Best Saints-Cardinals Picks: NFL DFS Showdown Strategy for TNF Oct. 20

For nearly a year now, I’ve been hosting the High Stakes podcast for Stokastic, interviewing DFS pros on a range of topics. There have been a lot of recurring themes on the show, but the most relevant for this article: DFS pros love NFL DFS Showdown.

That’s because a lot of casual NFL fans enter the Showdown fray as a way to have some action on island games. As a result, DraftKings and FanDuel offer enormous contests with generous prize pools. The contests become more difficult to win, too, when there are hundreds of thousands of entrants, but with a large portion of the new players being casual, the increase in difficulty pales in comparison to the increase in prize pools. It’s a tradeoff DFS pros will gladly make.

My goal with these Showdown articles — which I’ll be writing for each Thursday Night Football and Monday Night Football NFL DFS slate this season — is to help you attack the largest-field DraftKings GPP like a pro. There are three main components to discuss when it comes to Showdown, and I’ll break them down accordingly: Projection, Correlation and Differentiation.

Before reading this piece, you may find it helpful to read my evergreen piece about how to attack NFL Showdown GPPs more generally: https://www.stokastic.com/nfl/draftkings-showdown-simplified-tips-tricks-making-big-money-nfl-dfs-island-games-2022/

Week 7 NFL DFS Showdown: Saints-Cardinals Picks TNF

Projection

The goal in DFS is to make the lineup that puts up the most points and a natural starting point is looking at individual players who are likely to put up high scores or high point-per-dollar scores. Some pros run simulations or create their own projections to achieve this. Many others, like myself, rely on the Stokastic projections and tools to determine which players should be core pieces of our lineups. I primarily look at the base projections and the “Top Showdown Plays” Tool, which publishes results of 10,000 advanced simulations run by the Stokastic team.

Studs

These are simply the top projected players on the slate. I’d recommend having at least two of these players in just about every lineup you make tonight, either as captain or in a flex spot.

Kyler Murray ($11,200) is the top projected play on the slate by a wide margin.
Eno Benjamin ($8,200) has the second-highest projection on the slate, working under the assumption that James Conner will not be active. Benjamin comes at a nice discount relative to those with similar projections.
Alvin Kamara ($10,600) has the third-highest projection on the slate at the second-highest salary. In the two games Kamara has been active with Andy Dalton starting at quarterback, he has been targeted a healthy fifteen total times.
Dalton ($9,400) has the fourth-highest projection on the slate at the fourth-highest salary.
DeAndre Hopkins ($10,200) has the fifth-highest projection in his first game back from suspension. There are a lot of moving parts at wide receiver for the Cardinals, making it a less projectable spot than usual. Hopkins joins a group that will be without Marquise Brown but traded for Robbie Anderson this week.
Rondale Moore ($5,800) returned week four and has seen his targets increase each game, from five to eight to ten.
Zach Ertz ($7,000) has been targeted 49 times on 245 routes run this season, including double digit targets in four of the last five games.
Chris Olave ($7,400) is the clear top wide receiver for the Saints with both Michael Thomas and Jarvis Landry sidelined. In his past four games Olave has been targeted 39 times.

Top Point-Per-Dollar Saints-Cardinals Picks

These are just a few players who will be featured throughout my lineups due to their high projected points per dollar. At the same time, because I’ll typically have at least three studs in each lineup, the top points-per-dollar plays are often players I’ll be pivoting away from in some spots in favor of players who project a bit worse but will also garner lower ownership. I’m also excluding any player with a projection below three fantasy points from this list.

Keaontay Ingram ($400) is expected to be the top backup running back for the Cardinals with Conner and Darrel Williams out. Ingram rushed just three times for seven yards in his NFL debut in week six but could see increased opportunities with another week of practice under his belt.
Juwan Johnson ($3,000) played 78% of snaps for the Saints in week six after Adam Trautman left the game with an injury. Johnson has been targeted 22 times so far this season and could see his involvement increase further with Trautman still out.
A.J. Green ($2,600) has been targeted 21 times on 164 routes run in the five games he’s been active for the Cardinals.
Marquez Callaway ($4,800) and Tre’Quan Smith ($6,200) project similarly as secondary wide receivers for the Saints behind Olave.
As usual, kickers and defenses make for solid point-per-dollar options.

