In Sunday night’s Showdown, the Kansas City Chiefs visit the Las Vegas Raiders. For a breakdown of this game, check out Rich Hribar’s Fantasy Football Worksheet.
The Chiefs are small favorites so there should be a lot of even 3-3 builds, though the Chiefs players are more popular generally.
Strategy
Projections do in fact have the 3–3 even build expected in over 1/3 of all lineups, but the Chiefs are more over—rostered than I expected. The 5–1 Chiefs on slot is expected over 15%, while the Raiders odds light is only 2%; an absurd discrepancy considering the small spread. Lineups with four Raiders are projected to make up around 12% while for chiefs are expected over three times as often. This is another solid example of leveraging the underdogs and fields propensity towards favorites against them.
Either Tyreek Hill or Patrick Mahomes will be the most popular CPT, near 16%, though Mahomes could come in closer to 11%. He could also be the most owned overall, anywhere from 46–73%. Hill and Travis Kelce have failed to go off in the same game this season, so negatively correlated to make sense. Kelce has also negatively correlated with his teams’ RBs, so a negative boost makes sense.
My favorite players to target are Derek Carr and Darren Waller, But really there is merit to going overweight on most of the Raiders main options including Hunter Renfrow and both RBs. On the Chiefs side I would lean towards Kelce and Darrell Williams given their lower ownership than Mahomes and Hill. Another reason I like Kelce is that the Raiders tend to defend WRs very well but are weak against TEs.
DK Values
- Zay Jones ($600)
- Darrell Williams ($7200)
DK Leverage
- DeSean Jackson ($4200)
- Kenyan Drake ($6600)
DK Build Ideas
- Max 1 DST, Max 1 K
- Max 2 depth WR/TE/RB
- Negative boost same team RBs
- Negative boost Kelce with Hill and with KC RBs
- If CPT QB, include one depth option in stack
- If CPT RB, negative boost opposing DST/K
- If CPT WR/TE boost team QB and force at least 1 QB (either team)
- If CPT Mahomes, stack 3+
- Cumulative ownership under 250%
- Leave salary unspent
FD Values
- Darrell Williams ($11000)
- Mecole Hardman ($6000)
FD Leverage
- Derrick Gore ($7500)
- Kenyan Drake ($10000)
FD Build Ideas
- No K or TE at MVP
- Focus on 3-2 build construction
- No solo CPT in 1-4 construction
- Negative boost opposing QBs (Lineups with both only win 30%)
- If WR CPT, boost QB
- QB is overused but RB and WR are underutilized at MVP
- Don’t stack 3 pass catchers from the same team
- Don’t force the max salary
For more optimizer build rules to consider, check out the list for each DK and FD here.