While I'm not sure it's fair to say quarterbacks are as important to DFS football lineups as starting pitchers are to baseball, getting them right is certainly a huge boost. Today we're going to pick apart quarterback play from the first seven weeks of the season in an effort to uncover any filters that narrow down the field of viable candidates.
The focus will be on the top-ten scoring signal callers each week on FanDuel and Draft Kings. Please note these are one-QB sites. Getting the quarterbacks right is obviously important on two-QB sites but it is even more integral on FanDuel and Draft Kings.
We'll be looking at the following filters:
- Home versus away
- Grass versus turf
- Dome versus open stadium
- Win versus loss
- Team total or 24 or more points versus fewer than 24
- Game margin 7 points or greater versus fewer than 7
Before beginning the analysis I'd like to table a theory I have. It's admittedly anecdotal but if you don't at least consider different ideas, you can't stay ahead of the curve. There's a lot of rules of thumb out there, conventional wisdom if you will, regarding lineup construction. These are all based on how football has played out the past several seasons. But what if some of the variables are changed? Specifically, rules favoring passing and the preponderance of running backs by committee are major differences from previous seasons. These are fundamentally variables and when variables change, so may the result, I don't know if my notion has any substance but it seems plausible enough that each of the following tables should be approached with an open mind as opposed to having a preconceived conclusion.
HOME VERSUS AWAY
| FanDuel | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Home | 7 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 6 | 1 | 5 | 39 |
| Away | 3 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 9 | 5 | 31 |
| Draft Kings | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Home | 8 | 7 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 2 | 5 | 39 |
| Away | 2 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 8 | 5 | 31 |
For both sites, 56 percent of the top-ten signal callers were playing in their home stadium. I'll be curious to see if Week 6 turns out to be an outlier or if there will be more weeks where the visiting quarterback excels. If Week 6 is indeed an anomaly then a reasonable filter could be concentrating on home team quarterbacks. One of the nuances with fantasy football is we don't have ample games to satisfy most analytical sample size requirements so we need to go with our gut. My more than ample gut is telling me to use home versus away as a filter and try to find a home QB to anchor my team.
GRASS VERSUS TURF
| FanDuel | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grass | 6 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 36 |
| Turf | 4 | 2 | 6 | 5 | 6 | 5 | 6 | 34 |
| Draft Kings | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grass | 6 | 8 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 35 |
| Turf | 4 | 2 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 5 | 6 | 35 |
| Games | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grass | 56% | 62% | 37% | 62% | 60% | 53% | 53% | 55% |
| Turf | 44% | 38% | 63% | 38% | 40% | 47% | 47% | 45% |
There are 18 grass and 14 turf fields in the NFL so comparing the overall total of top-ten quarterbacks on grass versus turf, the fact they are roughly equal means a turf QB has a very slight edge. This isn't enough for me to use turf as a filter but I could deploy it as a tiebreaker.
DOME VERSUS OPEN AIR STADIUM
| FanDuel | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dome | 3 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 21 |
| Open | 7 | 8 | 6 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 5 | 49 |
| Draft Kings | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dome | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 20 |
| Open | 7 | 8 | 8 | 7 | 7 | 8 | 5 | 50 |
| Games | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dome | 31% | 6% | 31% | 23% | 27% | 20% | 27% | 24% |
| Open | 69% | 94% | 69% | 77% | 73% | 80% | 73% | 76% |
This is a little trickier since there are three retractable roofs along with four domes and 25 open air venues. Some box scores track whether the roof was open or closed so it's possible to adjust the data accordingly. The number of top-ten quarterbacks playing in domes was about 29 percent which is a tad higher than the expected 24 percent. So again, this filter is more of a tie-breaker than something that can offer a significant edge.
WIN VERSUS LOSS
| FanDuel | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Win | 8 | 6 | 6 | 9 | 8 | 8 | 6 | 51 |
| Loss | 2 | 4 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 18 |
| Tie | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Draft Kings | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Win | 7 | 6 | 5 | 8 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 47 |
| Loss | 3 | 4 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 21 |
| Tie | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Assigning half a win to the ties in Week 6 yields a winning percentage of 74 percent for FanDuel and 69 percent in Draft Kings. While it is intuitive to pick a quarterback from a favored team, I hear many pundits rationalize picking a quarterback from an underdog since they'll need to throw to catch up and at worse, they'll get garbage time points. While this may be true in select instances, with seventy percent of the top-ten quarterbacks coming from winning teams, the best play is to use a QB from a team Vegas says will win. This isn't a point spread thing; it's winning the game. Don't get cute. Unless the underdog quarterback's match-up is exceptional, stick with a winner.
Team total or 24 or more points versus fewer than 24
| FanDuel | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24+ | 7 | 8 | 6 | 10 | 8 | 10 | 7 | 56 |
| <23 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 15 |
| Draft Kings | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24+ | 6 | 8 | 7 | 9 | 8 | 10 | 7 | 55 |
| <23 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 15 |
Admittedly, 24 was an arbitrary choice. Perhaps the better study would be the minimum points necessary to finish in the top-ten though shooting for something higher provides more of a buffer. It's not exact math but taking the point spread and the over/under and determining the score matching those conditions gives a rough estimate of how many points each team is expected to put on the board. Based on these results, eighty percent of all top-ten quarterbacks lead their team to at least 24 points. That makes for a nice filter.
Game margin 7 points or greater versus fewer than 7
| FanDuel | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| <7 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 2 | 6 | 5 | 4 | 35 |
| 7+ | 3 | 4 | 5 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 35 |
| Draft Kings | Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5 | Week 6 | Week 7 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| <7 | 8 | 6 | 5 | 2 | 6 | 6 | 4 | 37 |
| 7+ | 2 | 4 | 5 | 8 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 33 |
Again, 7 was chosen randomly though as it turns out is appears to be the point at which half the top-ten quarterbacks finish above and below. One narrative is quarterbacks are forced to throw in close games while the other suggests throwing is how you go about piling up the points so choosing a possible blow-out is wise. This data does not really support either argument so the actual point spread isn't as useful as the over/under when it comes to choosing your quarterback.
SUMMARY
At the end of the day, we're all going to trust our own analysis and evaluation of the match-ups. That said, some of the above can certainly aid in that analysis.
An edge goes to
- home quarterbacks
- quarterbacks favored to win
- quarterbacks on teams expected to score 24 points
A slight edge goes to
- turf
- domes
Some if not all may seem intuitively obvious - and maybe they are. But I'd be willing to bet most focus more on the individual match-up with less credence given to the overall factors. Electing a filter or two to narrow the choices then evaluating those candidates may increase your chances to use one of the best quarterbacks that week.