Borg’s DFS Cash Lineup Review for Week 4 (Fantasy Football)

DFS is a funny journey because the process starts on a Tuesday and a week later, you can look back saying, “How did I get here?”

I knew Aidan O’Connell from his preseason prowess this year but I did not foresee him becoming the poster boy of this week for me and a play I’ll remember for a long, long time. Ok, let’s be honest, Christian McCaffrey was the real hero this week,

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 on DFS Cash Game Strategy + Creating Player Pools. I also published an article on DFS Strategy for Beginners and another entitled: How to Approach Each Position in DFS & Gain an Edge.

Week 4 Cash Lineup

Draft % and cash lines each week will be from DraftKings’ $25 Single-Entry Double-Up with roughly 7,000 entries. This is a slightly elevated price point from the $1, $5, and $10 double-ups and I think gives a solid idea each week of double-up roster percentages.

The Thought Process

Every week I’ll move from where I started on Tuesday to where I landed on a Sunday.

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Cash Locks (In My Opinion)

• In our Week 4 DFS Best Plays (which comes out on Saturdays for DFS Pass subscribers only), I shared the pool of players that were basically locked from the beginning of the week.
• From Day 1, I knew I wanted this to be a CMC week. Was it my ambition? My stubbornness? Whatever you want to call it, from the Tuesday podcast to Friday’s I was locked in with the workload and guaranteed production. With news eventually coming out that Elijah Mitchell would miss the game, the most valuable RB in fantasy became that much more valuable in my mind. Expensive? Honestly, I would’ve paid $10K for a full-time CMC as a two-TD favorite. I wrote in the Best Plays article, “Over the last decade, teams sitting at -14 or better at home averaged 30.2 rush attempts, 137 rushing yards, and 30.5 points scored. CMC is a large chunk of that and his median outcome is 100+ total yards and a TD in the bank. The ceiling? 30+ points and the clear RB1 on the week.” Who knew that 30 points would be laughable compared to the 50-point burger this man put up!
• Kyren Williams was our top RB play early in the week and it never really failed. His job security overcame any concerns about the matchup against the Colts. I mostly ignore RB statistics early in the season knowing his playing time.
• The Browns were pretty much locked in from early in the week. The pricing for the league’s No. 1 defense at home was too soft in my opinion. However, as you’ll see in this write-up, I did waver a bit at the very end.

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.

• This week was shaping up to be a true “WRs win the day” type of week. In my pool of players, I had Stefon Diggs, Davante Adams, Keenan Allen, and Ja’Marr Chase all part of the group. Honestly, with CMC, I didn’t think I could fit more than one this week.
• You might ask why Justin Jefferson and Tyreek Hill are NOT in that group. With so much salary allocated to CMC, it was virtually impossible to make two players above $8K work with my lineups when I started using actual projected points. That is one of the most valuable points I can drive home: make sure you are comparing point projections. I get hundreds of questions each week: should I go with this lineup or that one? If you haven’t compared simple projections and opportunities, it is really hard.
• I loved Ja’Marr Chase‘s matchup against Tennessee and he was the cheapest of the group. I also feel so deeply intertwined with Keenan Allen that it is hard to separate my emotions from what I should do in DFS. The volume was glorious but as I mentioned on the podcast, I’ve seen Keenan stall in spots like this in the past. I simply couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t play him in a great matchup with the Raiders and as you’ll see, he provided some nice correlation with the QB I ended up with.
• At TE, I toyed with George Kittle for a minute but with CMC in the lineup and Deebo surprisingly active for the game, no thanks. Pat Freiermuth was cheap and part of our best plays but I never felt comfortable with his projected targets. Dalton Kincaid and Chig Okonkwo were also in view knowing that Travis Kelce was not on this slate. I was not worried about getting buried at the position with roster percentages seemingly being even across the board. Tanner Hudson was just the type of punt TE that is way too easy to play in cash. The dude was elevated from the practice squad but was the clear route-running TE for the Bengals with Irv Smith out. I wrote an article a while back on Executing the “Punt Play” in DFS if you need an overview on the strategy.
• At QB, Anthony Richardson was the guy we discussed on the podcast as close to a lock for most of the week. The rushing floor and the game environment made him attractive but the offensive line injuries throughout the week made him not a lock.
• Raiders rookie QB Aidan O’Connell was a late development. You might woke up to news on Sunday morning that he would be the Raiders starter. I wrote in our Discord channel and Best Plays article this update at 6:30 East Coast time.

• O’Connell was awful… but it didn’t matter based on what it allowed my lineup to accomplish. Jamming in five absolute studs overtook the builds that were much more even. 12 points is all I wanted and 12 points is what I got!
• In the middle and lower tier of WRs, I had Puka Nacua, Jakobi Meyers, Tank Dell, and Calvin Austin II as the cheapie of the week. I loved Puka but it felt tough getting up to him with Richardson in the lineup. The final decision to add in Puka came down to him being in our Best Plays and a true commitment to stars and scrubs. If I was going to save the money with AOC, it was to jam in a player that belonged in the same pricing tier as Keenan and Chase but was more than $1,000 cheaper. I also did not mind two Rams because their roles are so solid in that offense and their projected targets felt unaffected by the other’s presence. Betz was all-in too.

• In terms of projected targets, I had all three of my WRs down for 10+ which is rare on any occasion. On builds that included Tank Dell or Calvin Austin II, I felt like I was sacrificing 5+ targets with players who are by no means sure things.
• Beyond AOC, the final build also forced me into playing another TE in the FLEX. This was not ideal but with Treylon Burks out, Okonkwo’s target projection was 5+ in my opinion. The process also felt sound with Titans backup TE Josh Whyle catching a TD. Sad times. I hate playing two TEs in cash but this week was an exception jamming in five absolute studs. I doubt I will have a slate where I get to force all of my top plays in the same lineup.
• This is my final two lineup comparisons that I went back and forth with and while I usually never trade points of projection, 141.4 to 142 is virtually nothing in my opinion.

• Two Chargers in my lineup would’ve been just fine except my “football guy” self has a major bias towards Palmer.
• In hindsight, either would’ve worked but the Panthers’ defense was a bit of a luck box considering Kirk Cousins threw an INT that was returned 99 yards for a score.

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 ran into a bit of luck with my true studs turning in 99% outcomes. Stars and scrubs build can work IF the field fails in a couple of key spots. Please take this advice: last week’s strategy will NOT work next week. I don’t think these type of builds are always successful. I just hopped on board CMC and Kyren early enough that I could overcome the hurdles this lineup presented.
• The conviction I had with Anthony Richardson early in the week probably should’ve trumped whatever fun build I could produce with AOC.
• Oh, two TEs?!? “Never again,” he tells himself knowing the temptation is always there. But to be honest, that probably was a bit unbridled but when you get a $4K QB, you do wild things.

2023 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.

Important Note: I will be taking Week 5 off DFS as my family heads to the beach for our Fall Break!

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