“Buy or Bye”™ – Daily Fantasy Football Plays for Thanksgiving 2025 Cash Games

November 25, 2025

By Ha Kung Wong

Gobble gobble everyone and hope you’re having a terrific Thanksgiving!

But what’s better than stuffing your face with gravy drenched turkey, mashed potatoes and those weird green bean casseroles which are really just Campbells cream of mushroom with canned vegetables? Winning money on your DFS cash games, of course!

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 on Thanksgiving of the 2025 NFL season!

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 Thanksgiving contests, along with they’re prices.

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 for DFS. We all know that the likes of Josh Allen and Jahmyr Gibbs are probably going to have the most consistent upside in terms of potential fantasy points from week to week. 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.
My approach to DFS on Thanksgiving is to anchor my lineup with at least one stud RB and TE and go with value elsewhere.
No “Free Square of the Week”™ for Thanksgiving, but we got a trio of high over/unders, which gives us plenty of options in every game.
The Kansas City Chiefs @ Dallas Cowboys game has the highest over/under on the Thanksgiving slate (52.5), so lots of opportunity here.
- For the Chiefs against the Cowboys defense that allows the 2nd most points (28.5) and 4th most yards (377.5) per game to opposing offenses in the NFL, I like Rashee Rice, Travis Kelce, Xavier Worthy and Kareem Hunt. Rice has come back from suspension to pick up exactly where he left off last year having the 5th most receptions (6.8) and 8th most receiving yards (78.8) among WRs and just came off a huge Week 12 game where he caught 8 of 12 targets for 141 yards. Kelce has lost a step, but he’s still getting the 6th most receptions (4.91) and 3rd most receiving yards (61.27) per game among TEs and makes for a great play against a Cowboys defense that’s struggled against TEs, allowing 7.3 catches for 72.7 yards per game to TEs over the last three. Worthy isn’t having as big a fantasy impact, but it’s not for lack of opportunity. He’s averaging over 7 targets per game with Rice back and makes for decent cheap exposure to this game. Hunt is still likely to lead the RB reps even with Isiah Pacheco back, as Hunt has done well recently and Pacheco will probably be eashed back in. Plus, Hunt is cheap across industry.
- For the Cowboys, who have the most yards (387.3) and 4th most points (29.1) per game on offense in the NFL, I like Dak Prescott, George Pickens and CeeDee Lamb. This offense has been cooking recently and managed to a huge come from behind win against the Philadelphia Eagles in Week 12. Prescott has the 3rd most passing yards (267) and 2nd most passing TDs (2.09) per game among QBs in the league and has a whopping 7 TDs in his last two games. And he’s doing this with his top two WRs, CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens, and honestly, Pickens might be the WR1A now averaging 145 yards and TD over the last two games. Lamb isn’t chopped liver though (do people still use that phrase?) as he still has the 4th most yards (90.29) and 3rd most targets (10.29) per game among WRs this season, so fire him up at a discount on Draft Kings. The Chiefs defense is solid, but we know that the Cowboys will fire away all game long, so the upside is there.
The Cincinnati Bengals @ Baltimore Ravens game has the second highest over/under of the Thanksgiving slate (51.5), so there’s also plenty of potential here.
- For the Bengals, with Tee Higgins already ruled out with a concussion, I like Ja’Marr Chase, Chase Brown and Andrei Iosivas. Joe Burrow is likely back and we know how he feels about targeting Ja’Marr Chase, who has the most targets per game (11.7) of any WR in the NFL. Chase Brown is having his best run of the season of late having over a 100 yards per game over his last 5. And Iosivas is a great cheap exposure being the default WR2. He was in a similar position last week and managed to catch 4 of 7 targets for 61 yards.
- The Bengals defense essentially can’t stop anything, so the Ravens are in a great spot. The Bengals are actually more vulnerable on the ground being ranked 3rd worst in the NFL, so I’m all in on Derrick Henry who has the 6th most rush yards (79.18) and TDs (0.82) per game among RBs this season. I’m sure Lamar Jackson may have a good game too, but he’s been underperforming lately and is a bit too expensive for me.

The Green Bay Packers @ Detroit Lions game has the “lowest” over/under on the Thanksgiving slate (48.5), but that’s still pretty high and we know there are going to fireworks between these NFL North rivals.

The Lions have allowed the 7th most passing TDs this season (21), so I’m in on Jordan Love and if I had to pick one Packers WR, I’m going with Christian Watson. Both will save you some cap space and should have plenty of opportunity. Watson averaged 6 targets and a TD over the last 2 games, so he’s certainly trending up. Note that as with last week, if Josh Jacobs doesn’t play, Emanuel Wilson would be a great play.

The Packers defense won’t be as easy to pick on as the Giants were in Week 12, but it’s hard to fade Jahmyr Gibbs right now after he had essentially the best fantasy game ever for any player with 264 total yards and 3 TDs. The Packer are just 15th against the run, so if you can afford him, go ahead and lock him in. The rest of the Lions are a little harder to figure out, but Amon-Ra St. Brown has been locked in and I think Jameson Williams makes up for his goose egg in Week 12.

Jahmyr Gibbs Game Log
				Rush	Rush	Rush	Rece	Rece	Rece	Rece
Date	Team	Opp	Result	Att	Yds	TD	Tgt	Rec	Yds	TD
2025-11-23	DET	NYG	W, 34-27 (OT)	15	219	2	12	11	45	1
2025-11-16	DET	PHI	L, 9-16	12	39	0	8	5	107	0
2025-11-09	DET	WAS	W, 44-22	15	142	2	4	3	30	1
2025-11-02	DET	MIN	L, 24-27	9	25	0	3	3	3	0
2025-10-20	DET	TAM	W, 24-9	17	136	2	3	3	82	0
2025-10-12	DET	KAN	L, 17-30	17	65	0	2	1	0	0
2025-10-05	DET	CIN	W, 37-24	12	54	0	2	2	33	1
2025-09-28	DET	CLE	W, 34-10	15	91	1	2	2	6	0
2025-09-22	DET	BAL	W, 38-30	22	67	2	6	5	32	0
2025-09-14	DET	CHI	W, 52-21	12	94	1	3	3	10	0
2025-09-07	DET	GNB	L, 13-27	9	19	0	10	10	31	0

Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com: View Original Table

On defense, I don’t really love any of the options, but the Baltimore Ravens Defense has been playing well of late, and Burrow is probably a little rusty coming back from a lengthy injury absence.