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Winning Fantasy Football On A Budget – Tips, Advice, and Strategy for Fanduel and Draftkings Contest Selection NFL Week 6 (FREE!)

I don’t know about you, but I don’t have $1000/day, or even per week, to plunk down on hundreds of different fantasy football contests like the big boys.  I’m a #Smallaballa through and through, and I need to be smart and efficient with my budget.  Contest selection is paramount to my success, and probably yours.  Every week, I will be drafted by DFS Army to offer you a roadmap towards building your own fantasy football bankroll smartly with tips, advice, strategy, and templates for several different budgets.

The track record is there on both Fanduel and Draftkings.  In 2020 alone, I have won an MLB contest containing more than 140,000 people.  I placed 4th out of 217,000+ in NBA.  I placed 2nd of 15,000+ in NHL, 4th of 7800+ in NASCAR, and 12th of 3500+ in PGA.  Being smart and well-rounded is my game.  I can teach you to conquer giant tournaments on a budget, but I can also teach you to grind up that bankroll while you lay in wait of the huge night.  So, follow me, and let’s lay siege to our next sport of the calendar year….NFL!

baseball mlb

What Started It All?  Revisit “The Ladder System:  Revolutionize Your Game

After we assemble the sample budgets, we will also discuss the types of players we are looking to utilize in these types of lineups.  When layering contests like 5050s and triple ups with only one or two lineups, we will operate from a smaller player pool than if we were playing giant MME formats with dozens of lineups.  We won’t focus on speculative, pure upside plays.  Those are for the huge life-changing gpps.  The focus here is grinding up bankroll with sensible upside and fun, not for playing the lottery.

For the more speculative types of players, please consult our GPP NFL Cheatsheets and our Coaching Forums.  The feedback you get from our coaches will change your game!

Week 6 Fantasy Football Sample Budgets

So far, I have offered several different budget sizes and combinations.  I love the feedback and questions, but please understand these are examples not rigid rules. Pay more attention to the amounts generally going towards which type of contest.  Pay less attention to emulating it perfectly. These examples are very flexible and many options make plenty of sense.  That’s the fun!

$25 Sample Budget

I love league play.  I find them “softer” competition in a general sense.  I find more inexperience, and more incorrect construction techniques.  Let’s give those a try!

  • $10 3-man leagues
  • $5 5-man leagues
  • $5 10-man leagues
  • $5 20-man leagues

Again, a very simple set of games.  But, we are focused on some volume (as we’ve laid out through this series in smaller field contests) to smooth out volatility somewhat.  3-man leagues are like head-to-heads in that one of the three players often submits a lineup so poorly constructed, these contests become a veritable head-to-head for triple your money.

5-man leagues can find the same, but less often.  So, you do need a solid lineup to really do well here.  And, as you climb the ranks, you need to build a stronger and stronger lineup to build a reasonable chance to win (top 10% strength to beat 10 people, and top 5% to beat 20 people).  You can also find various payouts from 5-man leagues paying two or three players to 20-man leagues paying the top six players (almost a third….becomes more like a triple up with some upside).  And, you can always create your own.  I lived in this format for over a year, and I had more fun creating contests and exploiting the “safety with upside” concept on a more voluminous scale.

$75 Sample Budget

If you are a fan of a “three-lineup structure” as I am, you will find this budget easily fits in the example above.  However, if you are looking to really pound that singular, strong lineup, it’s easy to pick up a wide array of contests, too.

  • $25 in $1 head-to-heads
  • $10 Double Up
  • $10 in 3-man leagues
  • $5 Triple Up
  • $10 in 5-man leagues
  • $5 Quintup Up
  • $5 100-man league (or the Hundo, 118-man, or even 237-man on Draftkings)
  • “Dealer’s Choice!”…. simply mix up the other $5.  Maybe you like single-entry contests, maybe you like 3-max contests and making a couple funky lineups.  This game is no fun if you can’t have fun with building lineups.

The idea of these examples is to give YOU ideas.  How would you have the most fun, and do so sensibly?  I wouldn’t personally do the same thing every single week.  I’d have a basic format I followed, and I would (more at the gpp portion of my example) play around and experiment with different contests and structures.

The Fantasy Football 100man Challenge!

Last week, we built 28 lineups and nothing landed in the top 12% on Fanduel to get paid off.  However, once again, we had solid success at putting these lineups in the top half and top third of the finishers.  However, we discovered a neat little twist…

On the side, I do love to play the MME (mass-multi entry) formats.  I built another 80ish lineups for Fanduel, and yet another 77 for Draftkings.  These lineups produced many top 1% finishers, and even a top 0.2% finish capable of competing in most small and medium sized gpps for the win.  Finishing this high, this frequently, took me a little aback in that our player pool is not supposed to produce lineups with this kind of upside, yet it did.  We will track this aspect going forward as well….as it may provide another strategic wrinkle to report and add into our routines.

As we roll into Week 6, we will compile our “NFL Modules” videos one by one, and put them all in a VIP-only article to catch all in the same place by the weekend.  Each video is 15 minutes or less, and we go position by position laying out our player pool for the week’s matchups.  This player pool comprises nearly 95% of what we build with for the week, as we keep focused on smart lineups designed to demolish cash games with just enough upside to get into bigger leagues and smaller gpps (like our 237-man contests on Draftkings shown above).

Games to Watch

Higher totals matter.  Vegas is more and more correct as the season goes on. Concentrating on game totals over 50 is just a nice benchmark to start with.

Detroit @ Jacksonville – This game opened with an implied total of 52.2 and quickly jumped to 54.5 on public interest.  I will be listening to podcasts like “Geek’s Vegas Lines and Betting Angles” for a read on whether this game is something to enter with reckless abandon or largely fade as a potential trap.  Jacksonville hasn’t faced strong teams yet, and Detroit is getting desperate to show anything.  I can see both fireworks and a clunking dud.  In situations like these, I do lean on players better than myself for some direction.  Everyone needs a coach!

Green Bay @ Tampa Bay – Many will have interest here.  I will be watching the ownership reports in tournaments.  Both quarterbacks are capable passers, and I would be more interested in the lower-owned quarterback and his primary receiver in a true shootout situation.  I will be running it back with the chalkier side of things.  (For more details in what to watch for, our coaching really helps you key in on statistics and game theory).

Players to Build Around

Quarterbacks heading for my lineups – Gardner Minshew and Kirk Cousins don’t inspire a ton of confidence, but find themselves home favorites with decent implied team totals.  I might focus more on a Tom Brady…or even Aaron Rodgers.  Cam Newton also returns to action potentially.  This doesn’t look like a sexy week for quarterbacks.

Running backs in committees make my stomach queasy.  If CMC is not suiting up, Mike Davis is a great option.  Alexander Mattison will be rightfully popular in a home and favored spot replacing the injured Dalvin Cook.  Derrick Henry, Jonathan Taylor, and James Conner should also be heavily considered.  Our “modules” videos will break them down in a little more detail.

Receivers and tight ends are volatile, so I’ll save those for this week’s Modules.  Defenses are easy; I’ve already narrowed myself down to two…Indianapolis and Baltimore.  However, as the Vegas lines move, I will be looking to add another one or two to my mix for diversity.  And, I’ll be consulting our NFL Cheatsheets compiled by our best fantasy football coaches this week, too.

Our coaching rooms are ready to offer you feedback as you put into practice what you learn.  I highly encourage you to check us out!!

The Secret to Winning Fantasy Football on a Budget

Here is my NFL Fantasy advice: the secret is simple. Employing the right tools in the right contests with the right support system.  We offer that inside our VIP walls at DFS Army.  And, as the weeks go on, I will give you small tidbits of different combinations for different budget levels.  But, if you want to really take your game seriously, jump inside and dive even deeper into contest selection with our coaches.  Stop putting the wrong lineups into the wrong contests.  Stop getting eaten alive by the sharks.  Become a shark instead!!

Join DFS Army

And, use coupon code DFSARMY for a 20% discount as a thank you from me for reading this article and passing it around social media.  I will see you again next week with a different set of contests and combinations for new budgets.

Featured Image:

Nov 10, 2019; Arlington, TX, USA; Minnesota Vikings running back Alexander Mattison (25) runs with the ball against the Dallas Cowboys at AT&T Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Matthew Emmons-USA TODAY Sports