Every week, some lucky person takes home $1 million by winning the DraftKings Millionaire Maker contest, aka The Milly Maker. The contest is $20 to enter with a maximum of 150 entries per person. I looked at a few key trends from two years of winners this summer and pulled some key trends that can be found here: Five Key Trends from Million Dollar DraftKings NFL DFS Lineups. In this series, we’ll look at what the winning lineup did each week with its NFL DFS picks on DraftKings and see if it aligns with prior trends or if there are new ways to take down the contest.
[PUMPKIN]
NFL DFS Week 7 DraftKings Millionaire Maker Lineup Review and Strategy
The Winning Lineup
The Week 7 Millionaire Maker-winning lineup was created by one of Awesemo’s own. Awesemo subscriber NCORFIELD8K stacked the 8 p.m. EST game with Russell Wilson at quarterback with Tyler Lockett and ran it back with DeAndre Hopkins. It also featured as a secondary stack of Davante Adams plus Jamaal Williams. The Seattle – Arizona game featured a 54.5-point total before kickoff. There were three games with totals over 52 points. The others were Atlanta – Detroit and Green Bay – Houston. This lineup featured players from all of those games. Atlanta’s game hit the under because both teams run more than 20 times at less than 3.1 yards per carry a piece. Todd Gurley was the only player to have a notable day from that game and appears in this lineup.
[NFL-Content-Links]
Even the two least popular players from this lineup played in games with totals over 50 points. The Cleveland – Cincinnati game and the Pittsburgh – Tennessee game both closed with totals over 50 points. No player in this lineup was in a game with a middling total. The Washington defense routed Andy Dalton as home favorites. The Dallas offensive line had suffered a myriad of injuries leading into the game, and Washington’s defensive line is stocked with first-round talent, including No. 2 overall pick Chase Young.
Check out Alex “Awesemo” Baker’s interview with “NCORDFIELD8K” about taking down a million dollars on Sunday night.
Choosing a Stack
Whether you’re building one lineup or 150, you have to choose teams or whole games to stack. The Millionaire Maker has not been won without a quarterback and one of their receivers in the lineup. Every winning lineup as featured at least three players from the same game (including the quarterback). Don’t get too in the weeds with choosing a stack. Look for players in blowup spots who aren’t going to be the most popular choices of the slate. Wilson was playing in a game with a massive total that featured two elite fantasy quarterbacks and was only rostered in 6.3% of lineups.
Baker Mayfield was another player who could have won the Milly Maker last week, and his performance wasn’t entirely unpredictable. The Browns were 4-point favorites in a game with a 50-point total, and their opponent was in the bottom half of the league in passing yards allowed entering Week 7. They were in a smash spot, but the public’s negative sentiment on Mayfield meant he was rostered by less than 1% of DFS players in the Milly Maker. The correlation’s with Mayfield didn’t hit outside of Harrison Bryant, so Mayfield lineups didn’t shuffle to the top, but the process in playing him was sound and nearly paid off.
Late News in NFL DFS
If you’re entering any money you care about recouping into the Milly Maker or any other tournament, you have to be available for inactive being announced and other breaking news. There was no reason to believe Bryant would start ahead of David Njoku. News broke before noon that Bryant would get the starting nod. he was at the minimum price on DraftKings. DFS players who weren’t around for that news missed a golden opportunity to take some easy value. Bryant’s ownership suggests that not enough of the field is paying attention to late news.
Playing the Good Plays
Finding the best 1% owned plays isn’t the hallmark of a good NFL DFS tournament player. It’s about measuring how likely something is to happen, adjusting for price, and gauging that against what the field thinks will happen.
With Aaron Jones ruled out, Williams had a very easy path to a three-down workload. Backup A.J. Dillon had been used sparingly throughout the year and Williams was already earning a role as a pass-catcher with Jones active. The Packers were favored and the game had a massive total. Using the Fantasy Cruncher Rewind tool, Williams was the best running back value of the slate because of his $4,000 price tag. There was a chasm between Williams 4.4 points-per-dollar projection and Clyde Edwards-Helaire‘s No. 2 value projection of 3.2. Williams was probably a better play than his 36.9% ownership indicated. The likelihood of him hitting was better than the modest payout his backers saw.
Follow us on all of our social channels! Check out our Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube for more great Awesemo content.
Looking for more NFL DFS picks content? We have loads of articles, data, cheat sheets and more on the Awesemo NFL home page. Just click HERE.
