Yahoo! Week 11 $1 Million Baller and Cash Game Strategy

Nov 19, 2021

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Whether you are playing in the biggest tournament of the week on Yahoo! or prefer to play in smaller GPPs, there are some general positional strategies that you can implement in any size tournament. These concepts include stacking, finding pivots off of popular players, and looking for leverage in other spots. While it’s important to implement these into your lineup-building approach, the foundation of any tournament lineup is a solid core, usually players that you would use in cash games.

Stacks to Target

QB Dak Prescott, Cowboys ($37)

WR CeeDee Lamb, Cowboys ($28)

TE Travis Kelce, Chiefs ($30)

Spending nearly half of your salary on a single stack may not seem ideal but the thesis of this play has as much to do with the unique situation of Week 11 as it does the ceiling projections of this game. Let’s start with the latter.

With a game total of 56.5 points, this is only the sixth time all season that a game has an over/under of at least 55 and it’s only the third time we’ve had such a game with a spread below three points—Kansas City is favored by 2.5 at home. The shootout potential is clear with two defenses that have given up huge games through the air—Dallas has allowed four 300-yard passers and five 100-yard receivers while the Chiefs have allowed as many 100-yard receivers and just one fewer 300-yard passer. Loading up on this game in any fashion makes sense, even with the expected high rostered rates across the board. That’s actually the point of rostering the most high-salary players in the game.

Because this game is in the late window, DFS players have a huge opportunity to leverage late swap, and having a high percentage of salary allocated to this game allows for maximum flexibility.

The idea is simple—with nine games in the early window, if your early-slate players (who should be contrarian since you are already taking on such high rostered rates in this game) have big games, you can stick to your chalky Chiefs and Cowboys. Teams that bust in the early window can late swap to contrarian players either in this game or from the two other games—since such a high percentage of the field will have exposure to this game, it will be virtually impossible to catch the field even if your chalky Chiefs and Cowboys explode.

With all that said, the Dallas passing game should be far less popular than the Chiefs side, making this a great leverage stack.

QB Josh Allen, Bills ($41)

WR Stefon Diggs, Bills ($28)

Any other week with a 28.5-point implied total against a bad Colts passing defense, coming off of his huge game, Josh Allen would probably be the most popular quarterback on the slate, despite his tremendous salary. This week, though, The Bills will be somewhat overshadowed by the Chiefs and Cowboys, especially since Dak Prescott and Patrick Mahomes have noticeably lower salaries than Allen.

Few teams put up less resistance against the pass than Indianapolis, ranked 29th in schedule-adjusted fantasy points allowed to quarterbacks and 27th against receivers. Only rostering two players from this game allows room for unique players elsewhere on rosters that still want to mini-stack popular Chiefs and Cowboys. No bring-back option is necessary on the Colts’ side as the Bills haven’t allowed a 100--yard receiver all season.

QB Aaron Rodgers, Packers ($33)

WR Davante Adams, Packers ($35)

WR Justin Jefferson, Vikings ($24)

Even though this stack takes up a large percentage of salary, it should be the most contrarian high-salary build after Aaron Rodgers’s quiet Week 10. The Vikings, however, are the perfect team to game stack, since their games are typically quite boom-or-bust—no team’s points scored correlates more with their opponent’s points scored than Minnesota. Additionally, playing Rodgers offers massive leverage off of A.J. Dillon, likely the most rostered player on the slate.

Only one team has allowed more 100-yard pass-catchers than the Vikings and Davante Adams is the most prominent name in 4for4’s Receiver Breakout Model this week. While Green Bay has been good against receivers as a whole, they have allowed big games to number ones such as Ja’Marr Chase, Terry McLaurin and Diontae Johnson.

Contrarian Plays to Target

RB D’Onta Foreman, Titans ($14)

In two weeks without Derrick Henry, the Titans’ backfield has been a three-headed monster but in Week 10, Foreman was given 48% of the backfield touches and was the only running back to handle the ball more than 10 times. This week, Tennessee is favored by 9.5 points at home against a Texans defense ranked 23rd in schedule-adjusted fantasy points allowed to running backs.

WR Tyler Lockett, Seahawks ($21)

It appears that Russell Wilson still isn’t fully healed from his finger injury, or at least he wasn’t in Week 10. That concern will keep rostered rates down on all of the Seahawks even in a game with a 47.5-point over/under against the Cardinals. Tyler Lockett leads 4for4’s Breakout Receiver Model in expected fantasy points over the last three weeks and is always a home run waiting to happen with the ninth-most targets of 15+ air yards.

Cash Game Strategy

Despite the ceiling opportunities from quarterbacks in the highest-scoring games, there is value in the middle tier at the position. There are a handful of mid-salary and low-salary running backs that open up salary for some of the stud pass-catchers on the slate.