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

January 25, 2026

By Ha Kung Wong

In 2024, we were over 70% for cash lineups again and we’re back with more Daily Fantasy Football advice for Cash Games for 2025 Conference Championships!

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 2025 Conference Championships!

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 Conference Championships.

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.
For the Conference Championships, I’m paying up for Matt Stafford or Sam Darnold, definitely targeting Kenneth Walker and trying to squeeze in at least one of Puka Nacua or Jaxson Smith-Njigba. The rest will be mostly value picks.
No “Free Squares of the Week”™ this week, but there’s still plenty of value. We’ll touch on that in each of the games.
The New England Patriots at Denver Broncos has an over/under of 43.5 and a spread of 3.5, but the Patriots seem to be int he drivers seat with Bo Nix out. The Patriots had the 2nd most points (28.8) per game during the regular season, so I don’t expect that to stop now. That being said, it’s unclear who is going the benefit the most, so I don’t mind playing some mainstays like Hunter Henry, and taking some shots at the likes of Kayshon Boutte, but I’m generally limiting exposure to the Rhamondre Stevenson since the Broncos have allowed the 2nd least rush yards per game (91.1) during the regular season. I’m probably avoiding Drake Maye as well, just because he might not have to do much in this game. I wouldn’t be surprised to see this to be more of a defensive game. The Patriots have top 10 defense all around, but I don’t mind taking cheap shots at RJ Harvey based on usage and Pat Bryant coming back from injury.
The Los Angeles Rams at Seattle Seahawks has an over/under of 45.5 with a spread of 2.5, and I like both teams. The Rams had the most yards (394.6) and points (30.5) per game on offense, so I really like Matt Stafford and Puka Nacua, who are probably my favorite two plays of the day. The Seahawks are no slouch as they have the 7th most yards () and 3rd most yards per game on offense, so I’m good with playing Sam Darnold, Jaxson Smith-Njigba and really like Kenneth Walker, particularly with Zach Charbonnet out. In fact, I don’t mind punting with George Holani returning from injury and taking over the RB2 duties.
On defense, I love taking value and paying down, so just slot in any defense you can afford. I don’t think there are any exceptional matchups to pay up for if you need the cap space for the skill positions.