When looking to improve your daily fantasy sports game, solid assessment is just as important as the lineup building process and research.  It is easy to use the terms blasted off, or stinks, to describe how a lineup performed,  but the key is understanding why.  My goal when building a lineup is to have a valid explanation on how it was constructed, and how it will win.  I continue to urge everyone that if unsure about why you see or not see a player recommended, that you ask why.  After the slate is completed, it is always best to go back and re-assess how it performed. This strategy works for not just your lineups, but others as well.  Below is a look at the NFL week three paylines for some top contests.

FanDuel:

NFL Sunday Big Double Up:  $5 entry fee, top 10,000 win

https://www.fanduel.com/games/21030/contests/21030-211343472/scoring

The winning lineup scored 167.62 points, with the pay line at 106.66.  

The FantasyAlarm Optimal Lineup scored 106.98 points.  

News and Notes: Le’Veon Bell was on the winning lineup, as well as on 72.9% of all lineups in this double up. The winning lineup had seven of their nine players at under 3.5% ownership. The cash line score had five players at 34% or higher.  Pairing Bell with Ty Montgomery was the popular choice, as he checked in with 60.6% ownership for his only nine fantasy points.  Many saved some salary at WR by going with A.J. Green, whose 22.1 points were on 82% of all lineups.  The Eagles defense was owned by 49.3% of lineups, and disappointed with only four fantasy points.  The Patriots, at 28.8% owned, didn’t fare much better with their six fantasy points.  The biggest disappointment may have been Rashard Higgins. Howard was right to go with Britt, as the 15.7% of those who took Higgins were not happy with his two-catch-10-yard day.

Although this contest paid out the top 10,000 entries, 247 entries tied for the last winning spot, providing them $4.05 instead of the $10 payout.

$2.75 million dollar NFL Sunday Million:  409,086 entries

https://www.fanduel.com/games/21030/contests/21030-211343400/scoring

The winning lineup scored 202.92 points, with the pay line at 112.18.

The FantasyAlarm Optimal Lineup scored 163.78 points.

News and Notes:  For the second week in a row, the winning lineup went with a Tom Brady, and Rob Gronkowski combo, but instead of Chris Hogan, it was Brandin Cooks as the third Patriot.  All three went under 7% owned.  Overall, Christian McCaffrey was the winner’s highest owned player, and that was only at 8.9%.  For the same exact price, A.J. Green was 27.7% owned, while Cooks outperformed him with a  lower ownership level at 5.9%.  The new sensation of Kareem Hunt was on the second place team, as well as on 29.4% of lineups.  Two 5% owned RBs stole the show though, with Dalvin Cook and Chris Thompson each producing over 25 fantasy points.  Finally, the Brady and Cooks combo was on the top five teams this week, with nine of the top 10 finishers having either Cook, Thompson, or both of them in their RB slots.  

A smaller GPP contest, the $100,000 NFL Spike, was a single entry, $5 buy in contest with 23,529 entries.  The top score was 179.32 points, with the cash line at 111.98.  The optimal lineup would have finished 24th, good for a 20X ROI in a single entry GPP.

DraftKings:  

NFL Sunday Massive Double Up:  $5 entry fee.  45,977 entries, top 20,000 win.

https://www.draftkings.com/contest/gamecenter/44885727

The winning lineup scored 210.32 points, with the pay line at 116.46

The FantasyAlarm Optimal Lineup scored 120.98 points.

News and Notes:  The winning lineup had only one of the top ownership levels in this large double up, with Zach Ertz, who was on 42.5% of lineups.  He wasn’t the highest owned though, that went to Rashard Higgins.  He disappointed 62.7% of users who went with him over Howard’s suggested Britt play, who made it on only 184 lineups. The top owned players this week were similar in cash games for both the two main sites.  Bell and Montgomery were the top two RBs for this double up, checking in with 60.35% and 59.5% owned.  The same was similar with the Eagles defense, who made it on 57.5% of lineups.  The big difference between the defenses on the sites is that no other team defense was at a double digit ownership mark after the Eagles on DK. The main overall difference was A.J. Green, who still checked in as the third highest owned WR, but at only 29.95% owned.  

Jobbers: Willie Snead dropped from being on three lineups last week to just one this week, but Randall Cobb was not late swapped on 31 lineups this weekend.  Ten users were hoping for a Greg Olson appearance, while 11 users took the risk that paid off, going with DeMarco Murray for 22 plus fantasy points.  

NFL $4.5MM Fantasy Football Millionaire Maker:  256,074 entries.

https://www.draftkings.com/contest/gamecenter/44843225

The winning lineup scored 229.38, with the pay line at 130.86.

The FantasyAlarm Optimal Lineup scored 149.58 points.

News and Notes: No single bullet winner this week, but we did see a 40 lineup train entered by a user to take down 39-78 place.  The winning lineup in this large gpp field did not have any one player over 9% owned.  Their highest owned player was Chris Thompson, at 8.8%.  It was Jordan Howard and Stephen Diggs, who were at 0.6% and 1.5% owned, that propelled this lineup to first.  Overall, we saw all the similar names at the top of the ownership levels at this contest as well.   Montgomery, Bell, Ertz, Eagles D, and Higgins were your top five owned, all between 24-30% owned.  

What stood out to me was the QB selection of the top ten finishers.  Brady led the way of course, being on three of the top ten lineups, but Jacoby Brissett and Case Keenum were each on two of the ten lineups, and even Eli made an appearance in the top ten.  Stafford, Rodgers, and Carr were your top three owned QB’s, but Keenum was only on 432 lineups, and two of them made the top ten.  One last note about the QB selection in this gpp, Wilson, Brees, and Winston were all less than 1% owned.  

Jobbers: Sticking with the QB’s, five users went with Andrew Luck, only two more though than the three who went with Tolzien.  Don’t worry, plenty of other backup QB’s were taken as well, as even Mark Sanchez made a lineup.  Derek Anderson made 15 lineups, second to only Sam Bradford’s 34 lineups as the highest non-starting QB’s taken.  

FantasyDraft:

FantasyDraft took their Run & Gun down from $200K prize pool to $150,000.   They also improved on their overlay as well, filling 88% of their spots.    Their Carolina Million qualifier jumped to a $222 entry fee cost, and filled only 75% of it.  The week four qualifier jumps once again, this time up to $444.  The Run & Gun drops to $125,000.