BigMarley’s Tiers Breakdown – DraftKings
Last year I won a trip out to the Live Final for DraftKings to compete in the PickEm’ (Tiers) Championship. I won my ticket to that with a $2 entry and I ended up winning $5,000 at the Live Final. This year, I am going to share all my Tiers secrets with the DFS ARMY members and hopefully, some of you guys can get an awesome experience like that this year.
The first thing I want to say about Tiers is that you don’t necessarily want to make a lineup going for the most points you can score. Instead, think of what the popular plays will be and try to be different by still making good picks. With Tiers, there is no salary, so people flock to the “best” plays. That makes it easier to know which players will be chalky. If you look at projections for each tier, the highest projected player will usually be the most owned guy in that tier. However, they don’t always score the most. Fading the chalk players is the way to go in GPPs and this format makes it easier for you to figure out who those chalk players will be.
With that said, let’s dig into the week 16 Tiers (Draft Pick) slate:
T1- I like this week’s format for Tiers and I am going to play a lot more volume this week. We start off with a tough QB tier in T1. I wouldn’t talk you off anybody you are interested in for this tier (other than Cam) but for me, I am only interested in the top 3 guys. I think Ben Roethlisberger and Andrew Luck will be the highest owned guys from this tier and I would say they are the top two cash plays if you are playing tiers cash. Big Ben is going against the 32nd ranked passing defense and his home/road splits are not bad this year. At home, Ben averages 24.4 but on the road, he is right there at 23.7. This game also has the highest total on the slate at 53.5 and if this game is a shootout it won’t be from Pitt’s running game. He is also the most expensive player on the main slate and we don’t have to deal with prices in tiers, so I have no issues with going Ben here and if you want to go all-in on him to get leverage then that is fine by me. Andrew Luck has looked great all year and he averages almost 4 more DK points in home games. This is an important game for the Colts too, so I expect them to start out fast and try to get into a big lead early. If TY doesn’t play this week then I will like Luck less and maybe even kick him out of my player pool, but with TY then Luck is right up there with Big Ben for me. The guy I think I would prefer most though because he should be lower owned than Ben and Luck is Matt Ryan. ATL hasn’t had much of a running game all year long and now Ito Smith is on IR so it’s just Coleman and a new guy in the backfield. I think that gives more passes to Ryan and he has been great all year long. If Julio plays, then I think Ryan would be the QB I want the heaviest exposure to because he is right there with those other two top plays and I expect him to be lower owned than both and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he outscored them.
T2- This is the easiest tier this week and the best two plays should get most of the ownership for that reason. Ezekiel Elliott is in a smash spot and he is my favorite play of the week at any position. He will be my cash game play for sure and if you want to go 100% Elliott to gain leverage then I think that’s a solid move this week. The Cowboy are 7.5-point home favorites this week and they are going against the 30th ranked rushing defense. They scored 0 points last week against the Colts and Zeke still found his way to 20 DK points. I expect him to get close to 30 touches in this matchup and I think he could break the slate this week and score 40-50. I think most of my lineups will have Zeke, but I want to throw Christian McCaffrey into some of my Matt Ryan lineups in case that game ends up shooting out. ATL is the worst team in the league against opposing RBs, especially pass catching RBs. CMac scored over 30 DK points in their first matchup and I would think they have to rely on him big time to have any shot of winning this game. I won’t be clicking on any other names in this tier because I don’t think Todd Gurley plays and the other three don’t belong in the same tier this week as Zeke and CMac.
T3- I am going to eat a lot of chalk this week and once again I am only interested in the top 3 plays in this tier. If Julio Jones was healthy, then he would be my top play in this tier, especially if I used Ryan in T1. Julio has been great all year long and has scored over 20-points ten times this year. He also had his monster 300-yard game against the Panthers and this Panthers team has nobody who can cover Julio and they rank 29th against WRs. With him being a game time decision, it makes me nervous enough to look at my next two favorite guys in this tier. I would say Saquon Barkley would be the safest play and the cash game option because the Giants will be feeding him if they have any chance in this game. He is also coming off his worst game of the season, so people will avoid him because of that. We know how good this kid is though and he can break out for a long TD at any point. I like throwing him on lineups I use Luck in T1 and hope this game can stay close. The other guy is DeAndre Hopkins. The way to beat the Eagles D is through the air and Hopkins is the guy Watson looks at on basically every play. He should see over 10 targets in this matchup and I would say he has the highest ceiling after his 42-point performance last week and Julio banged up. If you used Watson in T1 I think you almost have to use Hopkins here and that stack could set you apart from the field if they have a great game again.
