“Buy or Bye”™ – Daily Fantasy Football Plays for Divisional Playoff 2020 Cash Games

January 16, 2021

By Ha Kung Wong

In 2019, we were over 70% for cash lineups and we’re back with more Daily Fantasy Football advice for Cash Games for the Divisional Playoffs! We’re 72% on lineups so far this year, but we’re looking to win even more!

You’re welcome. ?

As usual, before we get to winning you more bragging rights (and DFS cash), remember, the point of this article is not just to give you one or two lineups for each site, it’s to give you examples of a few POSSIBLE lineups. Getting exposure to a few different lineups is always a good idea, so don’t forget to mix and match additional lineups from my suggestions below. Trust me, it’s a lot more fun that way AND you’ll improve your chances of cashing!

Let’s get to winning you some CASH in the Divisional Playoffs!

Cash Games, for those who don’t know, are essentially the lowest risk games. They include “50/50” games, in which half the entrants win about 1.8x the entry fee, and “Double Ups”, in which slightly less than half the entrants win 2x the entry fee.

Since there’s so many different sites, and I can’t cover them all, I’ve decided to cover just the most popular sites, including Fan Duel, Draft Kings and Yahoo! Daily Fantasy.

First of all, as a general rule for 50/50 Cash Games, there’s a basic target of points per salary cap spent that you’d like to look for:

For Fan Duel try to target at least 2 fantasy points per $1000 spent.
For Draft Kings, try to target at least 2.5 fantasy points per $1000 spent.
For Yahoo! Daily Fantasy, try to target at least 0.6-0.7 fantasy points per $1 spent.

Remember, this article is not focused on GPP (Tournament) Games, JUST Cash Games. Feel free to use a few of these suggested players as a base when constructing a GPP lineup, but you’ll have to take some chances on a few low cost, upside players as well.

As per usual, I’m going to provide you with a few sample lineups on each site and give you a few notes to consider. You’re welcome. ?

So, without further to do, here are my suggestions for the Best Daily Fantasy Football Plays for Cash Games for the Divisional Playoffs, along with they’re prices on FanDuel (“FD”), Draft Kings (“DK”) and Yahoo! Daily Fantasy (“Y!”).

FanDuel

Draft Kings

Yahoo! DFS

Game Notes:

For those new to this column, note that I never advocate against you paying up at any particular position. But remember that DFS is a salary cap game. You can feel free to sprinkle high priced players into your lineups, but you can’t pay up at every position because there’s simply not enough salary to go around. I try my best each week to provide my thoughts on how you might want to balance your cash lineups in terms of points potential and salary.
Tough to find a “Free Square of the Week”™ for the Divisional Playoffs, but if there’s one guy I like to pay down for to save cap space, it’s Devin Singletary. Zack Moss is out and the Bills were so desperate for backup RBs that they signed Devonta Freeman. I’m assuming Singletary gets at least 70% of the carries, which is pretty good for the value, even against a solid Ravens run defense. Paying down for a starting RB, particularly in a high powered offense like the Bills, and with Josh Allen a threat to run keeping defenses on their toes, isn’t an option that comes around every week.
- And speaking of the Bills, I like playing Josh Allen, Stefon Diggs and, if you’re trying to save cap space, Gabriel Davis. Allen isn’t my favorite QB (I’ll get to that later), but he’ll need to produce for the Bills to win, so I don’t mind sprinkling him in with his top target in Diggs. Davis caught all 4 targets for 85 yards in the Wild Card game, and he was averaging almost 6 targets a game in the previous 4. He’s a part of this offense and is pretty cheap for the upside. On the other side, I again like JK Dobbins and Lamar Jackson, in that order. The Bills defense is more vulnerable to the run and the Ravens excel at that. I don’t want to pay up for Jackson that much, but I really like Dobbins and his ground and pound (and TD) upside. As I mentioned on this week’s podcast, this is my favorite game of the weekend and I’d be surprised if we don’t see a few fireworks.
The Cleveland Browns @ Kansas City Chiefs game has the highest over/under of the weekend (57) and both teams are rolling right now. That being said, my favorite plays of the week are Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce, and Tyreek Hill, in that order. I suspect the Chiefs will want to make a statement in their first game of the playoffs, and the Browns have only the 23rd ranked pass defense in the league during the regular season. The Browns just gave up 501 passing yards to Big Ben, 157 yards to JuJu Smith-Schuster and 117 yards to Diontae Johnson. So, yeah, you can get air yards on the Browns. I don’t mind mixing in a little Clyde Edwards-Hilaire to save money since the Chiefs may need to just kill clock at the end of the game with a lead. As for the Browns, they’ll need to throw to keep up, so I don’t mind getting a few shares of Jarvis Landry and Austin Hooper. And since I anticipate a negative game script, I like getting some value with Kareem Hunt, who had 61 total yards and 2 TDs in Wild Card weekend. Also in Hunt’s favor is his red zone usage, as he out-carried Nick Chubb 4 to 1 last week and 41 to 37 in the regular season in the red zone.
- UPDATE – Le’Veon Bell now a good play with Hilaire out.
The second highest over/under of the week (52) belong to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers @ New Orleans Saints, so I do like some of the skill players in this game. I’m not interested in guessing which WR in Tampa will get all the targets, but I do think Tom Brady will have to sling it to keep up, so I don’t mind using him. For the Saints, I prefer to stick to Alvin Kamara for exposure to the offense, and Deonte Harris as an cheap upside alternative, particularly against the 21st ranked Bucs pass defense. Harris was a target monster in the Wild Card Weekend catching all 7 for 83 yards. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see something in that neighborhood again with the Bucs paying more attention to Michael Thomas.
Cam Akers broke out huge in Wild Card Weekend with 176 total yards and a TD. The Packers are more vulnerable on the ground with the 16th ranked run defense, and there’s not much else the Rams can do on consistently offense. I see a lot of opportunity for Akers this weekend. I don’t mind playing Packers this weekend, but I’m likely to fade them due to the competition, as the Rams are among the best defenses in the NFL.
On defense, I like taking the Green Bay Packers defense. Whoever is under center won’t matter, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see a couple sacks and a turnover this weekend. Aside from the aforementioned Akers, we saw how lackluster the Rams were on offense. The Rams clearly have the best defense this weekend, but regardless of what I said above re fading the Packers skill players, I also wouldn’t want to pay up for the Rams defense with them facing Rodgers.