Every Sunday, I get asked about my favorite plays of the week or who is my player pool that weekend for DFS.
This article series covers exactly that.
I will go through the players I am targeting as core plays for all formats here. I will cover tournament plays and games to target for stacks in other posts.
The idea is that this will paint a clearer picture of framing lineups.
Week 18 DFS Content:
Our core players are the players that we will have the most exposure to in their positions.
They can be played in cash games and tournaments and are the players we are primarily building our lineups with.
I will have some analysis on the player selections and game writeups, but check out the Week 18 Worksheet for a fully detailed breakdown of the players and games.
Quarterback
Josh Allen ($9,500) *FanDuel
FanDuel has included the Sunday night game on their main slate, which allows us to make a play on some high-end options.
Allen is not playing great real football entering this game, but his rushing has anchored him from a fantasy stance.
He is still averaging 22.8 fantasy points per game over his past seven games with five QB1 scoring weeks.
Allen has also crushed the Dolphins.
In 12 games, he has thrown 34 touchdown passes with another five rushing touchdowns.
Allen has thrown multiple touchdown passes in every one of those 12 games, including throwing three or more touchdown passes in each of the past three matchups.
He is averaging 279.7 passing yards and 49.3 rushing yards per game.
In the past four matchups between these teams, Allen has thrown for 400, 304, 352, and 320 yards.
When these teams met in Week 4, Allen completed a season-high 84.0% of his passes for a season-high 12.8 yards per pass attempt. He threw four touchdown passes and rushed for another.
Miami has played better defensively over the back half of the season, but they are down multiple pieces on Sunday.
Most notably, they lost Bradley Chubb for the season.
They had already lost Jaelan Phillips for the season back in Week 12.
When both Phillips and Chubb have been on the field this season, Miami has pressured passers on 39.5% of their dropbacks.
With both off the field, that drops to 32.1%.
To compound matters, Miami will not have Xavien Howard available for this game.
Geno Smith ($6,100/$7,300)
With the way Smith is playing paired with Arizona providing more potential push than when these teams played back in Week 7, Smith should be one of the better DFS options at cost this week.
Smith completed 75% of his passes for 9.1 Y/A when these teams played in Week 7, but Arizona only scored 10 points and had just 249 total yards in that game.
Smith threw nine total passes in the second half of that game.
Arizona did not have Kyler Murray or James Conner, and Zach Ertz was still their primary tight end.
With Murray, Conner, and Trey McBride on the field this season, Arizona is averaging 5.6 yards per play compared to 4.2 yards per play with those players off the field.
That is the difference from the team that is eighth in the NFL to one that is 31st in yards per play on the season.
With some added pushback, Smith has a higher ceiling in this rematch.
Arizona is 28th in pressure rate (32.0%).
When these teams played in Week 7, Smith was pressured on 35.7% of his dropbacks. That was his fourth-lowest rate in a game this season.
That is big here because Smith has been one of the most sensitive quarterbacks to pressure this season.
When kept clean, Smith has completed 72.9% of his passes (10th) for 8.4 Y/A (fourth).
When pressured, he has completed 51.2% of his passes (10th) for 5.3 Y/A (24th).
Smith is averaging a league-low 6.3 air yards per attempt when pressured compared to 7.5 air yards per attempt when kept clean (10th).
When Arizona has not pressured the opposing passer, they are allowing a 75.0% completion rate (30th), 8.1 Y/A (27th) with 18 touchdowns and six interceptions for a 108.1 rating (29th).