DFS Payline Analysis: NFL Week 13 Review

With the NFL regular season rapidly heading towards its apex, Week 13 delivered a very interesting slate with plenty of competitive games. As a result, scores were up almost across the board in daily fantasy contests on both Draft Kings and FanDuel.

When it was all said and done for Week 13, the paylines on FanDuel rose an average of 18-percent from where they were last week and the paylines on Draft Kings weren’t far behind, having shot up 12-percent from Week 12.  This marks a monumental increase the likes of which we have not seen since I started tracking this data on a weekly basis back in Week 7. In addition to the paylines ascent this week, the top scorers on FanDuel put up five percent more points than they did last week, while the top scorers on Draft Kings actually went down three percent. Last week I had mentioned that I thought that scores would most likely rise after a bit of a dull week but even I couldn’t predict the massive jump in the paylines that we saw yesterday.

FanDuel

As always we’ll get things started by looking at the GPP contest slate that was offered by FanDuel on Sunday, where user robbie622 had a fantastic week by winning the $5 Snap, $25 Sunday Million, and $300 Monster tournaments with a lineup that scored 195.26 FanDuel points. When it was all said and done, their first place finishes netted them over $325,000 dollars, which is quite the accomplishment. Robbie’s lineup was an interesting blend of popular plays and pivot plays, as they utilized David Johnson (57.3 percent owned), Jordan Howard (21 percent owned), Golden Tate (31.7 percent owned), and the Broncos defense (20.7 percent owned) while pivoting with Jordy Nelson (9.5 percent owned), Michael Crabtree (6.3 percent owned), and Zach Ertz (5 percent owned). All of robbie622’s highly-owned selections paid off handsomely as Johnson, Howard, Tate, and the Broncos defense were responsible for 105.2 out of their 195.26 total points. As always, it’s important to structure your lineup in a way where you can utilize popular plays while finding some pivot points to distance you from the field, and robbie622 was able to do this and ended up outscoring the second place finisher in the Monster by over 15 points.

Outside of the tournaments that robbie622 won, there were a couple of notable performances worth mentioning in the $5 Sling TV Rush and the $1,000 Gunslinger. In the Sling TV Rush, user jodaddy197 put up a fantastic score of 200.34, which is the second highest winning total in the tournament since Week 7. They were able to vault up the leaderboard by taking a gamble on a Joe Flacco and Dennis Pitta stack, and that decision paid off big time as they combined for two touchdowns and over 53 FanDuel points. In the $1,000 Gunslinger, DFS heavyweight saahilsud was able to take down the $50,000 top prize by fielding a lineup that employed the two most expensive running backs, Le’Veon Bell and David Johnson. I find this roster construction particularly interesting because it shows us that if you can confidently find value in cheaper players in other positions you can stack two very expensive options and potentially win a high buy-in tournament.

Regarding the payline this week on FanDuel, it was a very interesting week as we saw the score that it took to cash in GPP tournaments rise on average 18 percent. This is a huge increase when you consider that the payline actually went down an average of 10 percent between Weeks 11 and 12. If you wanted to cash in your lineups on Sunday you needed to score at least 136 points in the lower buy-in portion of the slate but if you found yourself playing in the higher buy-in tournaments the magic number you needed to get past was at least 141, and in some of the tournaments you needed to put up more than 145 points to cash, which is no easy task.

Switching gears quickly, we’ll take a quick look at the Big $25 Double Up in order to get some information about how cash games fared on FanDuel for Week 13. There was a total of 6,436 entries in this contest, and the payline settled at 136.66. This number is one of the highest paylines that we’ve seen in cash games on FanDuel since Week 7, which isn’t surprising seeing that the average lineup this week fared much better than it has as of late. David Johnson, Le’Veon Bell, Julio Jones, Dorial Green-Beckham and Golden Tate were all incredibly high-owned players, and all of them besides Green-Beckham put up decent numbers, so this is part of the reason why the payline was so high. Johnson (86.8 percent) and Julio Jones (66.8 percent) were some of the highest-owned players in recent memory but they were able to combine for 48.8 points, so if you were trying to fade them this week chances are that didn’t work out well.

