College Football DFS Archives - Page 14 of 31 - FTN (For The Numbers) - Fantasy Football, DVOA, Betting, DFS

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Week 1 of the college football season kicked off with a massive slate Thursday, and with the broken early season DFS pricing, scores were insanely high. Salaries will level off in a couple of weeks and we will be able to utilize our edge and find intelligent ways to find leverage. We have a five-game slate Friday on to dig through, so let’s dive right in.

Vegas Odds

Team	Odds	Team	Odds	Total
Miami (OH)	+575	Miami (FL)	-850 (-16.5)	45
CMU	+425	Michigan State	-575 (-14)	45
Louisville	-298	Georgia Tech	+240	49.5
Missouri State	+2000	Kansas	-6500 (-28.5)	58
Stanford	-148 (-3)	Hawaii	+124	55

Quarterbacks

Kansas QBs

Jalon Daniels is a gifted rushing QB who is as good as anyone at the position when healthy. He has a nagging back issue so there are serious concerns for me that he won’t play as much as usual once this turns into a blowout. As nearly 30-point favorites, the Jayhawks should be able to take care of business tonight. The goal for Lance Leipold is to get the win without any setbacks to Daniels. In nine games last year, he rushed for almost 500 yards while completing 66% of his passes for over 2,000 yards. He scored a total of 25 touchdowns (18 passing/7 rushing), so there is no doubt about him being the top play, if he is in fact healthy. Kansas has a capable backup in Jason Bean, a player that could have transferred to another school and been a guaranteed starter but decided to come back to Kansas knowing that Daniels was the guy. Bean started his career at North Texas where he played relatively well in the 2020 season before leaving that program for Kansas. He has eclipsed 1,000 passing yards in three straight seasons despite not being the full-time starter, which isn’t the easiest thing to accomplish. He threw for 14 touchdowns last year while rushing for 222 yards/4 TDs. Bean isn’t as electric as Daniels when it comes to rushing ability, but he can certainly hold his own in that aspect of the game. He has over 1,000 career rushing yards in fact. If Bean were to get the start prior to lock, he is an easy play at $5k and can be considered an intriguing GPP option, even if Daniels plays.

Brayden Schager, Hawaii ($7.9k)

The return to the “run and shoot” offense by coach Timmy Chang is going to lead to ridiculously fun games for Hawaii and the DFS community should rejoice. I do have to walk back my comments about Schager and my lack of confidence in him though. He threw for 351 yards and 3 touchdowns against Vanderbilt in a game that ended up being far more competitive than the sportsbooks expected. One thing to recognize is the fact that Tylan Hines had severe cramping and dehydration, which caused him to miss large chunks of the game. This is why he didn’t pan out and also likely led to Schager having to carry the game with his arm. However, even with Hines expected back and in good health today, the Hawaii signal caller will be tasked with chucking the football all over the field and there probably won’t be very many games in which he doesn’t attempt 30-plus passes. Schager chalk still worries me a bit but I’ll have plenty of exposure on a smaller slate like this.

Jack Plummer, Louisville ($7.3k)

Jack Plummer’s familiarity with new head coach Jeff Brohm’s system from their time together at Purdue has served the graduate transfer well throughout camp. Plummer has been a standout performer in practice and will now be running the offense that made Aidan O’Connell such a reliable fantasy option. Most people don’t even realize that Plummer had an above average year, statistically speaking while on a bad Cal team. He threw for 3,100 yards and 21 touchdowns while limiting his turnovers for the most part. This Louisville offense has legitimate weapons as well, so I like Plummer’s chances of being a consistent DFS target all season long.

Additional QB Options

Tyler Van Dyke
Bert Emanuel (splitting reps but upside is through the roof)
Haynes King

Running Backs

EJ Smith, Stanford ($5.7k)

The spawn of the legendary running back Emmitt Smith started hot in 2022, racking up over 200 and 4 total touchdowns in just two games. Unfortunately, he went down with a serious injury which cost him what was likely going to be a monster season. He appears to be fully healthy coming into 2023, and DK is being extremely conservative with his salary so I’m predicting him to be one of the most-rostered players on the slate at $5.7k. Hawaii held the Vandy rushing attack in check mostly last week but that has more to do with the fact that AJ Swann was moving the ball up and down the field with his crisp passing. Hopefully, the rest of the industry is somewhat hesitant to go all in on Smith coming off the injury but that is probably wishful thinking on my part. Smith’s pass-catching ability will be on full display tonight as well after catching 8 balls for 63 yards in his two appearances last year.

Tylan Hines, Hawaii ($5.4k)

As mentioned above, Hines missed part of the game against Vandy due to cramping. His bust hurt a lot of people as he was on 50% of rosters in week 0. This typically leads to far less rostership the following week and some people won’t even realize why he didn’t produce against Vandy. I’ll remind you that the RB1 in the Hawaii offense has been lethal for fantasy purposes and Hines is in a great spot to bounce back against a Stanford defense that gave up a whopping 220 yards per game on the ground in 2022.

Additional RB Options

Henry Parrish
Jacardia Wright
Casey Filkins
Nathan Carter
Dontae Smith
Daniel Hishaw
Devin Neal

Wide Receivers

Hawaii WRs

I need to make it clear that the run-and-shoot offense can lead to a ton of variance when it comes to who catches the touchdowns but this doesn’t mean we should completely shy away from exposure either. Kansas transfer Steven McBride had a big debut for Hawaii, catching 7 passes for 98 yards and 2 touchdowns. He had been turning heads during practice and he is clearly building rapport with Schager. Pofele Ashlock was magnificent as well, producing a stat line of 7-127-1. Alex Perry (4-51-0) and Greyson Morgan (5-33-0) also have viability in this deep receiver room.

Jamari Thrash, Louisville ($6.7k)

The Georgia State transfer is expected to be the alpha for Louisville, but he isn’t the only weapon in the receiver room. Ahmari Huggins-Bruce, Jimmy Callloway and Jamari Johnson are a formidable group of pass-catchers that will benefit from being in this offense with Plummer at the wheel. However, Thrash is coming off a season in which he caught 61 passes for 1,110 yards and 7 touchdowns, which is why he is even getting this opportunity with the Cards. We have seen ridiculous production out Jeff Brohm-coached receivers over the years and the upside Thrash has in this offense is limitless.

Additional WR Options

Tre Mosely (“the guy” now)
Colbie Young
Benjamin Yurosek
Kansas WRs
John Humphreys

Core

Brayden Schager
EJ Smith
Jamari Thrash

PrizePicks Plays

EJ Smith OVER 57.5 Rushing Yards (slamming the over on sportsbooks as well)
Jack Plummer OVER 19.5 Fantasy Points