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DFS Data Dive: The highest fantasy football player ceilings in Week 8

Orchard Park, New York, USA; Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen (17) passes the ball against the Washington Football Team during the second half at Highmark Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Rich Barnes-USA TODAY Sports

Our series of analyses on the single-game DraftKings showdown slates uses the combination of current projections, historical game results and similarity algorithms to simulate an upcoming game by looking back at the most similar historical matchups.


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In this analysis, I’m taking the same outline and applying it instead to the DFS main slate by projecting the likelihood each individual quarterback, running back, wide receiver, tight end and D/ST option will be the highest scorer of the slate. In doing this, we can find the unlikely tournament plays who may not have been on your radar.

METHODOLOGY

For each game on the DFS Sunday main slate, I looked through thousands of NFL matchups from 2014-2021 and found the closest analogies according to the following parameters: betting spread, over/under and average fantasy points scoring for the top-ranked positional players of both rosters (QB1, RB1, WR1, TE1).

Once I get the 75 most similar matchups for each upcoming game, I then simulate the main slate 10,000 times by randomly choosing one of the 75 matchups for each game. Then, I find the highest-scoring quarterback, running back, wide receiver, tight end and D/ST on the slate.

The last step is totaling the number of times a particular team shows up as the top option for the slate at each position and dividing by the total simulations. That number is what I call “highest-scoring %” in the team-labeled bar charts below. Below the charts, I join the highest-projected player on that team for the position, then list their projected fantasy points and salaries for DraftKings and FanDuel.

QUARTERBACKS

Pos Highest % Player Team DK Fpts DK Salary FD Fpts FD Salary
QB 12.71 Josh Allen BUF 26.3 8,100 24.8 8,800
QB 9.03 Jalen Hurts PHI 23.7 7,200 22.2 8,400
QB 8.42 Matthew Stafford LA 23.0 7,600 21.3 8,200
QB 8.17 Tom Brady TB 24.2 7,400 22.2 8,300
QB 7.50 Justin Herbert LAC 24.1 7,300 22.2 7,900
QB 6.05 Ryan Tannehill TEN 22.5 6,600 21.1 7,500
QB 5.62 Matt Ryan ATL 22.3 5,900 20.5 7,200
QB 5.47 Carson Wentz IND 19.5 5,700 18.1 7,200
QB 4.61 Mac Jones NE 19.5 5,200 18.1 6,900
QB 3.67 Geno Smith SEA 18.5 5,300 17.3 7,000
QB 3.60 Sam Darnold CAR 19.6 5,600 18.0 7,300
QB 3.35 Tua Tagovailoa MIA 16.6 5,500 15.5 7,100
QB 2.92 Ben Roethlisberger PIT 13.7 5,400 12.8 6,600
QB 2.77 Jameis Winston NO 17.6 6,000 16.4 7,400
QB 2.66 Taylor Heinicke WAS 17.8 5,300 16.7 7,000
QB 2.51 Davis Mills HST 16.1 4,800 14.8 6,300
QB 2.28 Jared Goff DET 15.8 5,200 14.8 6,800
QB 2.21 Joe Burrow CIN 22.0 7,100 20.4 7,800
QB 2.01 Jimmy Garoppolo SF 13.0 5,600 12.3 6,900
QB 1.96 Teddy Bridgewater DEN 18.7 5,400 17.7 7,000
QB 1.66 Trevor Lawrence JAX 17.9 5,500 16.7 6,700
QB 1.38 Justin Fields CHI 16.0 5,000 15.1 6,400
QB 0.81 Mike White NYJ 12.1 5,000 11.5 6,300
QB 0.69 Baker Mayfield CLV 12.5 4,900 11.9 6,400

Related content for you: The Fantasy Football Utilization Report: Week 8 waiver, trade and drop candidates via Dwain McFarland

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