Scott Barrett’s daily fantasy focus: Top plays, strategy, and advice for Week 9

This article is long, so I’ll spare you a lengthy intro. Here’s everything need to know in order to dominate your Week 9 DFS tournaments and cash games

Note: This article is published Friday mornings, so it can fall behind some of the more important late-week updates regarding injuries. This week especially there are a lot of players questionable for Sunday’s games. So, be sure to keep an eye on news throughout the weekend, and to apply some of your own intuition on who to play.

Quarterbacks

Russell Wilson, QB, Seattle Seahawks

(DK: QB1, FD: QB1)

Wilson has ranked top-four in fantasy points per dropback in seven of eight career seasons. This year, he’s averaging 0.64 fantasy points per dropback, which would represent a new career-high and the seventh-best mark by any quarterback this past decade. For a quarterback, we can say fantasy points per game comprises fantasy points per dropback and dropbacks per game. This makes figuring out when to play Wilson is fairly easy — Wilson almost always ranks highly in fantasy points per dropback, and we just need to determine when he’s going to rank highly in dropbacks per game. Unfortunately, that isn’t very often, but it should be the case this week.

At least, Vegas thinks so, gifting Seattle their highest implied point total of the season (28.75) in their highest over/under of the year (51.5), implying they think Tampa Bay’s offense can keep thinks competitive enough to warrant Wilson keeping his foot on the gas. The matchup warrants a pass-heavy approach as well, as Tampa Bay represents the league’s top pass-funnel defense. Teams are throwing the ball against Tampa Bay on 65% of their offensive plays, which ranks fifth-most, or most if adjusted for gamescript. It’s easy to see why — Tampa Bay ranks best in yards per carry allowed and fifth-best in run defense grade, but ninth-worst in pass coverage grade and sixth-worst in fantasy points per game allowed to opposing quarterbacks.

Matt Moore, QB, Kansas City Chiefs

(DK: QB20, FD: QB19)

If not paying all the way up for Wilson, I’m looking to pay all the way down. Of the cheap quarterbacks to consider, my favorite is Moore. Of course, Moore is nothing special in terms of talent, though he was more than adequate in a tougher matchup last week. He’s just perfectly cheap for cash games, where I prefer to pay down at the quarterback position. He also has a top supporting cast in Travis Kelce, Sammy Watkins, Tyreek Hill, and a head coach who just coaxed a historically great fantasy season from Patrick Mahomes, a year after Alex Smith almost won MVP.