Borg’s DFS Cash Lineup Review for Week 3 (Fantasy Football)

Did you roster CeeDee Lamb in cash?

In some of my double-ups, it was 50% of the field! Heck, the dude was my “Slate Breaker” on Friday’s podcast so in a ton of tournaments, I took a bath. But is it possible to weather a storm (a DraftKings snowflake of epic porportions) and still cash?

The goal of this article is neither to boast nor wallow in “shoulda, woulda, couldas” but rather give a transparent look at my thought process for the week. Hopefully, this will help DFS & Betting Podcast listeners and DFS Pass subscribers get a deeper window into the ups and downs of playing DFS and help you in your selections each week. On Tuesdays, Betz and I review our cash lineups, and this week we’ll give some common overreactions we see and hear.

For cash, I specifically play 50/50s, Double-Ups, and H2Hs on DraftKings. I’ll share my unfiltered gut reaction, and the thought process behind this lineup construction, and at the bottom, I will post my weekly results including the cash line and H2H record to stay accountable with you.

If you want to go back to the drawing board, we did an overview podcast before the season about DFS Cash Game Strategy and creating Player Pools. I also published older articles on DFS Strategy for Beginners and another entitled: How to Approach Each Position in DFS & Gain an Edge.

Week 3 Cash Lineup

Draft % and cash lines each week will be from DraftKings’ $10 Single-Entry Double-Up with roughly 4,600 entries. This is a slightly elevated price point from the $1, and $5 double-ups and I think gives a solid idea each week of double-up roster percentages.

The Thought Process

Cash Locks (In My Opinion)

• In our Week 3 DFS Best Plays (which comes out on Saturdays for DFS Pass subscribers only), I shared the pool of players and this week was blatantly obvious who the top plays were.
• Keenan Allen was the easiest click of the week at $4,700. I was shocked he was not in 75+ % of lineups. Ageists!
• The RBs on this slate were fairly easy to differentiate with Jordan Mason being our top RB play of the week. I could not fathom building a lineup without him in cash at $5,400.
• Rome Odunze was also a virtual lock at his price point coming off a monster game the previous week. The matchup against the Cowboys also was front-and-center. If you didn’t play Rome in cash, I guess you were getting too cute?
• Once we got news that Zach Charbonnet was doubtful, Kenneth Walker III moved into must-play territory as a 7-point home favorite against the hapless Saints. While I loved so many other RBs on this slate, in cash, he felt too easy to fit in thinking 60+ % of the field would also go there.
• All four plays above were likely in your cash lineup as well. It is plays like these I “concede” in cash knowing that a majority of my H2H opponents will be flipping over the same cards. You cancel out, use the salary savings, and move on.

Gut-Wrenching Decisions

My goal in this section is to discuss the pool of players I considered for cash and how I arrived at my final lineup.

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• Spending down on QB was certainly where the field was going to go this week. The only QB over $6K in my pool was Justin Herbert but even with all my love for the Chargers, I did not consider him at all in cash. I wrote in Best Plays: “paying down with Marcus Mariota or Carson Wentz in cash is certainly viable… We prefer Mariota given his success in this Washington offense last year (two top-10 finishes despite starting zero games) and his mobility. At $4,000, you are needing 12 points in cash, but our projections have him much higher. If you don’t want to mess around, Drake Maye can repeat what he did last week .” Going with Mariota opened up so many possibilities on this slate but I also assumed roughly 50% of the field would also side with the $4K QBs.
• I wish I could’ve fit four RBs this week into my cash lineup. With Mason and KW3 locked in, I toyed around with lineups with either Christian McCaffrey or Jonathan Taylor. CMC’s projections are going to be so strong every week and his work in the receiving game can make up for whatever inefficiencies the 49ers have while Brock Purdy and George Kittle are out. JTT was also way too cheap given Shane Steichen’s sick commitment to leave his All-Pro back on the field at all times, a fact we brought up on the podcast.
• With 2 WRs already locked in and a cheap QB, I certainly had room to consider one of the elite WRs: CeeDee Lamb or Puka Nacua. My conviction with CD as a Slate Breaker and access to a correlation play from the DAL/CHI game made him even more attractive.
• At TE, I only really considered 3 tiers: $5,700 Trey McBride, $4400 Tyler Warren, and $3900 Juwan Johnson. I have an emotional tie to all 3 players so this was not an easy decision. Warren is my My Guy for this season and Johnson is one of my most rostered TEs in Best Ball and Dynasty. McBride’s salary fell $300 curiously despite leading all TEs in 1st read target share and I felt like it was a slate I wanted to go into NOT simply punting the position. His late TD put me over the top in cash.
• We always preach that DST is a bit of a crapshoot. EPA metrics that we have through two weeks are honestly not very predictive as we simply ask the question: who did you play? I personally did not click DST until the very end and do not try to make the salaries work at all at any part of the process. In tournaments this week, DST was everything! We had monster scores from MIN, SEA, IND, and TB. In my Tournament Takes & Leverage Article, I wrote “I wish I could come in here and give you a dogmatic take about DST. My exposures will be relatively flat but my favorites for tournaments: HOU, JAX, MIN, and NYJ.”
• The final 2v2 decision I had was CD + JAX DST versus Puka + ATL DST. Notice how my decision tree led me to… the Falcons. While I had ATL higher in my ranks than JAX, my pessimism led me far, far away.

What Did the Field Do

My goal in this section is to discuss the pool of players used the most in cash style contests. You can compare the roster percentage, DK outputs, and how much of their salary they X’ed this week.

Mistakes Were Made …

Every week I’ll highlight my biggest mistakes which range from not weighing low-end outcomes to assuming, to not thinking, and ultimately moving away from plays I started with. We’ve all been there… stay water. Don’t try to justify yourself or make things sound better than they were. You made a decision, now deal with it.

• I handled this lineup pretty well given the slate context. In hindsight, perhaps I should’ve more open to playing Puka > CeeDee but none of us can predict injuries.

2025 Results

Each week I’ll post my head-to-head (H2H) win percentage here to give you an idea of what type of week I had. Keep in mind there are varying price points, competition, and players who take my H2Hs in the lobby that have no rhyme or reason. The volume of my H2Hs differs each week due to my feeling of the slate and my weekend activities with my family. Every week I will also post the “cash line” from the $25 Double-Up from DraftKings.

I was fortunate to get over the cash line… at the very end thanks to the 49ers somehow withstanding a late safety, getting the ball back, and marching down the field for a game-winning FG aided by a 20-yard reception by CMC. Nevertheless, hitting the cash line and above the 50% mark despite getting a zero from an $8K player is quite an outcome!