Welcome back to the Shark Autopsy Report, NFL Edition Week 5! If this is your first time reading the Shark Autopsy Report, Welcome! Over the course of the remainder of the NFL season this article will deconstruct winning DraftKings lineups in contests where the dark waters of Guaranteed Prize Pool (GPP) contests are ripe with sharks. Navigating these waters where the sharks smell blood in the water is not easy, but the DFSArmy has you covered, providing you with the essential daily tools to help our VIPs turn into sharks!
The article will be released weekly, with each day’s article looking at multi-entry GPP contests, specifically the Milly Maker contest.
Follow me on Twitter and if you are a VIP I will see you in the NFL channels. I enjoy seeing and hearing from all of the VIPs when things go well. If you aren’t a VIP member, there’s an easy way to get a free month to test the Army out. The Army has all of the content, tools, second-to-none Domination Station Optimizer, and the most accessible NFL staff and coaches in the industry to guide you in your journey of becoming a better DFS player.
In this edition of the Shark Autopsy Report, we look at the illustrious Milly Maker, a massive GPP tourney that pays out $1 million to first place. A true tale of the tape contest that everyone knows about and is discussed and written about extensively throughout the course of the week. Many think that lineup construction to win this tourney is all about the most contrarian construction possible, sometimes that is the case, but most of the times that is not the case.
Little Bit about the DFSArmy
For those of you who are new to Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) and are looking for a top notch, second to none DFS site that can provide you with the tools to construct quality DFS lineups like the pros use, then look no further, as the DFSArmy has you covered. At the DFSArmy we pride ourselves on the ability of our coaches to teach and provide our members with the methodologies, processes, tools and thought processes to become an equitable DFS player, who can grow their bankroll with proper bankroll management and turn your everyday DFS Joe into a DFS Pro.
Synopsis of the Shark Autopsy Report
Lineup deconstruction is what all of the sites are pushing these days, as everyone is wanting to get in on the action of making sure their DFS site is breaking down the winning lineups of these massive payout contests that are the DraftKings’ Milly Maker and the FanDuel’s Sunday Million. TJ Hernandez produces his “TJs Take: Weekly NFL DFS Recap”. I have read this article each week and other lineup deconstruction articles and their analyses are good.
The Shark Autopsy Report is different from those other lineup breakdown reports that you can read online, there’s a multitude of these types of articles. The Shark Autopsy Report shows you the top ten winning lineups (position-by-position), the number of lineups the top 10 DFS players entered into the contest, the average amount spent by position in the winning lineup, top 10 player ownership percentages, and week-to-week salary distributions of the top 10 lineups to determine if there’s salary correlation amongst the top ten lineups, to help better predict winning lineup construction in future weeks.
DraftKings $4.0M Milly Maker Contest
As DFS players, we are so attracted to the light shining down from the DFS Universe of the $1M dollar first place prize in the DraftKings Milly Maker and FanDuel Sunday Million contests. Because of this, I understand why DFS sites are analyzing these winning lineups. It should be part of your repertoire as a DFS player to revisit the prior week’s winning lineups, not just for the Milly Maker and Sunday Million contests, but for all of the contests you entered to see how the winning lineup was constructed. Additionally, you should be looking at your own lineups to determine WHY certain plays in your lineups went off and WHY other plays did not. This will ultimately make you a better player, but it will help you determine trends that you may not have otherwise noticed if you were not reviewing over past week’s lineups.
Changes in the NFL rules landscape has led to greater scores amongst the top finishing lineups in all NFL DFS contests, not just the Milly Maker and other colossal entry contests, but in cash games and smaller GPPs as well.
Now here’s a trend for you, for the fifth week in a row, the winner of the Milly Maker DID NOT MAX ENTER the tourney. Milly Maker winner in week 5, Slaytations entered 35 lineups. Gone are the days of Max Multi Entry to take down the colossal tourney. There were 4 DFS players who max entered the week 5 Milly Maker contest. In week 5, the DFS industry’s 2nd overall ranked player entered the top 10. Youdacao is ranked 1st or 2nd in every leaderboard on RotoGrinders rankings.
