NFL Week 7 Odds, Analysis, Sims and Showdown Data for Draftkings GPP Oct 2025

This is the 7th week of the season already. Now almost every site has data to work with, and most don't really know what to do with it. This writeup will showcase some of the most unique angles you can find for your builds, to set you apart from the field. I know this because I built everything you will see below, with the intention of murdering a milli maker some day. The goal isn't to be 100% contrarian in NFL. As mentioned, we all have data; free or paid, deep or shallow. Some obvious items are obvious for a reason and I will let the public do its thing. I intend to rely on the public for 1-2 RBs and 1 WR as a starting point. While there could be more chalky pieces, I believe that embracing that much every week will prevent you from jumping over the moon and falling off a cliff.

As usual, I am starting the week with repeatable charts up top and will continue to grow the page with insights at the bottom - or on an X thread, so follow both! And drop a like or a buck in my  Venmo if this stuff is helpful for you.

Weeklong Ceilings vs Salary

I don't usually play this slate, and quite frankly, ownership is too fresh to really trust. However it is nice to get an idea of who is popping above the line with high and low ownership. Those are the value plays in the eyes of a tournament. CMC lives there every week no matter his price. Next level up are usually Puka and QBs but we saw what happened to Puka - that leaves Mahomes, Trevor and J Taylor as the elite class. On the cheap end it is important too for value. Lil Jordan Humphrey did make a random appearance the other day and now finds himself as a top value for his price.

Vegas Lines vs My Lines

For now, these are my lines but they may change as they feel like they are a bit low for most home teams. They are automated lines based on some algorithm I put together years ago. I did some tinkering with this logic during the week, because I do think we should use a top down approach to DFS builds. Vegas odds to drive the games we target and try to stick to players who can score in those games. But not just targetting the games Vegas gets right. Infusing other games that could go off into the mix. Right now I align with the lines on Detroit vs Tampa on the main slate. Crazy enough, NY Jets vs Carolina might go over its Vegas total too per this view. I don't know if I truly believe that as Carolina defense has been better and the Jets offense has been worse, putting up -11 yards of passing offense last week. Let's circle back on that when we have to.

Offensive Lines vs Defensive Lines Matchup Chart

Blocking up front can dictate how the game ends up playing out from the start. If a team can't protect their QB, they might bring in extra blockers. If they have success running the ball, I think most teams prefer to keep running over passing it, if it is working.

Then there are cases where the QB scrambles and still performs well (Jayden sometimes, Hurts sometimes). Or cases where the RB is so good it doesnt matter if they have blockers as they make plays (Bijan, Achane, etc). So this is not the end all be all, but it can help tie break several cases.

Defense vs Receivers

The reliable piece to this chart is the far left table, showing the receiver who typically finds success the most often in the offense. The names may not be as accurate with injuries and slot vs outside WRs mixing things up. However it is worth considering players in good spots as a result of this chart. New England gets Tennessee this week, which I have Diggs in the WR1 spot (like last week). Boutte ended up going off as a top WR last week, not Diggs, so that is a decision point there.

For tonight, WR1 vs Pittsburg is quite the weak spot which means JaMarr Chase is going to be a target piece to consider. He also went off last Sunday so will he do it twice or does Higgins get that matchup instead?

Pittsburg will have more opportunity with passing to the RB, TE, or WR3 type WRs, but DK Metcalf is a playmaker so hes not one to avoid unless he is the chalk.

Game Flow

A big picture view of the games to be played and what part of the offense is beneficial based on the defense. I sorted by the highest paced games (which means more plays), although that doesnt always equate to more points. I see the lowest paced game goes to the highest projecting teams.

Early Projections

This is how things landed for me early on. The Eagles are looking like my pick for defense on the week, but the Steelers might be interesting for Thursday night as well. Flacco is a wild card to this offense since he just got here like a week ago. He has experience in that division already and is an upgrade to the team, which means its not the same slam dunk as previous weeks.

Cin vs Pit Simulation Results

As of the pulling of this data, I believe Cincinatti was a home dog of -4.5, meaning we fully expect the public to chase Pittsburg players. That will leave a bit of leverage on the Cincinatti side. The ecency bias will likely boost JaMarr Chase up a bit higher in ownership but from what I see here, he might end up being a viable captain play regardless, being in a good spot and in the game script that favors passing. I also may have some interest in Jonnu Smith as well as a captain play tonight, granted this is before I have peeked at my standard views. Aaron Rodgers is projected to have decent pass protection so he may just air it out to somebody with success.

Toxic Pairs vs Elite Pairings

Getting one player right isn't nearly enough to win anything in DFS. Getting at least 2 right or wrong can put you on the path though. So the first listing is the pairs of players that seemed to fail in the sims the most often for me, while the 2nd pairings had the most success in making the top lineups together. I also want to note that whether or not I do Cinci or Pitt stacks, I am more likely to play 4-2 team stacks tonight in some capacity.

