As the weeks have gone on, the importance of correlation plays can’t be ignored. Every so often, you see a luckbox type lineup at the top of the leaderboard with a lot of one-off plays but for the most part, lately, we’ve seen heavily correlated lineups reaching the top. There are plenty of teams on the main slate this week —13, in fact — that are implied to score 25+ points.
We’ll start off the same way we did last week by using the pace tool as our jumping-off point. It’s easy to fall in love with these totals and we should listen to what Vegas says to a certain extent but it’s wise to limit your exposure to the slower-paced games if possible.
Over the past month or so, Seattle and Arizona are in the top eight in pace across all situations. If you narrow that down and just look at when the score is within 8 points in either direction, they’re both in the top four. That seems like a good place to start.
Finding Leverage in Chalkville
The Cardinals have actually been the 11th-best team at limiting explosive pass plays on the season. They’re in the bottom half of the league when it comes to allowing explosive run plays, though.
Everyone will tell you to play the Seattle wide receivers and they definitely have ceilings that warrant consideration but it feels like Chris Carson ($6,400) will be under-owned. By a large margin. For all of the talk about how Russell Wilson ($8,000) is cooking, Carson has made the most of the opportunities he has gotten. When you’re in a large field GPP, you need leverage. This game will feature heavily owned pieces in the passing game and if you get a couple of goal line carries that find the end zone for Carson, he’ll be invaluable.
You can stack this game up by playing Wilson, Carson, one of the wide receivers, and DeAndre Hopkins ($8,200). You’ll have to find some value, obviously, but I think that construction will be unique.
Heating Up in Hotlanta
Detroit has struggled to limit explosive pass plays. If there’s anybody who can take advantage of a weak pass defense it’s Julio Jones ($7,100) and Calvin Ridley ($7,300).
Those two accounted for nearly 50% of the targets last week. If we could somehow get rid of the pity targets for the guys like Christian Blake and Keith Smith we could consolidate this target tree even further. On the other side of the ball, it feels like Kenny Golladay ($6,700) should be firmly in play. He hit the bonus last week on just six targets and was tackled on the one-yard line. Golladay should be slightly lower owned in Week 7 but will still be popular.
The play in this game is likely to include all three of these receivers in some way with Matt Ryan ($6,700) and Matthew Stafford ($6,500).
I’m Sorry Mr. Jackson
Justin Jackson ($4,900) is the aforementioned value play that will allow you to pay for some of these more expensive stacks. Jacksonville has allowed explosive runs at a 13% clip (see the explosive plays table above).
The Chargers haven’t been shy about running the ball. Across all game situations, they’ve been five percentage points below league average in pass rate.
It’s not every day that we get a $4,900 running back with this type of volume projection and even with some ownership, we’ll need to take advantage as a value play. The correlation play is DJ Chark ($5,500) as long as he’s active.
Once again, this is one of those classic spots where the defense’s weaknesses match up perfectly with the receivers' strengths. Assuming the spread holds and the Chargers are up big, Jacksonville will need to throw often to try to catch up.
Almost Min-Priced Receivers?! Almost Min-Priced Receivers!
Apparently, the salary setters at DraftKings HQ didn’t see that DeMarcus Robinson ($3,400) was on the field for 69-of-73 snaps last week.
With Sammy Watkins absent from practice again on Thursday, you’d think that Robinson would continue his role from last week. It’s impossible to argue against his workload at $3,400.
We’ve seen Robinson break a slate on just six targets. If he finds the end zone even once, he pays off at this salary. If he scores twice or hits the bonus, he’ll be in a ton of the top GPP lineups on Sunday.