We have reached the second-to-last week of the 2017 regular season and, as a result, are about to see a handful of ‘last-ditch efforts.’ The Browns are looking to avoid a winless season, while the Cowboys and Seahawks are trying to stave off elimination for another week. These storylines centered around the ‘must-win’ nature of some games lead to a rather predictable set of game flow expectations.
Sporfolio’s NFL Daily Fantasy Sports game-by-game analysis columns are driven by expected game flow. Based on a combination of our Week 16 NFL picks against the spread and our expectations for a given game, we project the actions necessary to make these picks come to fruition. We aim to pinpoint players integral to our predicted game flow for each game of the week.
Luke May is our resident NFL DFS expert, and Mario Mergola operates Sporfolio as our expert for NFL Picks Against the Spread.
Miami Dolphins at Kansas City Chiefs
Luke’s DFS Take: The Kansas City Chiefs have regained their position atop the division thanks a big victory over the Chargers last week. The Dolphins fell hard back to reality last week after their big upset win against the Patriots two weeks ago. Kareem Hunt is back in fantasy players’ good graces after two consecutive strong showings. He is proving to be quite the streaky runner, and I would buy into the current hot streak against these Dolphins. They rank 26th in terms of fantasy points allowed to running backs, so Hunt should be able to keep up his strong play of late. Kenyan Drake put together another solid outing last week, but his price has now risen to a point that may be too high to justify. That is especially true when you consider the matchup: the Chiefs rank 6th in fantasy points against running backs and 32nd against wide receivers. Any of Jarvis Landry, Devante Parker,and Kenny Stills should be able to break free in this game and make some big plays.
Mario’s DFS Take: It is a little naive to jump right back onto the Chiefs’ bandwagon after back-to-back wins, but we can also be fair to ourselves and acknowledge that Kansas City’s offense is going to need to maintain a high level of play to both win in January and clinch the division title in the coming weeks. It has to take advantage of Miami on Sunday, as the Dolphins are below average in nearly every important defensive statistic. With that, a late Chiefs lead would push Kareem Hunt back into the spotlight and, after returning to his early-season form, we can use the talented rookie with confidence. It’s never a bad idea to use Travis Kelce – the team leader in targets, receptions, and receiving touchdowns – and we can also use Kansas City’s defense against a horrible, turnover-prone Dolphins offense.