************TNF**********

And now we can clearly see that the upside for Chase is top of the chart, making him a must play for me in some ways, but he is also the top salary and ownership, meaning he may not be the captain play that I stick with. Jaylen Warren is up top as well in the positive Vegas game script, while Rodgers and Metcalf sorta shrink in the value department. The bottom left corner shows several value plays possible. With the lockdown on WR2, maybe Iosivas is viable, or Darnell Washington as well.

WR and TE Scores/ Redzone Report

Normally I would filter to the most likely plays to score a touchdown but with the injuries to Cincinatti at TE, I wanted to get a big picture view of who is who. Per my scoring system, DK Metcalf ranks the top in my scoring system followed by Chase, but Tee Higgins isnt far behind. None of the TE on this slate stand out actually. So not sure I will prioritize any after all.

Pittsburg Stacks

The top leverage play in Pittsburg appears to be either Rodgers or Warren, who has quite the points left on the table. If playing with the Vegas expectations and projections, Metcalf actually has the highest projection on my end on this slate and maybe is the leverge point to Chase ownership. The Steelers defense is viable in the flex for leverage as well, and so my primary build may be a 4-2 Steelers stack, although Warren or DK is the decision point as to a correlated lineup play. They all project well otherwise. Deep dart Connor Heyward might make more of the top plays fit if you want to try that route too.

Cincinatti Stacks

It appears that Chase is not quite leverage at captain but Flacco is, since Chase is the highest owned captain on the slate. You could potentially get single digit ownership on Flacco today. Noah Fant is showing as the top leverage in the flex spot for Cincinatti right now, which if taking Flacco, you likely want 2 pass catchers in the flex (Chase or Higgins or both, or Fant instead of Higgins). Iosivas and Sample are deeper flex leverage if you really want to get weird but it is kinda thin looking.

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------------------------Quick Showdown Recap-------------------------------

^^ Seems having Flacco + Chase was optimal, but Kicker was the leverage there, in addition to Pat at captain which I played 0. Looking back, he was one of 4 TEs who I projected upwards and also high leverage on my end. So I decided to back check my sims, by running 50,000 sims on my own projections. Seems I would have recommended him that way, although i would have overprojected Metcalf's ownership in the process.

Ill try to do 50,000 sims for the main slate as well, which is coming up Saturday.

*********************************Main slate********************************

Ceiling Finder

Looking for opportunity across the slate as a whole with this scatterplot, in hopes of finding a good ceiling for the money. Mahomes is the top usage player on the slate, playing at home in KC vs the division rivals (Raiders). He gets his top WR back and early podcast has spoken him up to be potentially chalk after missing a year of football. Therefore I assume the top owned stack of the week is Mahomes to Rice. I see two RBs atop of the list who put up monster points and usage last week. They are all possible to build around if punting TE/DST and maybe a WR spot, which Lil Jordan Humphrey appears to be 3100 and getting decent usage after 1 week. Jayden Daniels appears to be the chalk this week even over Mahomes due to the favorable matchup with Dallas, but I am not quite convinced just yet that I need to play a 20% owned QB to win a gpp.

Projections

These plays all project well in my system this week. Some of which may project higher due to last week's performance, but I'll throw caution out- that Pickens for example, will have some share removed due to Ceedee Lamb coming back in his WR1 position. I also see Justin Jefferson and Chris Olave showing up with good WR scores. At QB I sorta like the idea of Dak at home vs Washington is on the list at half the ownership of Jayden and Mahomes, in what we think is the highest scoring game of the week. He projects just as well as Jayden and having his top WR project well too helps (note; Ceedee should be in that spot). Jake Ferguson also projecting well for sub 3% ownership, so a double stack may be viable here. Biggest surprise in the projections will be the Panthers DST. I dont think they did well last time they made my list but I may give them another shot.

Summary (updated)

I told myself that I would try and do more of a top down approach to finding plays using the summary page, starting with the Vegas odds. There are only 3 games this week that project over th 26 pt target I set up, with Indianapolis coming in at 25, and New England at 24. I also reworked my Vegas lines a bit which might be a reason I have less teams showing so I am potentially going to update this target for future games. Nonethless, I assume that the teams projected to score the most will run the ball if the opportunity presents itself. Washington is facing one of the worst run defenses this week with a mobile QB as well that is projecting as one of the higher usage QBs in his offense. Mahomes also has the same thing going for him, although the run defense isn't quite as bad, yet I think this game could allow for more run carries to Hunt/Pacheco if they get ahead and play with a lead as expectations hint at. Chicago also facing an easier run defence, but also in position to throw the ball with success. Maybe a week where QB + RB could work with any one of them. Jacory Croskey-Merritt just put up 31 DKP 2 weeks ago, but also lost 2 fumbles in the last 2 weeks. That uncertainty makes me want to play him

QBs

Breaking down how things are shaping up, my quick Sim recommends something around the 5700 range for QBs - which I give or take 300ish salary. That gives me Caleb WIlliams, and then 4 QBs in sub 5% ownership (Bryce Young, Bo Nix, Justin Fields, and Daniel Jones. As I think about their situations, maybe Bryce Young is ideal since he has a WR in my top 5 projections, but if playing Carolina defense it is because I don't expect the game to shoot out, although him and Fields face each other from the list.

