“You’ve found the Best Week 5 DFS Fantasy Football Lineup with These NFL All-Star Players!”
Week 5 is here and the schedule is getting all kinds of wacky. It’s the first week of byes and there’s a London game so the main slate this week only has 10 games (11 on FanDuel including the Sunday Night game). In short slate weeks like this, it can be helpful to analyze the teams not on the DFS schedule to get a sense of which positions may be lacking.
The Lions, Chargers, Eagles, and Titans are on bye, and the Buccaneers, Falcons, Jets, Vikings, Saints, and Chiefs are playing off-slate games. Immediately you can see the Running Back position is going to be short-handed this week. With no Jahmyr Gibbs, David Montgomery, Saquon Barkley, Bijan Robinson, Alvin Kamara, Breece Hall, or Aaron Jones (among others) filling up the top of the Running Back rankings, other, lesser players will be pulled up to fill that pricing vacuum.
That leaves you two options at the position: pay up for the high-priced players that actually deserve to be high-priced players, or try to go dumpster diving. I don’t love the cheap RB options this week, so my lineups will be heavily slanted toward the top of the ranks.
Top Week 5 DFS Fantasy Football Picks
Quarterback
Since I’m playing the top-priced Running Backs, I’m not going to be able to pay up at Quarterback, so I’m going to need a pay-down option. If I need to pay down, why not grab Geno Smith, the league leader in passing yards? Seattle gets the Giants at home this week. They will be at a significant rest disadvantage since the Seahawks played at Detroit on Monday Night and the Giants played last Thursday, but New York will still have to make the 2400-mile flight to the Pacific Northwest. Maybe the rest differential will allow the 6.5-point underdog Giants to hang around long enough that Seattle can’t just sit on Kenneth Walker III all game.
If you want to pay up a bit at Quarterback and betting on DraftKings, you can look at Jayden Daniels. Daniels is averaging double-digit carries for almost 55 rushing yards per game and has scored a rushing TD in 3 of his 4 games this year, giving him a substantial production floor. His $6800 DK price tag is 13.6% of your available salary vs. $8700 and 14.5% on FanDuel, making him a much more palatable option over there.
Running Back Week 4 DFS Fantasy Football
Putting my salary money where my mouth is, my top RB play this week is Jordan Mason. There’s a clear three-player top tier of RBs I want to pay up for this week in Mason, Derrick Henry, and Kyren Williams. Mason has the best combination of price point, matchup, and game script this week. Arizona’s run defense has turned into the debacle we expected coming into the year. They’ve given up 110 yards & 2 rushing TDs to James Cook and Josh Allen, 188 yards and a TD to David Montgomery and Jahmyr Gibbs, and 216 yards and 4 rushing TDs to the trio of Brian Robinson, Jeremy McNichols, and Jayden Daniels just last week. The Niners are 7.5-point home favorites this week, Mason should be a big part of getting them a big lead and salting it away in the second half.
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If you don’t want to go all the way to the top of the running back ladder, you can look at Josh Jacobs ($7000, 11.7% on FanDuel; $6400, 12.8% on DraftKings). The Rams have been equally bad against the run and the pass this year. The Packers passing game is going to be attractive to DFS players this week, so we can leverage that by leaning into Jacobs. The Packers are 3-point road favorites, so Jacobs should have a favorable game environment. There’s no way Matt LaFleur wants Jordan Love throwing anything close to the 54 times he did last week. I also like pairing Jacobs with a certain low-priced tight-end option we’ll be discussing in a bit (foreshadowing alert!).
My tournament punt running back play this week is Tyrone Tracy of the New York Giants. Devin Singletary looks unlikely to play and see above: Smith, Geno the Giants are heavy underdogs this week. Since Daniel Jones can’t throw the ball more than 10 yards downfield, Tracy should get a lot of dump-off volume in a negative game script.
Wide Receiver
Stef Diggs Revenge Game! Need I say more? OK, I’ll say more. Diggs has gotten 21 targets in the last two weeks and the Buffalo defense is all kinds of beat up. The Bills are really bad against the run. With Ed Oliver, Austin Johnson, and Taylor Rapp injured and Von Miller suspended they should be equal opportunity bad. Joe Mixon isn’t expected to play for the Texans. It’s unlikely they’ll try to establish the run with Cam freaking Akers. I expect they’ll open up the passing game so Diggs and Nico Collins ($8800, 14.7% FanDuel; $7700, 15.4% on DK) are both viable options.
My cheap option wide receiver this week is Josh Downs against Jacksonville. Downs knocked off the rust of his injury in Week 3 and put up an 8/82/1 line in Week 4. Both defenses are bad so I expect a lot of points and a positive passing game script in this matchup.
Tight End
You’ve been waiting for it and here it is! The Russell Erxleben Memorial Punt Play of the Week is Tucker Kraft of the Green Bay Packers. No one is putting up consistent tight end points, so we shouldn’t be paying up for production that isn’t there. Kraft’s price point of $5300 (8.8%) on FanDuel and a stunning $3500 (7%) on DraftKings make him a near must-start. I love (#analysis) pairing Kraft with Josh Jacobs since Jacobs doing well means Kraft is on the field for a ton of snaps. Kraft will be the highest-owned tight end on the slate this week. If you go for a high-priced tight end this week, they better go off or you’ll be losing the position. That’s reasonable in tournaments but you’re just making it hard on yourself in cash games.
Defense
Has anyone else noticed how well the Denver defense is playing? They’ve given up only 29 points total over the last three weeks. Each of those three opponents had their lowest game-scoring output against the Broncos. This week they get the Davante Adams-less Raiders at home. Ranking as the 11th ($4000 FanDuel) and 9th ($2900 DraftKings) highest-priced units make Denver my Defense of the Week.
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Thank you for reading Joel’s Best Week 5 DFS Fantasy Football Picks, and be sure to catch next week’s NFL All-Star Lineup next week! When Joel will line up another winning combination with expert insight and analysis. You can find and follow @theJoelWirth on the X for more of his great content!
