Underdog Battle Royale: Week 7 Plays

The fantasy football world has already gotten a taste of Underdog Fantasy’s amazing interface in best ball drafts, with this year’s Best Ball Mania awarding $15,000,000 in prizes, but believe it or not, for a few years now, they’ve also offered a “Battle Royale” mode, which is a draft format, solely based on the Sunday afternoon games. In the Daily Battle Royale mode, you’re entered in a draft with five other players, drafting a lineup that will compete against every other lineup signed up in the Battle Royale. This week’s main Battle Royale contests are going to have a $300,000 prize pool with $30,000 offered for first place, which is not too shabby for a $5 entry.

Here are some details on the Week 7 contest:

Now that we’re ready to build some lineups, there are three important rules to apply in every single lineup that you’re drafting. 

1. Make sure to have some sort of stack in your lineup – It doesn’t necessarily need to be a full game stack, but with only six QB’s selected in each draft, there should be a way for you to get the QB you need in your stack. If you start your draft with WR, WR through the first two rounds, 99% of the time, you’ll have the ability to pair one of them up with a QB in the third round. More often than not though, you’ll even be able to wait until later in the draft to put together a QB/WR combo. While you might not put together a QB/WR combo, you might be able to pair your QB with an opposing RB or WR, or maybe a WR with an opposing WR. There’s a lot of different ways to get some correlation, so keep it in the back of your mind when you’re making selections. 
2. Pay attention to your competition – If you don’t have the ability to give 100% attention to your draft, including the five other teams drafting in your lobby, don’t enter the contest. You can make or break your drafts just by keeping an eye on the positions the others are drafting. Every single draft will have a scenario that requires you to put the pieces of the puzzle together. For example: if you’re in the fifth round, drafting in fifth position, and still need to draft a QB, but see that the person drafting sixth has already drafted a QB, you definitely want to avoid picking your QB until the sixth round because there’s no way the person drafting sixth can pick a QB.
3. Be creative with at least one of your picks – When it’s all said and done, there are only going to be 36 players (6 QBs and 30 RB/WR/TEs) drafted in any given slate. rostership is integral in every single GPP contest in DFS, and that includes these Battle Royales. It probably comes as no surprise that the top 36 players in ADP dominate the rostership. It doesn’t take much to differentiate your lineup, and you’re still going to be able to draft some pretty damn good players who have an ADP outside the top 36. With that said, I’ve looked over the results of the last three Battle Royales and there have been some winning lineups that haven’t been too unique, but more often than not, the way to go is to be a little different than the field.

Week 7 Battle Royale Strategy

Here is the current top 36 in ADP for Week 7’s Battle Royale:

Top Pairings

Justin Herbert and Keenan Allen, Los Angeles Chargers

The Chargers’ top connection of Justin Herbert and Keenan Allen should be easily obtained if you’re drafting toward the end of the first round. While Austin Ekeler is being drafted ahead of Allen, I think Allen is absolutely the player you want to draft if you want the Chargers stack. The Chiefs are one of the NFL’s best teams against the run and we’ve noticeably seen less usage this season from all of the Chargers running backs. Yes, you can also consider Joshua Palmer, who has seemingly taken over Mike Williams’ target share with Williams out for the season, but Allen is nearly automatic against the Chiefs. He has seen at least 10 targets and 6 catches in five of his last six meetings against his division rivals and four of those five performances included a touchdown. 

Baker Mayfield and Mike Evans, Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Mike Evans is coming off a rough performance against the Lions that could have been easily another monster game if it wasn’t for a tipped pass when he was wide open for a 80-plus-yard touchdown. Baker Mayfield struggled to connect on multiple deep passes to Evans and Trey Palmer but should be in a good position to rebound against a Falcons team that have historically struggled to contain Evans when healthy. Baker hasn’t been shy about airing out the football when the opportunity has been given to him, and the Falcons are a team that have struggled containing the deep ball throughout the season. 

Jared Goff and Amon-Ra St. Brown, Detroit Lions

Amon-Ra St. Brown is still getting the majority of his snaps from the slot, and that’s the real area of opportunity when it comes to targeting against the Ravens this season. Arthur Maulet gets 100% of the snaps against the slot and while he does get the job done more often than not, he’s 30 years old and is going to have his hands full against ARSB, who is one of the best route runners in the league. It’s amazing how we’re finally seeing Jared Goff as a top-six QB in these Battle Royale drafts, and he’s actually getting a terrible matchup against the Ravens. With that said, the Lions are still going to need to air the ball out more than they probably want to, considering their top four running backs on their depth chart (David Montgomery, Jahmyr Gibbs, Craig Reynolds, Zonovan Knight) are all injured, with only Gibbs and Reynolds in position to potential dress and get snaps on Sunday.

Top Low-Rostered Plays 

Baker Mayfield, QB, Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Baker Mayfield is being drafted as the QB10 in the Battle Royale this week. Even after a down week against the Lions, we need to understand that Mayfield is in a situation where he’s more than capable of putting GPP-winning numbers in that Tampa Bay uniform. He absolutely did that a few weeks ago against the Saints and I think this matchup against the Falcons is a matchup that could set him up for redemption. Again, I prefer it if you pair him with Mike Evans, but I don’t necessarily hate it if you’re the last person to draft a QB and don’t have much else to choose from. 

Jerome Ford, RB, Cleveland Browns

Jerome Ford is being drafted as the RB11 in the Battle Royale this week. While Ford is losing a lot of carries to Kareem Hunt, he’s still undoubtedly the lead back and getting the majority of touches (19-15 last week against the 49ers). The Browns are facing a Colts team that has had a tough time against the run this season. They’ve allowed a total of seven rushing touchdowns, tied for the third most in the NFL. With Deshaun Watson likely out another week, it’s hard to imagine a world where the Browns don’t depend on their ground game, in a much more favorable matchup than they had last week. 

Jakobi Meyers, WR, Las Vegas Raiders

Jakobi Meyers is being drafted as the WR19 in the Battle Royale this week. He was able to continue his stellar 2023 season last week, bringing in five catches for 61 yards and a touchdown, which once again was a better performance than Davante Adams, yet Adams is being drafted as the WR5 while Meyers is the WR19. You could argue that most of his success has been with Jimmy Garoppolo at QB, but with Adams not at 100% health, I think Meyers is likely going to continue to see the majority of targets regardless of if it’s Brian Hoyer or Aidan O’Connell at QB.

Romeo Doubs, WR, Green Bay Packers

Romeo Doubs is being drafted as the WR25 in the Battle Royale this week. I’ve been picking on Damarri Mathis of the Broncos all season long (long before he went viral for not hitting Patrick Mahomes), and I’m not stopping this week with the Packers coming off a bye and plenty of preparation for this dumpster fire of a Broncos team. The Broncos like to shadow WR, and I see Pat Surtain shadowing Christian Watson throughout the game. That potentially leaves Doubs to matchup against Mathis and a great situation considering he has been Jordan Love’s favorite target for most of the season. 

Pat Freiermuth, TE, Pittsburgh Steelers

Pat Freiermuth is being drafted as the TE7 in the Battle Royale this week. Freiermuth gets an interesting matchup coming off a bye against a Rams team that has allowed the third-most fantasy points to the TE position this season. His lack of consistent volume from Kenny Pickett is frustrating, but the choices at TE this week are extremely slim outside of the big three of Travis Kelce, Mark Andrews and Sam LaPorta, and even worse when you go outside of the top six. I’m going to end up taking plenty of Luke Musgrave whenever possible in order to avoid a situation where I am stuck choosing between Kyle Pitts and Freiermuth.