NFL DFS FanDuel Week 3 - Projections vs Cost

Consensus figures were generated by first scraping raw projections from the following publicly available sources:

• CBS
• ESPN
• FantasyPros
• Fantasy Sharks
• Fox
• numberFire
• Yahoo

For each source, raw projections were converted to fantasy points using FanDuel's scoring system. Consensus projections were then calculated by simply taking the average of the individual sources. Projections that combine multiple sources have been shown to be more accurate than any single source by itself, consistent with the wisdom of the crowd.

The blue line is the linear regression line (or line of best-fit) for projected points vs. FanDuel cost. Just a simple model for gauging the relationship between a player's fantasy point total from his salary. For example, in week 3, we expect a QB who costs $7500 to score about 17.5 fantasy points.

The shaded area is the 95% confidence interval for predicted values from this linear regression model. So, for example, we expect with 95% confidence that a QB costing $7500 should score somewhere between 17 and 18 fantasy points. The more scatter, the less confident we are in the relationship between projected points and cost.

The line helps to visually distinguish between players who are undervalued and those who are overvalued. Players who fall outside of the shaded area are considered to be statistically significant outliers. For example, this week Tannehill is significantly undervalued while Dalton is significantly overvalued. Roethlisberger is appropriately valued since his dot falls right on the regression line.

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One glaring projection set that we noticed was Fox Sports.  They have Cam Newton at just 17 points.  Every other site had him over 21 points, with FantasySharks at 25!  On the flip side, they love Ryan Tannehill more than the other sites at 21 points, while numberFire has him below 18. despite a poor start to the season, and an eight game stretch where Blaine Gabbert has been better, Aaron Rodgers is the only QB projected to score 20+ points across the board.

With so many injuries to running backs in week 2, it makes sense that few RBs are projected to score at least 15 points in week 3.  DeAngelo Williams seems like the safest play, but is projected to score anywhere from 15 points (CBS) to 21 points (FantasySharks).  FantasySharks gave Williams the highest projection, but David Johnson the lowest of the seven sites at 14.  All of the other sites had him at 16.5-17.7.  Matt Forte and Ezekiel Elliot are the only other RBs projected to score at least 12 points across the board.

Yahoo does not like Odell Beckham matching up with Josh Norman, giving him the only projection below 15 points.  Alshon Jeffery (10.77 CBS) and Allen Robinson (10.9 FantasySharks) had the lowest projections among the top 10 projected receivers.  numberFire is high on Larry Fitzgerald and A.J. Green, but all the other sites project a more modest day for the veteran receivers.  Kelvin Benjamin is the only receiver outside of the top 10 projected to score 15 points, thanks to FantasySharks.

Jordan Reed's 15 points projection via FantasySharks makes him the only tight end projected to score more than 12.68 points across seven sites!  He is also the only TE projected to score 10+ points by all sites.  Greg Olsen just missed that cut thanks to Fox Sports projecting him at 9.5 points.  Delanie Walker was the only other TE with a 12 point projection (CBS, numberFire) but also was projected to score less than 8 by FantasySharks.