T4- I feel like this should be T8 this week because it is the worst tier of the group. It is another tough one where I don’t hate any plays and wouldn’t try to talk you off anybody you wanted to use. The two guys I will be looking at here for my lineups will be Sony Michel and Eric Ebron. With the Pats being 13.5-point home favorites, it sets up well for Michel to get a lot of work and after the podcast last night with Geek, I am sold on Michel and I think he will be pretty low owned in all formats. The other guy I want to use in this tier is more for my Luck lineups, but I like the Luck/Ebron stack a good bit this week. With TY being a game time decision, I think Ebron makes a lot of sense to stack with Luck. This is a big game for the Colts and one they should win. If TY is banged up and the Colts have the lead, then I would think they give TY some rest and that should lead to more Ebron targets. He is already the top red zone threat for the Colts but if TY is on the sidelines then Ebron becomes the best receiving target for Luck. I will have Ebron in all my Luck lineups, but if I am not using Luck then I like throwing Sony in and hope the game script goes how Vegas thinks it will.
T5- This is probably the toughest tier for me this week and I am not sure how the ownership will break down for this group. This is going to be the tier I reference you over to the Domination Station. I click on the DS every day for all sports to see what projections it gives, and I really love it for Tiers because most people playing tiers don’t have a lineup optimizer available to them and I think the DS spits out some great cash lineups. This is what the DS is liking for T5 this week:
T6- This is an all-in spot for me. With Gurley likely not playing and Cooks probably being shadowed by Peterson, this Rams game sets up really well for Robert Woods. Goff is going to pass a ton with Gurley out and Woods should see the most targets and I would confidently project him for over 10. He has averaged over 10 targets the past four weeks and that was with Gurley commanding a lot of work in the offense. I don’t see the Rams running the ball a lot with CJ Anderson so I think Woods could see 15 targets in this spot and I love that possibly opportunity. I will have Woods as my cash game play and he will also be in 100% of my GPP lineups. The other two I would look at if you are not a fan of the Woods play would be either Eagles guy. Zach Ertz and Alshon Jeffery are both solid plays as well but we don’t really know how Foles will move the ball around yet so I just don’t feel good rostering either of them over Woods in my own lineups.
T7- This is another tier I have interest in 3 guys. I think Travis Kelce is very interesting because it is the late game and we can’t get any investment on him for the main slate. I don’t hate having a piece of that late-night hammer and Kelce has been amazing this year averaging over 20-points per game. Kelce averages 11.5 targets the last 5 weeks without Watkins and he is a great red zone target. I am not sure how many people will choose a TE over a QB, RB, and WR, so we could even get Kelce at somewhat lower ownership here. On the other side of the ball I think Russell Wilson is a solid play for the late-night hammer reason. Right now, I don’t plan on Wilson making my player pool but if T.Y. Hilton is going to sit this week then Wilson will jump into my top 3. I always like targeting TY at home though and with this being a big game he will need to be involved for the Colts to jump off to a big lead. I like stacking him in my Luck lineups and if healthy then he will be one of my top plays. The last guy is Alvin Kamara and I expect he will be the chalk. He is the cash game play for me and if you want to go all-in on him to gain leverage then that is totally fine. This is the big game of the week with the 53.5-point total and Kamara is one of the best talents in the league. He should get over 20 opportunities in this game with his rushes and receptions and he could break a long one at any time. The DS also has him projected for 2 more points than anybody else, so I’d say he is the top play in this tier and if you aren’t worried about ownership then just roll with him.
T8- The trend continues with me liking the top guys on the list and Tyreek Hill and Antonio Brown are the only two guys I am really interested in here. I love Hill for the late-night hammer angle and he is the most explosive player in the league playing with the top QB. He also averages almost 10 more points on the road compared to home games. He destroys in prime-time road game and that is what we have here. Hill has the highest ceiling in this tier and one of the highest on the whole slate. I love him for GPPs and I think he is safe enough for cash as well. I do think with the injury to JuJu that Antonio Brown is a bit safer and I would probably prefer him in cash games. If this game does shoot out like Vegas thinks it might, then there is no way AB isn’t a part of Pitt putting points on the board. With or without JuJu I love this spot for AB and I expect him to get fed 10-15 targets in this matchup, even if Lattimore is guarding him. I feel safer in AB getting 10+ targets more so than I do about Hill. I just think Hill has the higher ceiling and can turn his targets into more points, so I would prefer Hill in GPPs and AB in cash. If I used Big Ben in T1 then I will almost certainly be pairing him with AB here.
Good luck to everyone in the DFS ARMY for week 16! I hope to see some more huge winning screenshots this week and if I don’t win the big Tiers GPP, I hope one of you do.
If you have any questions you can hit me up in my Slack channel at #BigMarley-NFL-MMA