New Year's resolution: draft more Zero RB in 2023...

In today’s Fantasy Life Newsletter presented by BetMGM:

• A championship-weekend must-start RB.
• Rankings Update. RB Extravaganza. 
• Dear Pete. Life as a fantasy sicko...
• Bets from the group chat. Two rookie WRs take flight.
• DFS Building Blocks from OWS.
• Roster Watch's Top DFS Value.
• Its 12/31. Take it away Dwain McFarland...

All season we have seen RB injuries change the fabric of the fantasy landscape from week to week.

Why would we expect championship weekend to be any different?

With an injury to a teammate, we have another rookie set to join the must-start conversation for Week 17.

🤩 Brian Robinson Jr.

Robinson averages 17.2 rushing attempts per game, and in Week 17, Antonio Gibson – who averages 8.7 carries in games with Robinson – is out due to a knee injury. Gibson also handles most of the passing downs, which is a driver to Robinson’s low 21% route participation average.

The Commanders don’t have much roster competition in Jonathan Williams and Jaret Patterson (practice squad), meaning Robinson could push for 25-plus touches as an every-down bell cow this weekend in a juicy matchup.

The Browns allow the seventh-most rushing yards (134) and the third-most TDs (1.3) per game in non-overtime play. Cleveland ranks last in PFF run defense at 33.5.

With the stars aligning, Robinson has 100-plus yards and multiple TD potential. He climbs to high-end RB2 status, joining Tier 2 with names like Travis Etienne, Nick Chubb and Joe Mixon.

🏈 There’s only one ball we’re worried about dropping this weekend…

If you're located in  Maryland, Kansas, Illinois, or Louisiana, we’ve got good news for you...

IF ANY TEAM SCORES A TD IN THEIR BOWL GAME, YOU GET $200 IN FREE BETS!

Are you making it ’til midnight????

Will Harbaugh finally do it????

Can the underdog QB become the top dog????

Does unranked TCU go all the way????

New year, same you???

Lots of questions, one answer—you want $200 in free bets:

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3. Bet on Any Team in their bowl game

Not in one of these four states? No matter who ya got this weekend, we got you.

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Going with your gut can only get you so far. Use our industry-leading rankings to gain an edge over your league mates. Need help? Don't worry, Dwain has you covered.

📈 Risers

📈 RB – Miles Sanders

Sanders is the definition of a boom-bust RB.

The lows can be really low, with four outings under six fantasy points. However, the highs can also be really high for the explosive RB, with three outings of 28.5 points or more.

This weekend, the Eagles are the fifth-largest favorites (six points) over the Saints’ run funnel defense. New Orleans allows the second-fewest passing yards per game (207) in non-overtime play but gives up the ninth-most on the ground (132). On average, opponents run the ball 29.1 times against the Saints.

Sanders a mid-range RB2 with a high-end RB1 upside.

📈 RB – Cam Akers

Akers has taken over the Rams backfield, averaging 65% of the team’s rushing attempts since Week 13. During that stretch, he has finishes of RB8, RB21, RB22, and RB1.

The third-year RB isn’t highly efficient, but he will get help this weekend in a matchup against the fourth-worst graded PFF run defense (35.8). The Chargers allow the sixth-most yards per game on the ground (140) in non-overtime.

Akers is a mid-range RB2 that ranks ahead of names like Najee Harris, Leonard Fournette and Devin Singletary on championship weekend.

📈 RB – Tyler Allgeier

Allgeier has taken over the lead RB responsibilities over the last two games with 50% and 56% of the Falcons’ rushing attempts. He has RB11 and RB12 finishes and is closing in on 1,000 yards. The rookie also registered a season-high 16% target share on a healthy 54% route participation in Week 16.

The Falcons run the ball more than the NFL average in trailing (1st), close (1st), and leading (4th) game scripts. There isn’t a situation that can unfold on Sunday that will push Arthur Smith off of his commitment to the ground – which provides Allgeier with insulation from a bad outcome.