Correlation for Saints-Cardinals picks

In NFL DFS, correlations are endless, both positive and negative. Most are minor enough that they don’t necessarily need to be factored into lineups. If you want to give a boost to your running back’s defense, for example, that’s great; but running backs will frequently be optimal without the defense also being optimal, even in Showdown.

The only correlations that are almost mandatory to consider on Showdown slates involve quarterbacks. Particularly, non-rushing quarterbacks. That’s because of the scoring dynamics on DraftKings. On each passing play, the pass catcher scores more fantasy points than the quarterback. For example, if a quarterback throws a pass for 5 yards, he’ll get 0.2 fantasy points — 1 fantasy point per 25 yards passing, divided by five. The receiver will get 1.5 fantasy points — 1 point per reception, plus half a point for 5 yards receiving . The quarterback also only gets 4 points per passing touchdown, while the receiver gets 6 points for a receiving touchdown.

The quarterback is also generally one of the most expensive players on his team. Thus, more often than not he will need to be his team’s highest fantasy point scorer to be the optimal captain. Outside of rare occasions where the quarterback scores fantasy points by passing to a player who is not in the DraftKings player pool or gets points as a receiver on a trick play, there are essentially just two ways for the quarterback to be the highest-scoring player on his team: adding fantasy points via rushing or spreading the ball around to multiple pass catchers.

Some general thoughts:

If you play a quarterback at captain, and he does not have rushing upside, and he is the most expensive player on his team, you will almost always want to have multiple of his team’s pass catchers in the flex. This is also largely true if the quarterback is only slightly less expensive than the most expensive pass catcher on his team.
If you play a quarterback at captain, and he has moderate rushing upside, you can consider playing just one of his pass catchers in the flex — but multiple may still be preferred, depending on the extent of that rushing upside. The quarterback’s price may also come into play here; the more expensive he is, the more likely you’ll need to have multiple pass catchers in the flex.
If you play a quarterback at captain, and he has major rushing upside, you don’t necessarily need to play any pass catchers in the flex. This is relatively uncommon, and only applies to a few quarterbacks.
If you play a quarterback in the flex, and he does not have rushing upside, you will generally want to have at least one of his pass catchers elsewhere in the lineup, either at captain or in another flex spot.
If you play a quarterback in the flex, and he has moderate to high rushing upside, you don’t necessarily need to include one of his pass catchers elsewhere in the lineup. But there will always be positive correlation there between a quarterback and his pass catchers.

Some game-specific thoughts:

IF you play Murray: Murray has already rushed for 233 yards and two touchdowns this season. He clearly has the ability for rushing spike weeks, and thus does not necessarily need to be paired with any pass catchers. Still, he is more likely to be optimal with at least one Cardinals pass catcher elsewhere in the lineup, particularly if he is optimal in the captain spot. Benjamin has been active in the passing game for the Cardinals and can be considered a pass catcher.
IF you play Dalton: Dalton is more expensive than all of his pass catchers other than Kamara. He has rushed for seven total yards on eight carries in the three games he has started this year. Thus, generally, Dalton will need to be paired with at least one Saints pass catcher somewhere else in the lineup, and multiple if used at captain. Dalton has targeted Kamara 15 times in the two games they have played together, thus Kamara can certainly be considered a pass catcher.

Differentiation

Making highly projected lineups with smart correlations will separate you from the lowest level Showdown players, but there are many very smart casual players as well. Differentiation is the last step to separating pros from Joes.

