DraftKings Diary | Buys, Sells, and What to Look for on DraftKings Reignmakers for Week 15
In the DraftKings Diary, each week Lucky Trader's Jason Rouslin will walk through his buys, sells, and team lookahead to give you insights from an experienced DraftKings Reignmakers player.
Check out Jason's full portfolio with the Lucky Trader Reignmakers Portfolio Tool.
It’s the home stretch of the NFL season, and the last few weeks are sure to provide all the thrills and spills that make fantasy football so entertaining. This also marks the final stretch of the inaugural DraftKings Reignmakers season. One undeniable positive feature of the Reignmakers’ game is the variety of ways to produce yield from it. There’s the obvious one of “playing for the glory” and going for the big score by playing the cards in DFS-style contests, and of course, buying and selling in the marketplace. In addition to those, which can be done on a relatively small bankroll, the game also affords those that want to build a portfolio of cards and subsequently invest the time to generate a yield from it. A “triple-threat,” as one might say, and in this Team Diary, I walk you through my plan of action in all three of the yield-producing categories each week. Let’s dive into the playbook for week 15.
Week 14 Diary
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Week 14 Top Lineup Strategy/Tier & Contest
Contest: Elite | Fiat Frenzy Main Slate 100K to First 250K GTD
Lineup:
- QB: Jalen Hurts
- RB: Tony Pollard
- WR: A.J. Brown
- WR: Amon-Ra St. Brown
- Flex: Ja'Marr Chase
Total Points: 114.48, 83rd place
The week started with an under-the-radar game that saw Baker Mayfield lead two touchdown drives in the last three minutes of the game to all but knock Las Vegas out of the playoff race. Coming into the game, LV had won four straight games and was on the verge of getting into the playoff picture. But Josh McDaniels will have to go back to the drawing board once again.
One strategy and contest I’ve been following rather closely on showdown slates is the $100 Millionaire Maker Sattelite Contest at the ELITE tier. The same strategy I’ll discuss next can be applied to the $20 Satellite at the RARE tier and the $3 for the CORE tier. That strategy is to use a non-superstar, highly-projected player from the game in the captain’s slot from the tier below (i.e., RARE to ELITE) and field at least two other players competing in the game with a projection over five points. This can include D/ST, kickers, and tight ends. The strategy was two for two this week in cashing in that aforementioned satellite contest, where the lineup would have only cashed one of two slates in the main ELITE Fiat Frenzy contests had it been put there. It actually would have been three for three to one for three had I employed the same strategy for the Sunday night game, but the greediness of playing for the glory won out in the decision-making this slate. Lastly, in most situations, anyone can purchase a lineup using this strategy for less than $100 in the marketplace on any given showdown slate.
Now, onto the main slate, where it’s always fun to play Monday morning quarterback in fantasy football… And with Trevor Lawerence, anyone who wants to join me on the “I should have stuck with him” train can because I’m handing out free tickets. He showed a ton of poise engineering a come-from-behind win against Baltimore a few weeks ago and came out and dominated a good Tennesee defense this past week. The former No. 1 overall pick seems to finally be finding his stride and was the top-scoring QB of the week. Lawrence, Miles Sanders, Justin Jefferson, Ja’Marr Chase, and Tony Pollard were the five players that took down the 100K this week in the ELITE Fiat Frenzy contest. Adding to the MMQB debacle, the latter five are all a big part of the portfolio. The winning lineup, pairing all of these players together with no correlation, was a strategy that hasn’t won out all that much this year. However, it likely provides a unique build each week, as each of the top two finishing teams in the ELITE Tier Fiat Frenzy contest was unique and had no correlation. Compare that to more correlated lineups; for example, my main lineup this week (seen above) was duplicated with just one correlation (Hurts and A. Brown), the first time that’s happened all year. Outside of Lawerence, the other four players were all projected within the top five of their respected positions outside of the Superstar-status players, so even though there was no correlation between them, it still projected out well.
