UPDATED: Thursday, Sept. 4 at 4:45pm ET

Are you ready for some NFL DFS Week 1 picks? Oh baby! You know we are, here at Fantasy Alarm!

Thursday Night Football brings us the first game of the 2025 NFL season – Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles – and we are already champing at the bit, ready to set some DFS lineups. In fact, if you are looking to build some Week 1 DFS Showdown lineups for either the Thursday or Friday game, be sure to check here as Dan Malin is already hard at work putting those pieces together.

NFL DFS Week 1 Watch List & Top Picks

What you are looking at in this article, is the NFL DFS Week 1 Watch List which covers NFL DFS Week 1 picks for the main slate on DraftKings and FanDuel. You can, obviously use it on other DFS sites as well, but their pricing won’t be listed. Not the end of the world and, typically, good bargains are similar from site to site, but just to be aware.

If you have been a longtime Fantasy Alarm subscriber, then you know what this DFS Watch List is all about. If not, allow me to properly introduce it using my favorite adage:

Give a man a fish, he’ll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime.

We take this to heart when it comes to playing NFL DFS. The Fantasy Alarm DFS Playbook isn’t just about handing you a list of players and a lineup to use each week. It is designed to help you learn to be a better DFS player. It’s about teaching you the process used in selecting which players to scout and, eventually, which ones to use.

Therefore, we will begin each week with this Weekly NFL DFS Watch List which is designed to keep tabs on marquee names, chalk plays and, of course, the weekly bargains who may not see the same coverage and exposure. This piece will be continuously updated throughout the week, based on the most recent news and injuries which means you may see a name or two removed as we get closer to kick-off. You may also see a few late-week additions who pique our interest for some reason too, and by the end of the week, this Watch List will eventually become your Playbook. Again, it’s about teaching you the process.

This week is always the most difficult when making your NFL DFS Week 1 picks. While you can look back at last season’s numbers and see which teams struggled the most against the pass or the run, that data may be outdated and, in some cases, irrelevant as coaches, player personnel and schemes change so often from year-to-year. A team that struggled mightily against the run last year, for example, may have added some help on the defensive line, thus fortifying their weakness. The same can be said about a weak secondary from 2024 which changed from zone to man-to-man coverage. We’ll still be able to use some of the data, but as we’ve seen before, it takes a few weeks before we spot some of the more noticeable trends.

Once again, our focus here is the Sunday main slate. This list will start out with some of my favorite plays, but again, keep in mind that I will be adding more names throughout the week, as well as possibly even removing some. 

Let’s get to those NFL DFS Week 1 picks we're watching.

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