RBs

Ok so RB is the position in which I think its wisest to watch the chalk and work with it. In this case I do see strong reason to take Quinson Jenkins as chalky as he might be. Facing the worst defense and scores well in my algorithm for RB selection. The sims also think the average spend on RB is in payup territory so I wont fight it when hes right on the number. A second RB of interest for me could end up being Javonte as a chalk too. We do need a RB to get around 24 points this week and so if Dallas can somehow operate from a lead theres a chance. Since I know you didnt come here just to hear about how I'm eating chalk, I will mention the other two GPP oriented plays of interest: 1st will be Isaiah Pacheco (or Kareem Hunt), with the idea in mind that the Chiefs will use the RB vs the Raiders in a high scoring matchup. The other? Zonovan Knight from Arizona. My algorithm says that AZ is going to be in position to run a touchdown in, and hes cheap - so I am playing him for the first time this week.

WRs

WR productivity is typically a product of QB play + game environment, so understanding which games are going to allow for these ceiling performances is critical. Starting with the high scoring games and teams, Deebo is out, which really only leaves a few noteable options left. Rice is likely the chalkiest of those in these games, yet he now shares the field with 3-4 capable WRs, so I dont know that i get there. Ceedee is the potential highest owned WR in one of the high scoring games, but I noticed that Pickens as WR2 is in a better position than Ceedee to put up points. Meanwhile you can get Xavier Worthy for under 10% and DJ Moore for under 5% ownership from popular QBs. The second list is the WRs that all have a good score for their situation. Justin Jefferson and Chris Olave appear to have the higher scores of the top projected.

TEs

The TE spot this week actually has lots of higher scores on their situations than usual. I could actually see a world where double TE wins this week in order to fit more higher upside pieces based on payup requirements in QB and RB as is. Trey McBride is the most popular play and he scores well for me as well. Very close in scoring is Hunter Henry and TJ Hockenson, which could make for an interesting stack piece. The sims are saying to average around 3100 in salary for TE, which leads to the Saints TEs, Mason Taylor and - Hockenson shows here too.

Stacks

Last week, this view had a 50% success rate, which mean that the player combinations scored 20+ points or more each. This week only two stacks showed a stack score over 40 but I'm still showing the top 5 stacks per the defense. In the chicago case, Id be somewhat interested in swapping Odunze for DJ Moore for a real GPP dart. Cmet has a floor of 0 as well which is on display every time I play him. I think that Cleveland stack is the most interesting there, with the Njoku out. Waddle as a run back is even possible with it.

Sim Results (experimental)

I took two separate projection sources this week - stokastic vs my own and ran them through my sims to see if there is overlap or not. I will say the stokastic projections push me a bit more towards Philly vs Min, with Carson Wentz stacks, while my projections seem to favor a Tua build with Waddle. I am likely to add a Wentz since JJ is in my top projections with him, and because both Hockenson and Devonta Smith both score well on my items as well.

Top Owned Lineup

What can we learn from this? 3 RB builds, Pay up at QB and RB and then punting at WR is looking like what most are going to do this week. I think 2-3 pieces of chalk are ideal, and if I'm doing that, Judkins, Olave, Trey or Javonte Williams are my top 4. Whether or not we keep the 3 RB build or not is still questionable to me, because if you wish to pay up for WR, it will require an additional punt play and TE has the cheapest position for it. Several high priced WRs are in good spots this week with their QBs.

Pivots and Leverage Spots

Based on ownership projected, the top owned plays on the table on the left, as well as the top owned games on the top, next to the teams with the most leverage showing. Going through a couple, its important to understand why someone is chalk to detemine if its good chalk or not. Ill list the chalk reason, reason to fade and pivot options below for all these guys.

Ceedee - Why is he chalk? He's a target hog when hes on the field, in a high total game. Why fade? First game off injury, tough matchup in DVOA. Pivot? - If Ceedee fails, it is because Pickens who has a great matchup likely stole tds, or Javonte Williams rushed touchdowns or even Jake Ferguson in the redzone.

Rashee - Chalk because of his workload last year vs his current price against a bad team. Why fade? We dont know his workload in his first game with 3-4 viable receivers with him now. Pivot? - I think the run game is interesting in KC in a game script that favors running the ball. Worthy and Kelce are also viable for big scores or absorbing touchdowns and targets.

Breece - Chalk with Wilson out and theres like no one left to move the ball. Why fade? Carolina defense projects high for me. If Fields turns it over for pts, less opportunity for Breece.

Quinshon - Chalk with Njoku/Tillman out, facing a bad run defense. Why fade? Bad weather could help stall drives and limit opportunity. Pivots? Achane on the other end, or passing game with Fannin/Jeudy/Waddle all projecting well if the weather holds up.

JT - Chalk workhorse and consistency over the past 6 weeks, Fade if you think this game turns into a shootout or Daniel Jones QB sneak touchdowns come back. Pivot: Daniel Jones/Tyler Warren absorb the touchdowns.