Atlanta is a 5.5-point favorite at home against an Arizona offense that might not put up much of a fight with David Blough starting at QB. The Cardinals are the eighth-worst-graded PFF run defense (50.1).

Allgeier is a mid-range RB2 with a high-end RB1 upside.

📈 RB – Zack Moss

Moss will likely be forgotten by most after an eight-point fantasy performance in Week 16, but his underlying utilization was great.

The veteran back dominated snaps (69%) and rushing attempts (80%), including all of the short-yardage work (100%). He also registered more work than Deon Jackson on passing downs, with 62% of the long-down-distance work and 50% of the two-minute offense. Reports out of Indianapolis indicate that Moss should be the No. 1 again this weekend.

The Colts aren’t a good team, but they are willing to stick with the run, and the Giants have struggled in that department. New York allows the fifth-most yards per game (143) in non-overtime play and sports the fifth-worst PFF run defense grade (47.1).

Moss is a high-end RB3 with high-end RB2 upside in Week 17.

📈 WR – Jerry Jeudy and Courtland Sutton

Greg Dulcich was placed on IR on Friday, ending his season. It is a tough blow for a struggling Broncos passing game, but from a fantasy perspective, it is a positive development. Most of the targets should consolidate through Jeudy and Sutton moving forward.

The Broncos are 12.5-point dogs this weekend and will need big plays in the passing game to have a chance against the Chiefs.

Jeudy has five top-24 finishes in his last six healthy starts and is a mid-range WR2 with upside this weekend. Sutton is a low-end WR3.

📉 Fallers 

📉 WR – DeAndre Hopkins

Hopkins popped up on the injury report on Friday with a knee issue, and Colt McCoy was downgraded to out with concussion symptoms. The veteran WR has a strong matchup against the Falcons – PFF’s third-worst-graded coverage unit (50.4) – but he will be hard to trust at less than 100% with David Blough under center.

Fortunately, the Cardinals play in the early window, so at least fantasy managers will know if Hopkins is playing or not.

Hopkins falls to low-end WR2 territory.

📉 WR – Tyler Lockett

Lockett expects to play on Sunday, but he will be a game-time decision in a late-afternoon tilt against a Jets defense that allows the fifth-fewest yards per game (213) in non-overtime.

The veteran WR carries additional risk due to his hand injury that could make him a game-time scratch, knock him out of the contest early or reduce his effectiveness.

Lockett falls into the WR3 range and carries a lower floor and ceiling than usual.

Feeling lost in life? Need help with your fantasy football team? Pete is here to help. Send your questions about fantasy, or life to dearpete@fantasylife.com

Dear Pete, A couple of weeks ago, I ended up meeting the friends of a girl I was seeing.  These people were wild.

Singing the “That’s What Tequila Does” song and ordering shots at 11 PM on a Saturday. I was like, hey, inactives are in 11.5 hrs. They just looked at me like I was a weirdo. I couldn’t take it and had to leave. How do you deal with people who aren’t as dedicated as they should be to the fantasy life? I wanted to pray for them but figured it was minus EV. Sincerely, Rudy was Offsides.

DEAR RUDY WAS OFFSIDES: First of all, congrats on the sex. 

Learning how to juggle being a fantasy sicko as well as a normal, functioning member of society is one of the greatest challenges we face as managers.

When I first started playing DFS back in 2013, I used to heavily anticipate a value chart each week that David Dodds would post on Footballguys late on Saturday nights. This was back before projection systems and optimizers were ubiquitous, so the concept of points per dollar values felt like a cheat code at the time.

So much so that I remember maniacally refreshing the article on my phone while still at parties and then making a quick Irish exit the second it posted so I could run home and make lineups in the quiet of my own apartment. There’s certainly something both sad and beautiful (ok, just sad) about a young twenty-something leaving a fun party in Cambridge, MA, to see whether Pierre Garcon was popping as a value or not. 

