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Jayson Werra | Archive | Email |
Staff Writer


Daily Dose: Wildcard Weekend
Fantasy Football Bonus Time
1/2/15


Now that season-long fantasy leagues are completely over, it is time to focus all of your efforts into the one-week contests. If you have not done so already, this is a great time to get your season-league mates involved as well. Set up a head to head with a buddy or a private league with a handful of friends and let the battles continue. Sure, you can play against plenty of random people, but isn’t it more fun to trash talk and beat the people you know?

With the NFL playoffs upon us, you are probably wondering how your thought process should change as you put together your DFS lineup. The significant change is the amount of games and players available for you to consider but the thinking should remain the same. You will see that the contrarian players are not as contrarian because of the limited choices and fewer permutations on how one can construct a lineup. If you have dabbled in other daily games, you might have experienced what this is like on a night when there is a smaller slate of games. Here are some players to consider you put together your lineup for this first week of the NFL playoffs.

Las Vegas scoring lines for Wildcard Weekend:
  • Baltimore (21) at Pittsburgh (24)
  • Arizona (15.75) at Carolina (22.25)
  • Detroit (20.75) at Dallas (27.25)
  • Cincinnati (23) at Indianapolis (26)

Bye: Seattle, Green Bay, New England, Denver
Salaries: (FanDuel/DraftKings)

Quarterbacks

Ben Roethlisberger (8,500/7,300) – Last time Big Ben played Baltimore in Pittsburgh he threw for 340 yards and 6 touchdowns. With Le’Veon Bell (knee) questionable to play, Roethlisberger should help shoulder the load with close to 50 pass attempts against a Baltimore secondary that continues to struggle.

Cam Newton (8,300/7,600) – Newton has played well of late including averaging over 60 yards on the ground since his Week 12 bye. He has recorded a rushing touchdown in each of his last three games. Arizona has given up top-three production to opposing quarterbacks over the last month.

Running Backs

Justin Forsett

Justin Forsett averaged 7 yards per carry in Week 17.

Justin Forsett (7,000/6,100) – After a couple of down weeks, Forsett was able to bounce back against the Browns last week in the season finale. Based on the predicted game flow, Forsett should see a decent amount of carries as well as a few catches out of the backfield.

Jonathan Stewart (6,500/5,300) – There are not a lot of big-named running backs available this week. Stewart is priced as the 7th RB but has potential to show top-three production at the position against an Arizona defense that has been giving up points to opposing backs of late. Even with DeAngelo Williams (hand) set to return, Stewart should continue to see the bulk of the carries.

Josh Harris (5,600/3,500) – If Le’Veon Bell (knee) does not play, the backups will provide some salary relief and upside potential. For the price, I would gamble on Harris over Dri Archer (6,600/4,500). This would be more of a tournament play than a cash game selection for me. Newly acquired Ben Tate is not available this week on the daily sites.

Wide Recievers

Kelvin Benjamin (6,900/5,900) – Benjamin is priced as the 6th / 5th wideout this week, but at a considerable discount to the players ahead of him. He is coming off a one-catch game but he still saw a team leading five targets in a game Carolina had in hand early. He will continue to be heavily targeted against a Cardinals defense that has been slipping of late.

Steve Smith (6,400/5,000) – Smith has seen heavy usage with 12 targets in each of the last couple of weeks. He has not had a good yardage output and has not found the end zone against the Steelers this year, but he does have 11 catches in those two games. Based on the volume and Pittsburgh giving up top-ten production to opposing receivers, Smith is a value gamble this week.

Markus Wheaton (4,900/3,100) – As I mentioned with Roethlisberger above, I expect Pittsburgh to throw early and often on Saturday in the likely absence of Bell. Wheaton played 59% of the snaps last week to Martavis Bryant’s 44%. Bryant will probably be heavily owned because of his touchdown totals on the season, so I would go move to the contrarian play at the cheaper price in this plus matchup.

Tight Ends

Jason Witten (5,400/4,500) – Witten does not have an exciting matchup against the Lions this week, but he has seen a nice volume of targets (22) and catches (18) over the last three weeks. As DeMarco Murray’s hand continues to heal, I expect Witten to maintain that target level.

Heath Miller (5,000/3,900) – Miller has a tough matchup against a Ravens defense that is good against the position. With the amount of passing I expect in Pittsburgh this week, Miller should see a couple extra opportunities providing a decent scoring floor in your lineup.

Defenses

Carolina (5,300/3,500)
Cincinnati (4,500/1,900)

Good luck this week!

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