Fantasy

9/17/22

6 min read

2022 Week 2 NFL DFS High Stakes Advice from a Milly Maker Winner

high stakes

Football season is officially underway with an exciting Week 1 in the books. Last week, I came about 30 points away from the Million-dollar top prize in the $20 Milly Maker contest. You won't be perfect every week of the season, and you’ll always have your regrets about who you started, but you need to move on and keep pushing. One very important thing when you're playing DFS is to have a short memory. Don’t chase for your money back because that’s how you dig yourself into a hole. Manage your bankroll and do your research. You'll be fine. 

Contrary to most DFS pros, I don’t usually run 150 lineups or use an optimizer. I hand-build one or two of my favorite lineups using my own projections and enter them into multiple tournaments. I typically play all the Milly Makers, a few single-entry contests and I’ll dabble in the Satellites & Qualifiers. The DraftKings Fantasy Football World Championship is in New Orleans this year with a $2.5 million top prize, so I’ll shoot to get a few seats there.

Having a strategy is very important when you’re playing DFS, especially since you’ll be going up against some of the best players in the country. After reading this, you can check out my article Anatomy of Winning a GPP to see my strategy for my Milly Maker lineup in Week 3 of last year.  

Let’s get to it.

VALUES

  1. RB Darrell Henderson: $5,700. This price is a steal for a guy who had an 82% snap share to go along with 18 opportunities. I was shocked with how little Cam Akers was used, but it looks like this is Henderson’s backfield, at least for the meantime. This week, he gets the Falcons in a game where the Rams are favored by 10 points and have the highest team total projection at 29 points. This is an easy play in cash games, but even in tournaments, it might be worth eating the chalk here.
  1. QB Trey Lance: $5,700. Alright, it wasn’t pretty last week in Chicago, we get it. However, that game was more about bad weather than anything else. I’m all in on Lance this week. He’ll be facing a low-end defense without Jamal Adams, and I think this is the week we see him just explode. Losing Elijah Mitchell hurts the offense, but the Niners will rely on Lance even more. The rushing floor is nice, and if he can connect on a couple of touchdowns, his ceiling is as high as anyone on this slate. I love the Lance/Aiyuk stack this week.
  1. RB Antonio Gibson: $6,200. Gibson is my smash start of the week in my latest Start 'Em, Sit 'Em article. For DFS, his price is very reasonable, and he should eat against a Lions defense that let up over 5 YPC and 4 rushing touchdowns to the Eagles last week. This game has one of the highest O/U on the slate and for good reason. Both defenses are poor and missing key players, while both offenses have weapons at every level. Gibson had 22 opportunities against the Jags and turned that into 20 DK points. He didn’t even have to get into the end zone last week to pay off. Against Detroit in a potential shootout, though, I’d be shocked if we saw anything less than what we saw last week. This is another game I’m very interested in stacking. Pairing him with Amon-Ra St. Brown is ideal and not crazy expensive where you can still get your studs to go along with it. 

Honorable Mention

  1. WR Brandon Aiyuk: $5,100 
  2. RB Javonte Williams: $6,500
  3. WR Marquise Brown: $6,200 

STUDS

  1. WR Davante Adams: $8,600. Davante Adams had one of the best debuts for a new team that I’ve ever seen. He led the league in target share and showed chemistry right off the rip with Derek Carr. While they didn’t score a ton of points, Adams went 10 for 141 and a touchdown. He is still one of the best, if not the best wide receiver in football today. This week, he faces a Cardinals defense that was just demolished through the air last week. The Raiders' offense will bounce back at home this Sunday. They have no choice. Adams is going to see a ton of man coverage, and he’s going to get himself open easily, as he always does. Adams is a safe play, and I prefer him to Cooper Kupp at $9,900, since the Raiders game could be a shootout, whereas the Rams are probably going to blow out the Falcons and run the ball a ton in the second half.
  2. RB Saquon Barkley: $7,300. I didn’t know if I should throw Barkley in the “Values” or the “Studs” section. Let’s call him a stud with tons of value at $7,300. If you’ve been following me all offseason, you know I stuck my neck out on the line for Barkley. Week 1 may have been one of the most satisfying feelings for me. He went absolutely bonkers, and it was exactly what I had envisioned and more. The guy is on a mission this year. Did you see him when he got into the end zone for the first time? What about the two-point conversion at the end of the game? He showed the love and passion that he has for the game of football, and I’m honestly very happy for him. On Sunday, he gets the Carolina Panthers defense that was destroyed by the likes of Kareem Hunt and Nick Chubb last week. This is one of the more obvious plays this week. Please, I’m begging you, PLAY HIM EVERYWHERE!
  1. WR Deebo Samuel: $7,800. As you can see, I am very high on the 49ers' offense this week. Realistically, the Seahawks' defense was horrible against the Broncos, giving up a total of 433 total yards. Melvin Gordon and Javonte Williams both fumbled on the one-yard line, so the box score doesn’t truly show how bad they really were. Again, the 49ers are missing Mitchell, so I think we’ll see Kyle Shanahan will use Samuel heavily as a running back this week. If he gets close to 15-20 opportunities - which I think he will - he is going to eat. He might finish as one of the top players on the entire slate. I have a feeling the Million-Dollar lineup will have some sort of Niners stack in it.

Punts

  1. WR Paris Campbell: $3,700
  2. TE Juwan Johnson: $2,500 
  3. Bengals Defense: $2,200

Favorite Game Stacks

  1. Raiders/Cardinals
  2. Lions/Commanders
  3. Ravens/Dolphins
  4. 49ers/Seahawks
  5. Saints/Bucs

Reach out to me via Twitter if you have any questions or just need some advice!

Good luck!


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