Ultimately, I think you have three ways to handle this dynamic…

1) Hide it. This is the safest and most socially acceptable move. When people ask you why you don’t want your 9th tequila shot, don't say you need to go check on Austin Ekeler’s knee. Instead, say you are getting up early to make breakfast for your grandma and take her to church. Or something more plausible. Just don’t let the normies know you are ghosting them to go slide your 4 pm guys into your flex for max optionality.

2) Flaunt it. This is by far the trickiest angle to take. If you are going to convince the normies that what you do is not just Dungeons and Dragons for football, you’re going to need to flash some receipts. Have you had a big score in DFS? Did you win a big-money league? That will help prove that this is more than just a hobby and that you are justified in obsessing over it. 

Note: this move can backfire in a big way if someone in the friend group has their own fantasy football team and proceeds to pepper you with start/sit questions until the end of time. Proceed cautiously. 

3) Spin zone it. This is my personal go-to move. Because I do this for a living, I can justify basically anything fantasy-adjacent as being for “work.” It’s much easier to bring your laptop over to your in-laws on Christmas Day to build Dolphins/Packers showdown lineups when you have the ultimate cover of saying you are “working.”

Bonus move: have a child. I milked an extra 30 minutes of RedZone watching on Christmas Eve while “putting the baby down for a nap.”

Good luck in Week 17. Tequila shots on me if you win.

🚁 An NFL QB assists in a life-saving rescue. He is a real-life hero.

🤕 Jalen Hurts practiced on Thursday and Friday. Gardner Minshew is likely to start.

📢 A fluke performance? Trash talk might be extra motivation for a star WR.

📊 Jelani Woods could get extra work again. Kylen Granson is out.

💰 Some players are very motivated. There are millions of reasons.

🥴️ Congrats if you are in the championship game. 2022 has been an obstacle course.

Our resident betting sharps at Fantasy Life have a group chat. Lucky for you, they are leaking the alpha. Here's what Eliot came up with for Week 17...

🛫 Garrett Wilson Over 64.5 Receiving Yards -115 BetMGM

Wilson has gone nuclear with Mike White under center for the Jets. In White’s three starts for gang green, Wilson is averaging 10 targets and 111.7 receiving yards compared to just 7.4 targets and 55 yards without him. I strongly agree with Dwain, who has Wilson ranked as a top-10 receiver this week. 

Wilson has dominated opportunities for the Jets. On the season, he has a WOPR of 54.1%, 23 points closer than the next closest Jet, and the importance of not having to play with Zach Wilson cannot be overstated.

On the season, Zach has a catchable pass rate of 66.5%, ranking 46th among QBs. With his volume, matchup, and QB chemistry, Wilson is going to sail over this number.

📈  Drake London Over 57.5 Receiving Yards -115 BetMGM

Gone is QB Marcus Mariota, hurt is TE Kyle Pitts, and learning he has a budding superstar receiver is head coach Arthur Smith.

London has dominated targets since Pitts’ injury, seeing 8.6 per game, up from 5.8 with Pitts in the lineup. London’s dominance has come even more to fruition, with Desmond Ridder garnering a target on 34% of new QB's pass attempts. London has gone over this number in back-to-back games and should make it three in a row on Sunday.

JM's Building Blocks are unique player pairings that can be used as foundational building blocks for tournament rosters.

JMToWin is a founder/developer of One Week Season, where we focus not only on preparing you for each unique slate, but also on teaching you the strategies and theories behind winning DFS play. Become a part of the OWS Fam with OWS Free!

📓 JUSTIN FIELDS + DJ CHARK + D’ANDRE SWIFT

• COST: $17.5K DK // NOT AS SHARP ON FD

📓 STORY:

“This game plays out as expected, and Fields smashes on the ground”

📓 WHY IT WORKS: 

As explored in a number of places this week, there aren’t a whole lot of ways to “get different” with this game.

The Lions have a three-man rotation in the backfield and — outside of Chark and ARSB (who play pretty much all the snaps) — a messy rotation among pass catchers (with elevated 12-personnel rates the last few weeks, four tight ends in the mix, and three wideouts vying for WR3 snaps).

