it can improve your chances and is certainly something to consider.
Furthermore, be sure to do your research and find some reliable daily fantasy optimizer sites to help set your lineups. Just using the right tools is one of the most vital parts of succeeding in DFS, regardless of the sport.
Another way you can use correlation in DFS might be to target a potential low-scoring matchup. Doing this, you might take a team’s running back and run it back with their DST. Again, this isn’t absolutely necessary, but they’re different strategies and approaches that can be considered.
Contrarian
Being contrarian is vital, especially when entering a large tournament. If your analysis leads you to a group of 3 players and all three are projected to perform similarly, you may be better suited to choose the player with the lower ownership projection. Several sites will provide ownership projections. In the end, be sure to look at projections suited for the type of contests you are entering.
When playing FanDuel NFL games, one should always be aware of late-breaking news or injuries. These can provide an opportunity to differentiate yourself from others and could very well be the difference between minimum cashing and taking home a significant payday. Now that you have some of the basics down, it’s time to get to work, build a team, and rise to the top. Be sure to follow me on Twitter for more NFL DFS content.
Trending Now
2023 Fantasy Football Rankings
Fantasy Football Consultation
Best Ways to Determine Your Fantasy Football Draft Order
Fantasy Football Team Names
Connect and Engage with the Show:
- Subscribe on YouTube
- Visit us on the Web
- Follow us on Facebook
- Follow on Twitter
- Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
- Follow on Instagram
- Subscribe on Google Podcasts
- Subscribe on Spotify
Join our Communities:
