The Simple Six | DFS NFL Week 16 Leans for DraftKings and Fanduel

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, welcome to week 16 of the NFL Season!  It is the all important semi-finals of most season long and best ball formats, and there is of course plenty of DFS monies to be made.  Those presents you put on the credit card aren’t gonna pay for themselves.

It is a bit of a turd in the eggnog that Covid and injuries have already reeked havoc on the slate, particularly at the running back position.  Gone are Dalvin Cook, Lenny Fournette, and Austin Ekeler.  We now have underpriced versions of their backups, Mattison, RoJo, and Justin Jackson.  All should be popular choices for those looking to pay down at the position.

Aside from the RB value, another thing that stick out to me is the fact that there some serious price discrepancies between the two main sites. I’m going to highlight two of these discrepancies in my Simple Six plays.

 

1- Antonio Brown, $4,900 on DraftKings, while $7,000 on Fanduel

We all saw the looks of frustration on the face of Tom Brady trying to get on same page with Tampa’s second tier receivers last week after Godwin and Evans went out.  He is absolutely going to pepper the returning AB with targets.

Brown probably would have come back from his ankle injury a week or two ago if not for fake the vax card suspension.  He returns now, fully healed, to an increased roll.  In the last 2 games Brown played (weeks 5 and 6) he averaged 29.3 DK points, and that was with Evans and Godwin active.

The $7,000 on Fanduel seems like a fair price, and I will pay it in some game stacks with Brady and Gronk.  I don’t care how many games he’s missed, $4,900 is joke for Antonio Brown and I won’t make many DraftKings lineups without him.

 

2- James Robinson, $5,900 on DraftKings, while $8,200 on Fanduel

With all the running back value emerging on this slate, Robinson will not even be as chalky has he looked like he could have been early in the week.  I would argue that JRob is in the best spot of the value RBs.  Mattison faces a tough Ram D, we don’t know if Rojo will play on pass downs, and Justin Jackson  is definitely the Charger you want to play, but Josh Kelly and Larry Roundtree will likely be involved.

Robinson tied his season high with 21 touches last week.  He now has the pleasure of facing a Jets defense that we have successfully picked on all season long.  Robert Saleh’s crew just allowed Duke Johnson to return like the ghost of Christmas past and rush for 107 yards and 2 TDs.  Robinson should feast this holiday weekend against Gang Green.

 

3- Justin Jackson, $4,20o on DraftKings

Our Domination Station currently shows the Chargers with the highest implied team total (28.25) on the slate.  The Bolts are missing Big Mike Williams, Austin Ekeler, and Jaylen Guyton.  Jackson, who looked explosive in limited duty last week against KC should be featured prominently in both the run and pass game.  Kelly and Roundtree will get some work, but Jackson will get the first chance to impress.  As the Geek pointed in the VIP Player Club, the man himself, Austin Ekeler instructed his fantasy owners to play Justin Jackson.

It is a tougher decision on Fanduel where Jackson ($5,400), Rojo ($5,400), and Mattison ($5,500) are all essentially the same price.  On DraftKings, the discount on Jackson ($4,200), relative to Rojo ($5,100), and especially Mattison ($6,800) is too big to ignore in most roster builds.

 

4- Dallas Goedert, $5,100 on DraftKings and $5,900 on Fanduel

Once again we get a player that is priced too cheap because he played at night the previous week.  The discount on Goedert is a welcomed one on a weak tight end slate.  There is no Kittle, Kelce is in Covid protocols.  A couple hours ago Mark Andrews seemed like a great play.  Now his QB is recently signed third stringer Josh Johnson (I think).

Goedert seems to have established himself as the top passing catching option in Philly. He put up a slate breaking 31.5 DK points two games ago when Minshew started and stayed hot last week with Hurts back at the helm, posting 23.5 points.

The Giants are known to be soft against the tight end.  Goedert will have a great opportunity to make it 3 big games in a row.  Gronk ($6,200 on DK) is also a great TE play this week and I will use him in Brady stacks, but in cash/single entry formats, I’ll the the $1,100 discount on Goedert.

 

5- Tom Brady, $7,400 on DraftKings and $8,400 Fanduel

Does Tom Brady strike you as the type of dude that is going to take getting shut out well?  Last week’s goose egg against the Saints probably ruined Tommy Boy’s Christmas and he’s going to take it out on a Carolina team that has lost 4 in a row and 9 of their last 11.

Brady is usually tough to stack because he has so many different weapons that he throws to you.  Normally, you also have to worry about the occasional game where Lenny hogs all the TDs.  Neither of those concerns exist today.

I will stack Brady with Brown and Gronk (especially on DK where AB is way too cheap).  If Tom throws for all the TDs (I wouldn’t put it past him as tries to keep up with Rodgers in the MVP race) you will get great leverage in GPPs off the 25-30% of the field playing Rojo.

 

6- Josh Palmer, $3,300 on DraftKings

As you can see I like the Chargers, with a condensed target share, indoors at a bad Houston team.  LA has been giving more work to their talented 3rd round draft pick in the second half of the season.  Now, with Williams, Guyton, and Andre Roberts all out, Palmer should be on the field for virtually all offensive snaps.

He will serve as the number 2 WR behind Keenan Allen.  Practice squad call up Jason Moore, who only has 2 career catches will be the number 3.  As a $3,300 salary saver, you could certainly do worse than a man who will be the second read on most of Justin Herbert’s drop backs.

 

Best of luck to all trying to negotiate this ever changing slate.  Every time tried to start writing this piece, 3 new bits of news dropped.  I hope you and your families had a wonderful Christmas or holiday week.  If you haven’t already joined the DFS Army family, there is still plenty of time! Use promo code DFS ARMY to save!

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