DFS Tournament Game Breakdown 2020 WildCard

Quarterback

Philip Rivers, IND

Rivers plays in a game with a 51-point total and his team won't get the luxury of running the ball; copiously against an inferior team. Verus Buffalo, as nearly a touchdown dog, Rivers will have no choice but to pass. He's been pretty good at doing that this year.
* 68% completion rate - 8th
* 7.7 yards per attempt - 9th
* 97 Quarterback Rating - 13th

Ryann Tannehill, TEN

For playoff content, I'll try to list one player from each day so whether you're playing Saturday, Sunday, or both, there's something of value here for you. On Sunday, the value comes with Tannehill. Vegas has the total of Tennessee's matchup with the Ravens at 54.5 points and the spread is just over a field goal in favor of the Ravens. The game has the highest total of the weekend. Vegas has the Titans leading all underdog in scoring with their implied team total of 25.75. Buying the cheaper quarterback in the shootout of the weekend looks like a winning strategy this week. Rolling with a Tannehill and J.K. Dobbins stack instead of the chalk Lamar Jackson stack is beautiful tournament leverage.

Running Back

Derrick Henry, TEN

The thesis of the Sunday slate will be that if Jackson doesn't erupt, the leverage wins. The first way to do that is by playing Tannehill and Dobbins, banking on Dobbins stealing enough scoring potential to hamstring Jackson's ceiling. The second is betting on a repeat of the Ravens' 2019 playoff loss to the Titans. Tennessee shut down Baltimore and let Henry rush 30 times for 195 yards. This isn't a probable outcome but ownership is going to skew toward Jackson and Alinv Kamara instead of Henry. Is it really that unlikely that Tennessee can't do a thing we have already seen to Baltimore one more time?

Cam Akers, LAR

Akers' volume over his previous four games has been impressive. He is posting 21.5 carries and 2.8 targets per game over that span. His backups steal little to no meaningful volume and his team will be incentivized to run with either a less than 100% healthy Jared Goff or John Wolford under center. The Rams are seventh in the NFL in rush attempts and Akers projects to see the bulk of that volume.

Wide Receiver

Terry McLaurin, WAS

At $7,100 on FanDuel and $6,300 on DraftKings, McLaurin still comes in as one of the best ways to buy volume adjusted for his price. Through Week 16, his 47.1% air yards share led all wide receivers outside of Michael Thomas, who was working within a small sample. His team should be forced to throw excessively and aggressively as they are the second-biggest underdog of the weekend. That makes McLaurin in play as both a high-floor and high-ceiling option.

Michael Thomas, NO

If you time traveled from the end of 2019 to today and saw DraftKings priced Thomas at $6,300, you would take out a loan to get more money down on him at that price. Because he has had a tumultuous season and is coming off IR, his ownership isn't going to be insane either. Bet on Thomas when the field doesn't.

Tight End

Cole Kmet, CHI

Kmet set a career-high in snap share in Week 10. Dating back to that week, he has averaged 5.1 targets per game. Jimmy Graham has played on more than half of the team's snaps once over his past six games and is mostly an afterthought in the Chicago on offense. Kmet is only $5,300 on FanDuel and $3,000 on DraftKings.

Rob Gronkowski, TB

No tight end on the Saturday slate has a higher ceiling than Gronk. His aDOT is up to 12.2 since Antonio Brown joined the Bucs and he is second on the team in red zone targets. He is only three red zone looks behind Logan Thomas on the year and comes in at a fraction of the price. Still, he projects to be far less popular in tournaments.