No rest for the wicked. Non-stop football rumbles on with a three-game CFB slate Tuesday night. Here are my favorite plays on DraftKings tonight in a slate that actually has some pretty good options with all three games lined under a touchdown with a total between 54.5 and 61.
Core Plays
QB Kaidon Salter, Liberty – $8,600
RB Nate Noel, APST – $6,400
WR Sam Pinckney, Coastal Carolina – $5,500
Salter is the chalk at QB but for good reason. Chadwell is a QB whisperer, turning Salter’s near FBS-worst PFF grades from a season ago into top-25 numbers passing the ball. He’s a tremendous athlete with elite rushing upside so the passing stuff is really a cherry on top. Jacksonville State has a pretty good and disruptive defensive front but the secondary can’t guard anyone, ranking 84th in EPA per pass and 114th in passing explosiveness.
Nate Noel is my favorite RB on a slate with a bunch of good ones. Coastal’s defense is better than its reputation after stinking to High Heaven last year, but App State has managed at least 417 total yards in every game this season and Noel is the focal point of the offensive attack. Usually a program to divvy up carries, Noel has established himself as the lead back this year and is on pace for a huge season. His team is a TD favorite at home in a game with the highest total on the board, so he’ll be chalk.
I feel like I get the Coastal WRs wrong every time that they’re on a slate. I like them both, but Pinckney is my favorite in all formats as he’s getting the most usage. His 46 targets are second most on the slate, he’s been really effective this season and matches up against a weak App State defense in a game that seems good to stack.
Secondary Plays
QB Grayson McCall, Coastal Carolina – $6,000
Hmm … what to do with the second QB spot? McCall has taken a huge step back this season but he still makes sense to me in all formats on this slate in a good game environment. Coastal’s offense has been better than most give it credit for this year, averaging 425.5 total yards per game on 6.2 yards per play. App State’s defense is better against the pass than the rush, but McCall can run the ball a little bit anyway and has two good stacking options. The offense has been humming lately and he’s really cheap.
QB Zion Webb, JacSt – $5,600
Jacksonville State kills me. They rotate QBs and it seems like one of them pops off for a 30-burger each week, but good luck figuring out who it will be as the staff has said that they have no plans to stop the rotation any time soon. Smothers stunk last week while Webb led a huge comeback, so my guess is that Webb starts this game. Rich Rod’s QBs are gold and Liberty has shown vulnerabilities in the ground game at points this season, letting Bowling Green and New Mexico State rack up big performances rushing the ball in Week 1 and 2. They’ve really tightened things up since then and have completely stuffed each of their last three opponents, but all of those teams sucked as well. That makes this a difficult handicap for me but I’m still hesitatnt to believe in JacSt considering their numbers aren’t good (104th in EPA per play, 121st in explosiveness on offense) and have been reliant on crazy second-half comebacks. That has me out on most of their players this week and I’ll fade their team for the most part, but their QBs are wayyyy too cheap and you can flip a coin and play one in GPPs, with Webb being the weighted side of the coin.
QB Joey Aguilar, App State – $7,500
This would be an easier play if there weren’t reports that Week 1 starter Ryan Burger wasn’t back at practice and could be back under center on Tuesday. Hopefully we get news before kick as I find both to be viable options and they have a similar price. Aguilar only has one dud this season and it was in Laramie, which you can’t fault him for, and he’s gone for over 27 FPs in his two outings sandwiching that one.
RB Tyre Shelton, LA Tech – $6,700
I’ve written about Shelton for a few midweek slates already and touched on him in a waiver wire piece as well, so he’s becoming a familiar face. I considered making him a core play but there are two other RBs I’m considering that are cheaper, so I think it’s feasible to fade a heavily-owned Shelton in GPPs. He still looks like a good play in all formats against an MTSU defense that has really been struggling to stop the run, ranking 85th in rushing success rate and surrendering 870 rushing yards and 12 rushing TDs so far this season.
RB Braydon Bennett, Coastal Carolina – $5,500
I don’t think Bennett will be very owned on this slate and he makes a lot of sense to me in tournaments. App State has been putrid defending the run, checking in at 131st in EPA per rush and 125th in rushing success rate. The defensive line has been no help whatsoever, ranking dead last (133rd) in both line yards and stuff rates. Those metrics are simply not something that I can ignore and I’ll be well overweight on Bennett for this slate. They usually split carries up but the other backs have been banged up and no one else was a factor last game, and Bennett ran for over 100 yards as the lead back. He’s a good receiver and an explosive player as well.
RB Frank Peasant, MTSU – $5,800
RB Anwar Lewis, JacSt – $4,300
I’m fading JacSt’s Malik Jackson ($7,400) in most lineups. He’s still fine in cash as he’s been a monster, but I think that comes with the caveat that this team’s RB room has been very banged up and they’ve played a bunch of crap teams. Anwar Lewis is getting healthier and probably continues to eat into the workload, so he’s fine as a punt in GPP lineups. MTSU’s Frank Peasant is viable this week against a dreadful LA Tech defense ranking 112th in EPA per rush and 110th in rushing explosiveness. MTSU doesn’t run the ball a lot (119th in rush rate) and stinks when they do (123rd in rushing success rate) and they split carries as well, which usually makes Peasant unappealing but this matchup is so good that I actually think he’s viable.
WR Smoke Harris, LA Tech – $7,100
WR Cyrus Allen, LA Tech – $6,300
I’m not playing a lot of this LA Tech / MTSU game but will still have 1-2 players per lineup. MTSU only passes, but usually not well, which is a bad matchup for a LA Tech team with a great secondary (sixth in passing success rate) but an undersized front seven. That has me more so leaning toward LA Tech guys, and either of these two WRs is fine. Smoke has been a target hog and has 14 more targets than any other WR on the slate. They’re probably still playing with the backup QB who hasn’t shown me anything, so it’s hard to be too confident in playing him, but volume is volume. Cyrus Allen has burned me a few times but I still think he’s fine in GPPs on a short slate against an MTSU team ranking 103rd in EPA per pass and 92nd in passing success rate.
WR Kaedin Robinson, App State – $4,700
Robinson leads his team with 31 targets and has been pretty effective, so he’s priced too cheaply here and is a fine play. I find App State’s WRs infuriating to play (spread the ball, hard to predict which one will pop off) but Robinson should be more expensive as he’s gone for 15+ FPs in three of five games this year.
WR Jared Brown, Coastal Carolina – $5,700
Brown is fine in all formats. He’s fourth on this slate with 39 targets and is elite with the ball in his hands (8.3 yards after catch per reception, 12 MTFs).
WR CJ Daniels, Liberty – $5,500
WR Treon Sibley, Liberty – $5,200
Jacksonville State’s defense was just torched for 454 yards and 2 TDs through the air by a bad MTSU offense, so one would think Liberty’s passing attack can do some damage against this unit. It’s an odd carryover as MTSU attempts nothing but little short passes and yet still found explosive plays against this secondary whereas Liberty chucks it further downfield per attempt than any other team in the nation.
All Liberty does is throw the ball deep and both of these guys have an astronomical average yards per reception above 24. That makes them very hard to trust as they’ll be boom or bust every week, but they’re the two best guesses this week against a poor secondary. Daniels is the better play but it’s hard to believe he’ll pop off every week as he’s only averaging 5 targets per game, which is impossible to trust. Elijah Smoot ($4,100) has as many targets (17) as Sibley, which is embarrassingly low, but his aDOT is nine yards higher (23.1 to 14.1), so he’s viable in GPPs as well even though he’s been very ineffective. Keep in mind how small of a sample size we have.