Draft Kings

Moving onto the Draft Kings slate from Week 13, we’ll take a look at the low buy-in portion of the slate first, which contains the $3 Play Action and $9 Slant contests. User jmp420 was able to win the first place prize of $50,000 in the Play Action by paying up at running back and wide receiver and then hitting big on a four-man Ravens stack that included Joe Flacco, Steve Smith Sr., Mike Wallace, and Dennis Pitta. The Ravens were a team that went largely under the radar in most GPP tournaments as Joe Flacco and Dennis Pitta both saw sub-two percent ownership in most contests. After a great performance from Ladarius Green (3.7 percent owned) in the flex, jmp420 was able to put up 218.94 points and secured the victory. The winning score of 218.94 is the lowest score to win the tournament since Week 7. In the $9 Slant, which I’ve long said is one of the softer tournaments on either site, it took just 207.38 points in order to take down the $20,000 top prize. This represents a four percent decrease from last week’s already low top score, and it is firmly entrenched as the lowest top score in this tournament since the start of this column. User dommmm2324 was able to take down first place by stacking Andy Dalton and Brandon LaFell, and got solid performances at low ownership from Tyler Lockett and Zach Ertz.

In the $20 buy-in Millionaire Maker, user imsparticus put in an incredible lineup that tallied 236.14 points, which is the highest score that we’ve seen in the Millionaire Maker since Week 7. They were able to win $1,000,000 on the back of a strong performance from a low-owned three-man Ravens stack of Flacco, Pitta, and Wallace but they also hit big on Jordan Howard, David Johnson, Ladarius Green, and Golden Tate who all had more than 21 Draft Kings points on the day. Julio Jones and David Johnson were two of the most expensive players on the slate but imsparticus was able to make their lineup work by hitting big on their value plays, and when you can do that you have a shot at winning any tournament you enter.

As far as the high buy-in portion of the Draft Kings slate, which includes the $333 Wildcat and the $1,500 Luxury Box, user imsparticus remarkably struck again and won the Wildcat by posting a lineup that hit almost 210 points. User azwildcat10022 was able to take down the Luxury Box despite utilizing Matt Barkley at their quarterback spot who ended up scoring less than eight Draft Kings points. Azwildcat10022 utilized a three-man tandem of Jordan Howard, David Johnson, and Julio Jones much like many of the other GPP winners, but they were able to gain ground on the field by hitting big on their value plays of Brandon LaFell, Malcolm Mitchell, and Coby Fleener while going with tight end Travis Kelce in the flex. All of the four previously mentioned players had a salary of under $5,000 dollars and put up great numbers, so it’s important to find diamonds in the rough to complement your high-priced plays.

The payline on Draft Kings rose significantly from where it was last week as it took an average of 12 percent more points to cash in Week 13 than it did in the week prior. In the small and medium buy-in contests, the payline hovered between 144.5 and 147.25 points but rose significantly in the Wildcat and Luxury Box tournaments where you needed to score over 152 points to cash. This makes sense because the higher buy-in tournaments tend to have the most talented DFS players in them, which makes the score of the average lineup rise.

Before wrapping up this article, we’ll take a look at the Massive $25 Double Up on Draft Kings, which will give us a window into how cash games went for Week 13. There were 18,390 entries total in the tournament, and the payline settled at 146.36. The payline in this tournament alone rose 18 percent from where it was last week, and that can be attributed to the homogenization of lineups as there were a few high-owned players that fared well (i.e. David Johnson and Julio Jones). As always in cash tournaments, whether or not you make money will often times come down to your decision on whether or not to fade chalky players, and if you are able to pivot onto better plays with less ownership you will certainly fare better in the long run.

In Review

Week 13 was an atypical week that saw paylines rise dramatically on the back of solid performances from highly-owned options. A vast majority of DFS players created similar lineups due to a few factors that included injuries, great matchups, and underpriced players, and when that happens it can be tricky to distance yourself from the field if you fade the wrong guy. In weeks like this, it’s important to find the proper value plays to add to the high-priced, high-owned players, as they can be the difference between cashing for the minimum and winning a million dollars. That’ll do it for Week 13! Good luck, and let’s make some money in Week 14!