DraftKings Diary | Buys, Sells, and What to Look for on DraftKings Reignmakers for Week 6
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.
The NFL will start its cycling of bye weeks with the kickoff of Week 6, resulting in the smallest NFL slate of the year, with no international game and four teams inactive.
Despite the slate shrinking, equity and prize pools remain the same and it should raise the liquidity of players playing this week while also providing a few "deals" on players with a bye. This article will give a quick review of last week's slate and preview Week 6. So, let's dig in.
Week 5 Slate Review:
These were the top lineups I played from the available Week 5 DraftKings Reignmakers slates.
Slate 1: Thursday Night Football - Indianapolis vs. Denver
- Captain: Alec Pierce
- Flex: Denver D/St
- Flex: Denver D/St
- Flex: Denver D/St
Slate 2: New York Giants vs. Green Bay
- Captain: Saquon Barkley
- Flex: Aaron Rodgers
- Flex: Darius Slayton
- Flex: Randall Cobb
Slate 3: Main Slate
- QB: Josh Allen
- RB: Leonard Fournette
- WR: Gabe Davis
- WR/T: Taysom Hill
- Flex: Tyler Lockett
Slate 4: Baltimore vs. Cincinnati
- Captain: Mark Andrews
- Flex: Justin Tucker
- Flex: Hayden Hurst
- Flex: Joe Burrow
Slate 5: Kansas City vs. Las Vegas Raiders
- Captain: Travis Kelce
- Flex: Patrick Mahomes
- Flex: Josh Jacobs
- Flex: Derek Carr
Week 5 Diary
If you missed last week's article, where I discussed my strategy up to this point in the season, check it out here. Interested in seeing what makes up the 700 + NFT card collection? Check it out here!
Week 5 Top Lineup Strategy/Tier & Contest
Contest: Elite Level Main Slate Fiat Frenzy | $250,000 GTD, $100,000 to First
Lineup:
- QB: Jalen Hurts
- RB: Austin Ekeler
- WR: Amon-Ra St. Brown
- WR/T: Devonta Smith
- Flex: Gabe Davis
One of the first plays of the slate, a 98-yard TD bomb to Gabe Davis, gave this squad a great start. Austin Ekeler would continue that strong start with a 70-yard run, followed by his first touchdown of the game. Now, the only thing that needed to come was for St. Brown to start producing. But New England had other plans, and even with a solid outing from Hurts and Smith against the Cardinals, the lineup finished in 58th providing a solid $300 payout. Given the total investment of $1,500 for the squad, 20 percent is a solid weekly return.
One of the other main focuses of the portfolio for the week was to take advantage of the equity that was present in the Deep Roster format, especially at the core level. Of the 16 lineups entered, 13 ended in a cashing position. However, on the Rare side, the portfolio's results were flipped, favoring the main slate at the Rare tier. So, this week, the top five projected lineups of the week for the Core side will go into the main slate, as opposed to the 18 entered this week.
That should allow for 25-30 Deep Roster Core Level lineups. I entered five lineups at the Rare Level in the Deep Roster and Main Slate contests. This week, the strategy will be to enter the two most optimally projected lineups in the deep roster format, using players from showdown slates, and focus the rest on the main slate.
I've made no changes at the Elite tier in terms of strategy.
Week 5 Buys & Sells
The injury bug is bound to catch every team each year. While some teams catch it earlier, nearly every NFL team goes through it at some point in the season.
Tampa Bay has already had a fair share of injuries on the offensive side, but finally, they seem to be getting healthier. With that, teams aren't able to stack the box or dedicate a playmaker to Leonard Fournette, and it showed, as he delivered in a big way this past week.
Fournette and Drake London were the two most significant adds to my portfolio. One more note on Tampa Bay, they have a very good matchup on the defensive side of the ball this week going up against Pittsburgh. They’ve looked superb at times this year, while Pittsburgh has rarely looked good on the offensive side of the ball.
On the sell side, the Denver Broncos offense continues to struggle, and because of that, Jerry Jeudy's value has plummeted. Since the profile consisted of multiple Rares, and an Elite, I decided to cash in on what value was still left at the rare level especially given their upcoming showdown slate.
Week 6 Lookahead
Week 6 brings four separate DraftKings Reignmakers slates.
- Slate #1: Chicago vs. Washington
- Slate #2: Main Slate
- Slate #3: Dallas vs. Philadelphia
- Slate #4: Denver vs. LAC
With the goal of having at least one, if not two, close to optimal projected lineups for the main slate Elite Level per week, the portfolio will have to embrace a bit of turnover to accomplish that goal here in Week 5.
With four of the main five guys playing in showdown a showdown slate, or in the case of Amon-Ra St. Brown on a BYE, something will have to change. Travis Kelce now becomes the premium card and happens to be matched up against Bills and Gabe Davis.
Adding in the Saquon Barkley Rare picked up from last week, now I have three highly projected players to start the lineup. Still, it needs more firepower to compete for the 100K, with a glaring hole at QB. Over the next few days, I'll look to sell a few cards and hope that the Marketplace will provide a good buy on any of the following players at the elite level: Lamar Jackson, Leonard Fournette, or Marquise Brown.
Moving on to the showdown slates now. There is one of the three that has far less interest to the public than the others this week, and it's the Thursday night game featuring Chicago and Washington. While not very sexy on paper, it provides fairly solid value for the highest projected players from the slate.
Focusing on Justin Fields, who started to look better throwing the ball last game against a difficult Minnesota team, will see a much more favorable matchup this week. His prices are still among the bottom tier of starting QBs and should provide excellent value for the slate.
Now, let's check in a few situations worth monitoring. The first one up this week is Arizona. After losing to the Chiefs in the season opener, winning against the Raiders in overtime, losing against Los Angeles and Philadelphia, and beating Carolina, their schedule has been undeniably tough.
But it gets much easier for the next few games, going up against the Seahawks, Saints, Vikings, and Seahawks again. Add in the fact that this week will be the last week they have to play without DeAndre Hopkins after getting Rondale Moore back this week, and it looks even better.
While some may think that these things hurt the value of Marquise Brown, there’s reason to believe the offense on the whole drastically improves with him back, increasing the number of plays they run and likely not decreasing the number of targets or target share Brown gets. Also, James Conner didn't return to the game after being injured, and Eno Benjamin was very productive and has yet to see his prices rise all that much.
Lastly, Kyler Murray sits around 11th in scoring among QBs this year and isn't likely to be named a superstar in Week 9 when the list is updated, as Jalen Hurts is. As a result, Murray's NFT cards should remain eligible to play at the next rarity tier up.
Next up is New England, who finally played well against Detroit on Sunday. In that win, Jakobi Meyers returned from injury and looked great. He was also given a higher target share after Nelson Agholor went down with a hamstring injury. Speaking of hamstring injuries, Damien Harris also had one, and Rhamondre Stevenson looked great both catching and running the ball after he went down and could be in line for heavy RB1 work if Harris is set to miss any time.
Looking for a few more additional tips for Week 6, check out the rest of the Lucky Trader Reignmakers content!
