DraftKings Week 1 GPP Breakdown
This will be a GPP-specific breakdown of DraftKings. In GPPs, your main focus should be on player ceilings and you should be willing to take risks. You should also be submitting multiple tournament entries each week -- if you have $100 to spend, ten $10 GPPs is better than one $100 GPP. One huge cash could exponentially increase your bankroll, and there are only 20 playable weeks in the season, so you need to give youself as many chances as possible to win by diversifying your player pool.
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Below, I'll highlight the players I believe should be taken into consideration in DraftKings tournaments (Millionaire Maker, I'm looking at you)-- that is, who your player pool should consist of. I'm not trying to make an airtight case for why a player is one of the safest picks on the slate, I'm instead concerned with highlighting potential upside. I won't talk about downside, but it should be understood that many of these picks carry significantly more risk than cash game options would, although if a player appeared in my cash game breakdown, he'll most likely make it into here too.
You need to beat a large portion of the field, so having some players that aren't in many other entries is key. I'll extrapolate from my Ownership Outlook column where I can, because of course we're trying to target players that have the right balance of upside and potential low ownership. Players will generally be discussed in order of how much exposure I think you should have to them. Also keep in mind that it's OK to have some highly owned plays -- if you're fading ALL of the best values in every lineup you'll have a hard time placing. The key is to not have a bunch of the most popular plays all in the same lineups, you want to give yourself multiple ways to profit depending on who the rest of the field ends up being wrong about.
Since stacking is a key component of tournaments, I'll include QBs, WRs, and TEs under the heading 'Passing Game'. I'll focus more heavily on the passing game, because that's where a lot of the volatility occurs. Also, it is generally a smart move to get a WR in your flex slot on DraftKings, as they have much higher upside than RBs due to the site's scoring system.
At RB, my player pool is smaller-- I focus on Vegas favorites and I'm not as worried about trying to over-diversify in fear of "missing out" on top performances -- I'm just looking for enough value to keep me in the running. Also, I'm not diving in to the Shane Vereens and Danny Woodheads and ignoring the Chris Ivorys and Alfred Morrises just because of the scoring system. I want good value; I don't care how I get it. Depending on how you fare in your picks in the passing game, up to three positions and four lineup slots may be affected, but if you mix and match too much at RB, it could lead you to ruin a great stack with a sub-optimal RB play. Ditto for D/ST.
Passing Game
Andy Dalton ($6,100) is at his best with a clean pocket, and the Raiders finished last in adjusted sack rate a season ago. Dalton finished as a top-5 fantasy QB in 2013, but last year was without A.J. Green ($7,800), Marvin Jones ($4,200), and Tyler Eifert ($3,500) for 34 games; they're now healthy. The Raiders have two members in their starting secondary who allowed TDs on over 10 percent of targets last season, in addition to employing a 39-year-old Charles Woodson. Green tends to excel on the road: he has a 6/101/0.7 in 30 career road games. Dalton-Green is my favorite stack; Jones and Eifert are in play as well. Dalton was 1% owned in FanDuel's Thursday GPP; Green was 7%, and it's likely to be in a similar range on DraftKings.
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