Top 10
Winning Lineup
Slaytations’ winning lineup utilized a low owned 3-man stack of Aaron Rodgers, Davante Adams, and Marquez Valdes-Scantling, who had a 6.5% average tournament field ownership, put up a total of 85.48 DK Pts. Slaytation utilizing the Green Bay stack along with Odell Beckham Jr. at low ownership propelled his lineup up the leaderboard during the 1 PM slate of games. A great stack play in a game where there was player availability uncertainty where most were on the opposite side of the ball with Stafford and Marvin Jones Jr. stacks. The uncertainty of Davante Adams heading into the game kept his ownership low in what was a plus matchup for him.
The winning lineup incorporated 3 RBs and 3 WRs at an average salary spend of $6,467 for RBs and $6,300 for WRs. As you can see below, 4 of the top 10 lineups utilized the RB in the Flex position and 6 of the top 10 lineups utilized the WR in the Flex position.
Top 10 Lineups at a Glance
Over the course of the 2018 NFL season, we will be comparing on a weekly basis how the top 10 scoring Milly Maker lineups have distributed their salary across each position within their lineups to determine if there’s correlation week-to-week amongst the top 10 lineups.
Weekly Salary Distribution
For the weeks 1 to 4 of Milly Maker top 10 lineups, we can see some trends for each allocable position. The top 10 lineups allocated on average 11.56% of their salary towards the QB position, 16.52% on average to the RB 1 position, 12.13% on average to the RB 2 position, 12.88% on average to the WR 1 position, 10.8% on average to the WR 2 position, 8.72% on average to the WR 3 position, 11.77% on average to the FLEX position, 9.51% on average to the TE position and 5.89% on average to the DEF position. Over the course of the first 4 weeks of the season, the positional percentage of spend was relatively flat across the QB, RB 2, WR 1, WR 2, and FLEX positions ranging in percentage spent of 10.8% to 12.88%. The outliers of where the most amount of the top 10 lineups salary was allocated was towards the RB 1 position, which saw 16.52% on average spent towards the position, this percentage equates to an average monetary spend of $8,260 towards the position. Over the first four weeks of the season, the top 10 lineups on average spent a total of $49,878 of the $50,000 ceiling.
In week 5, there was a shift in spending from RB 1 to WR 1. For week 1 to 4, the top 10 lineups average spend on WR 1 was $6,438, whereas in week 5, the average spend on WR 1 went up to $7,940. This was a result of 3 of the 10 lineups rostering Antonio Brown at $9,100 and Odell Beckham Jr. at $8,000. Though Todd Gurley was used in 3 out of 10 lineups at $9,400, 7 of the top 10 lineups utilized an RB 1 that was priced at or below $7,500 and this pulled the total average spend for the week for RB 1 down.
Weekly Highest Owned Plays (Top 10 vs. Field)
The below graphic displays the week’s highest owned (by field ownership) NFL players and the percentage of top 10 scoring Milly Maker lineups employed the highest owned plays in the tourney. What can be gleaned from the below graphic is that of those top 10 scoring lineups in the weekly Milly Maker contest, the winning top 10 lineups are either over-weight or under-weight on the highest drafted NFL players that week as compared to the tourney’s overall field ownership. In week 5, the top 10 lineup’s field were bullish on two plays, T.J. Yeldon and David Johnson as compared to the field in the Milly Maker. What’s interesting is that the top 10 field was bearish on the remaining 8 players of the 10 highest rostered players, so much so that none of the top 10 lineups even rostered them in their lineups. The top 10 scoring lineups take a stand on a play or two and either go under or over weight on those respective plays that week.
Hmm…. GAME THEORY IS THE NAME OF THE GAME TO SCORING IN THE TOP 10 OF THE MILLY MAKER!
To conclude this installment of the Shark Autopsy Report, the DFS Army was started based on the concept that bring high-level tools, projections, and information to average players would allow them to compete on a level playing field with the DFS pros that have been dominating the industry for years. Check out our full Wall of Wins to see countless other screenshots from regular players utilizing DFS Army tools and advice to take down 6 figure prizes on a regular basis. Sign up as a DFS Army VIP today to take your game to the next level and start competing like a pro.