The Sunday Night slate was where excitement for the final two games turned to frustration. A large share of Jaylen Waddle and Keenan Allen in the portfolio gave me high hopes for the slate, especially with solid pieces around them. But, Waddle wasn’t part of Miami’s gameplan, for whatever reason, at least until the fourth quarter, having his second straight lousy performance and, consequently, second straight loss for Miami. As I’m sure it did for many, the frustration turned to sadness when Kyler Murray went down on the third play of the Monday Night game. Having him, Rhamondre Stevenson, DeAndre Hopkins, and Marquise Brown with a solid tie-breaker at the ELITE tier, the slate had solid prospects going into it. It was not to be, however, as the game of football gets faster and the players get stronger, it, unfortunately, yields more injuries. It’s sadly just part of the game.
The slate wasn’t great, but it wasn’t the worst either, yielding just about $1,400, or 8 percent. However, the portfolio is still on a solid trajectory to turn a profit before the playoffs start.
Week 14 Buys & Sells
It is 12 days away from Christmas (as of writing this), and while it may mean lots of toys for everyone, it also means the third biggest DraftKings Reignmaker contest of the year. The 400K GTD 100K to first place contest is a three-game slate on Christmas Day featuring Green Bay versus Miami, LAR versus Den, and Arizona versus Tampa Bay. Starting to prepare for that contest can produce some solid opportunities to use the marketplace and start building out lineups. The strategy I used was to build out my lineups, then, if I was missing a highly-projected player, I’d look to add someone from either Tampa Bay or Miami with a good serial number. It’s yielded a few solid buys over the last 10 days or so and will be something I’ll continue to do this week. Last week the most important pickups were Tua Tagovailoa and Mike Evans.
On the sell side, the slate didn’t yield many leftover players that had much value in the marketplace, so it was a rather slow week of selling.
Week 15 Lookahead
Week 15 has five notable Reignmakers slates:
- Slate #1: San Francisco vs. Seattle
- Slate #2 (3-Game Saturday Slate): Indianapolis vs. Minnesota, Baltimore vs. Cleveland, Miami vs. Buffalo
- Slate #3: Main Slate
- Slate #4: New York Giants vs. Washington
- Slate #5: Los Angeles Rams vs. Green Bay
Week 15 Targets
As was alluded to at the beginning of this article, this slate is a weird one. It’s the start of back-to-back weeks where NFL games will be played on Saturday. One main difference, however, is next week’s Saturday games are the main slate, and this week is being treated like a Showdown slate in terms of pricing. It presents an interesting choice for some big-name players like Josh Allen, Stefon Diggs, and Tyreek Hill, among others, on where exactly to play their cards. Using them in Deep-Roster formats will provide double the equity in terms of pricing. Still, there is a lesser likelihood of the cards being optimal and going up against an entire pool of players versus just those from the five other teams on the slate. The number of entries leading up to lock on Thursday evening will be a significant factor, as it’s likely that the Saturday slate takes a considerable percentage of entries that would typically go into a Deep-Roster format.
Now, onto the main slate where J. Chase is set up to have the biggest game of his season, possibly. That’s saying something for a guy who has scored more than 30 points four times this season, but he’s got a matchup against Tampa Bay, whose secondary is decimated by injuries right now. Speaking of injuries, both Tee Higgins and Tyler Boyd, the second and third options for Joe Burrow on that Cincinnati receiving corps, left the game versus Cleveland last week and did not return. Chase racked up 15 targets after that and could see something similar again this week if either or both of them aren’t able to play against Tampa Bay. He’ll be in a nice matchup of star receivers, as Chris Godwin is on the other side. Godwin continues to receive a healthy share of targets and touches and makes big plays with them. Stacking these two together with a non-correlated Superstar QB in either Patrick Mahomes or Jalen Hurts could provide a unique build with a high upside. Or, pair them up with Justin Fields and use Austin Ekeler or Derrick Henry as the Superstar; as for positional players, it’s either them or Davante Adams on the main slate.
Lastly, there are three teams currently tied for the last playoff spot in the AFC: LAC, NE, and NYJ. While there are a lot of questions about Stevenson for New England, all of the teams have players that are solid targets for this week, and with their teams on the verge of the playoffs, it could pay off in a big way. Some of the names from these teams are Keenan Allen, Mike Williams, and Garrett Wilson Jr.
One last note for Week 15, there is no need to get fancy at running back, at least for the main slate. Use Josh Jacobs as much as possible, and when not available, fill in with Joe Mixon, Tony Pollard, or Miles Sanders.
Good Luck in Week 15 with all your DraftKings Reignmakers’ lineups!