On the other side, the Bears are back to a timeshare in the backfield and have seen only a random, unpredictable 17-pointer from Dante Pettis providing any sort of value at the wide receiver position outside of Darnell Mooney (on I.R.).

Cole Kmet can be paired with Fields, but Fields can also hit without any one piece from the Bears hitting, while Chark and Swift, at their price tags, can hit without Goff “breaking the slate.”

📓 HOW IT WORKS:

This setup essentially says, “Goff scores around 22 to 26 points and supports a big game from Chark, Swift finally breaks off some long plays, and Fields goes for 35 to 40 while spreading out any passing touchdowns.” This is not “the likeliest way” for this game to play out, but it’s also not a wacky bet, and it’s different enough to get you a unique path to first place around what is the clear top game environment on the slate.

📓 MAHOMES + MCKINNON + JUJU + KITTLE

• COST: $26K DK // $30K FD

📓 STORY:

“Kansas City does what they did last time vs the Broncos, and Kittle does what he does without Deebo on the field”

📓 WHY IT WORKS:

The combinatorial ownership on this full stack will be close to zero, but it makes all the sense in the world.

📓 HOW IT WORKS:

The last time the Chiefs played the Broncos, Travis Kelce scored 11.1 DK points while Mahomes // McKinnon // JuJu combined for 83.58.

JuJu’s game logs make it look like he’s more inconsistent than he is; he has actually scored 17.8 to 28.4 in five of the last six games in which he played his normal allotment of snaps.

If betting on a scenario in which both McKinnon and JuJu hit, you are almost certainly betting on a scenario in which Kelce misses — creating a situation in which the best way to maximize our paths to a first-place finish is to find a tight end who can absolutely bury rosters that are taking that disappointing score from Kelce.

Enter George Kittle, who has now averaged more than 22 DK points per game in the last eight contests in which Deebo was out or limited (note: Deebo will be out once again this week).

There is clear potential to get 4x the total salary spent, and well over 100 points, from this comprehensive bet, while clearly positioning your roster for a first-place finish with a low-owned combination that directly attacks a more popular way for these spots to be played.

Playing the best players is easy enough, but value is where it's at in DFS. Every other week Alex from Roster Watch will be dropping by the Fantasy Life offices to give you his top DFS values of the week. 

👀 Allen Lazard, WR Packers

• $5400 on DraftKings, $6200 on FanDuel

The Packers will attempt to keep their playoff hopes alive at home this Sunday in a must-win tilt with the Vikings. Numerous signs point to Lazard being a good value in Week 17 DFS contests.

First, the matchup against the Vikings is terrific for outside receivers and has been all year long, ranking as the No.1 matchup of the week for opposing WRs on the RosterWatch Week 17 Matchup Tool.

There is also the chance that stud rookie WR Christian Watson will miss this week with his hip injury, and even if Watson goes, he'll likely be limited after missing most of the week of practice. During the Pack's Week 16 win over the Dolphins, when Watson left the game early, Lazard booked 11 targets, tying his season-high.

Then there is the evolving nature of the Vikings' defense in coverage: For the first 12 weeks of the season, the Vikings were the second-most-zone heavy team in coverage per PFF. Minnesota HC Kevin O'Connell challenged DC Ed Donatell to "be less predictable" at the start of December, and the result has been a gradual move toward tighter man coverages. Per Pro Football Network, the Vikings have been one of the league's most man-heavy defenses over the last two weeks.

This lines up well with Lazard's skill set, as his target rate versus man is 28% compared to a 16% rate versus zone coverage per PlayerProfiler.com.

There are only two starting receivers in the NFL with greater discrepancies between their man and zone target rates than Lazard: A.J. Brown and Ja'Marr Chase.

Vikings at Packers features the third-highest game total of the weekend (O/U of 48.5), and Lazard makes sense as a cheap way to get exposure to it.

Hopkins finding out Colt McCoy wasn't coming backtwitter.com/Underdog__NFL/…

— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz)
Dec 30, 2022