The best DFS stacks & blowup targets for wild-card weekend

Small slate DFS requires a completely different approach than the traditional regular season main slate with around 10 different game options. The DFS sites broke up the wild card round into featured slates and also provided a three-day structure with all six games.

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The various DFS models in this article will have applications and plays for any of the sites that span the weekend contests. On shorter slates, don’t be afraid to press on the game stack, with the expectation that identifying the right game provides value when it far outshines the others.

SALARY-ADJUSTED FANTASY PERFORMANCE

One of the best ways to find value opportunities on a given slate is to start with the salary-adjusted expectation for all players. We have a worthwhile dataset of player salaries and their resulting fantasy performances for DraftKings since it has been around for over six years. By figuring out the expectation based on each player’s salary and position, we can compare their salary-expected fantasy performance to PFF’s fantasy projections. Doing this highlights the best value plays based on salary.

Player	Position	Team	DK Salary	Salary Expectation	Proj. Fantasy Pts	Proj. Above Salary Expectation
Leonard Fournette	HB	TB	5900	12.96	17.91	4.95
Tyler Johnson	WR	TB	4000	6.96	11.55	4.59
Cooper Kupp	WR	LA	9000	22.69	26.92	4.23
Jakobi Meyers	WR	NE	4500	8.53	12.74	4.21
Antoine Wesley	WR	ARZ	3300	4.75	8.47	3.72
Odell Beckham Jr.	WR	LA	5100	10.42	14.07	3.65
Tee Higgins	WR	CIN	6300	14.20	17.77	3.57
C.J. Uzomah	TE	CIN	3200	5.11	8.63	3.52
Tyler Boyd	WR	CIN	5000	10.10	13.14	3.04
Emmanuel Sanders	WR	BUF	4000	6.96	9.92	2.96
Brandon Aiyuk	WR	SF	5400	11.36	13.96	2.60
Hunter Henry	TE	NE	3700	6.68	9.21	2.53
Ja'Marr Chase	WR	CIN	7400	17.66	20.14	2.48
Cole Beasley	WR	BUF	4300	7.90	10.24	2.34
DeVonta Smith	WR	PHI	5500	11.68	14.02	2.34

PASS-CATCHING BLOWUP MODEL

Utilizing specific variables, we can build a model tuned to predict performances where a pass-catcher goes over a certain site-specific scoring threshold. For DraftKings, this is set at 25 fantasy points.

This model provides the percentage chance each receiver will meet or exceed our fantasy-point threshold for the site given their historical opportunity. The model won’t be right on every player, but it is useful in identifying the blow-up performances we want to unearth in our DFS lineups.