In just about any DFS GPP, finding low-owned gems is key because lower ownership reduces the field of lineups you’re competing against when the player has a 99th-percentile outcome. Taking it to the extreme, just as a thought exercise, let’s say that Kamara scores 100 fantasy points tonight. You’re not just going to need him; you’ll need him in the captain spot (150 fantasy points). If 20,000 lineups in your contest have Kamara in the captain spot, you’ve essentially reduced the field of lineups you’re competing with to 20,000. If only 200 lineups have Kamara at captain? Now we’re talking.

On NFL Showdown slates there is an additional factor for large-field GPPs. We don’t just want to find seldomly used players; we want to find seldomly used LINEUPS. Why? Well, I’ll give you two examples from last year:

On Sept. 20, 2021, DraftKings had a Milly Maker for the Packers vs. Lions tilt, but the top lineup was duplicated 231 times. Rather than winning a million dollars, the users who entered those 231 lineups had to split the top 231 prizes, for just a bit over $6,000 each. That’s despite having everything go their way, which requires an extreme amount of luck.
On Oct. 11, 2021, we saw the other end of the spectrum: user rcoho1984 played a unique lineup in the Ravens vs. Colts Milly Maker, taking home not just a million dollars but a ticket to the Tournament of Champions.

If you’re going to win — which takes a lot of luck, regardless of how well your lineup projects — I’d suggest making it count. I’m not necessarily concerned with making an entirely unique lineup like rcoho1984 did every single time, but I aim to be a lot closer to their unique lineup than those that were duplicated 231 times.

Some Easy Tricks

Low-owned players. Yup, even if you’re using other tricks to get unique, it’s still a good idea to play a few players who won’t be getting much ownership. Some low-owned players to consider:

J.P. Holtz ($200) or Nick Vannett ($200) could be interesting dart throw plays if active tonight, with Trautman sidelined.
Keith Kirkwood ($800) played 71% of snaps for the Saints in week six. He is questionable with an ankle injury and is likely to see a reduced role with Olave back, but the extent that his role will be reduced is uncertain and he will be a solid tournament play at low ownership if active.
Robbie Anderson ($5,600) will make his Cardinals debut. According to Josina Anderson, he is going to be “involved” in at least 10-15 plays and could play more “if things are acclimating.” At low ownership, and with his ability to score long touchdowns, Anderson makes for a solid boom-or-bust play.
Corey Clement ($200) has been called up from the practice squad for the Cardinals. The team may trust the veteran Clement more than Ingram at this point, so at low ownership Clement may be worth a few dart throws as the potential backup running back.
Taysom Hill ($7,200) might be the hardest player to project in the NFL. Hill was listed as a tight end to start the year, but through six games he has seen just one target. He has rushed the ball 26 times and thrown the ball five times, though, and is used as a red zone threat. At less than 10% projected ownership, Hill makes for a fine GPP target.

Embrace lineups missing some correlation pieces or even with some negative correlation. Generally, highly correlated lineups will be over-owned, whereas the field will avoid negative correlation at all costs. If you want to read my reasoning, check out the evergreen piece I linked near the top of this page. In some of my lineups, I like to see the following:

Quarterback against opposing Defense.
Pass Catcher at Captain without including the QB at Flex.
Multiple Running Backs from the same team in a lineup.

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Leave salary on the table. This is the easiest way to lower your duplicates. Casual players assume that if they have salary left over, they should upgrade. The problem with this approach is that it almost inevitably leads to highly duplicated lineups. How much salary should you leave on the table? That’s up to you. If it’s less than $600 and you haven’t gotten extremely unique with player selections and weird correlations, it’s likely you’ll have to split any winnings with many other entries.

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Author

Neil Orfield

Neil Orfield has been playing DFS regularly since 2013, but his success really started taking off in 2019 when he had a six figure payday with a hand built NFL lineup. The next day, he signed up for a Stokastic+ subscription with FantasyCruncher. Since then he has won an NFL milly and added six figure wins in XFL, MLB, and NBA. He has recently excelled at NFL Showdown, with many five- and six-figure wins since 2021.