FanDuel NFL picks, Week 4: Best DFS fantasy football lineup
FanDuel NFL picks and advice for Week 4 of the 2021 NFL season to help you build the perfect DFS fantasy football lineup.
Welcome back to another weekly installment of FanDuel daily fantasy football advice, this time for Week 4 of the NFL season. After a profitable Week 1 and Week 2, Justin Fields single-handedly stunted our streak of profit. While there were still plenty of strong plays discussed in the article, Fields putting up one of the saddest quarterback performances you will ever see was very hard to overcome.
As always, it is important to not only focus on the outcome of your week but to learn lessons based on your successes and mistakes. At the time of writing last week’s article, Dalvin Cook’s status was still up in the air.
However, by the time Sunday rolled around Cook was ruled out, making Alexander Mattison at $5,200 one of the best plays of the week. I personally played Mattison in as many of my lineups as possible, which unknowingly allowed me to dodge Justin Field’s performance in a few lineups. If you set your lineup early and do not keep up with player news, you are putting yourself at an extreme disadvantage in DFS.
Looking ahead to Week 4, players from the Cincinnati Bengals, Jacksonville Jaguars, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, New England Patriots, Los Angeles Chargers, and Las Vegas Raiders will all be unavailable on the main slate this week.
When talking about players I will reference the salaries and salary cap of a typical FanDuel tournament. I will also show a complete sample lineup, which consists of nine positions: QB, RB, RB, WR, WR, WR, TE, FLEX, and DEF. Note that your individual strategy should change based on the type of contests you enter, though I will reference different strategies for both cash and tournament formats.
Without further ado, here are picks and advice for every position for Week 4 of the NFL season!
FanDuel Week 4 picks and lineup advice: Quarterback
As always, Patrick Mahomes ($8,700) and Josh Allen ($8,500) are the two premier plays at the quarterback position this week. The Eagles defense has looked highly questionable so far and I do not see the Chiefs dropping the third game in a row, so expect the Chiefs to have a solid game plan in this game.
Josh Allen also seems to have gotten over his slump from the start of the season and now sees himself as a 17-point favorite in a matchup against the Texans. Since Buffalo has shown their unwillingness to run the ball even when playing with a lead, Allen could be in for a huge day.
There are not that many middle-priced options that I like this week, but there are a few exceptions. Matthew Stafford ($7,800) is clearly at home on the Rams and gets a matchup with an Arizona defense that I believe is slightly fraudulent.
Dak Prescott ($7,700) is unquestionably playing like one of the best quarterbacks in the league and even though he has a tough matchup with the Carolina Panthers, they are missing Jaycee Horn and have yet to face an offense with the receiving threats of the Cowboys.
However, if you do not end up going with Mahomes or Allen, I would much rather save up and play an even cheaper option at quarterback. Sam Darnold ($7,200) should be forced to throw without McCaffrey in the backfield and gets to go against a weak Dallas defense. He has shown signs of being a much more competent passer in Carolina than he was in New York and should be able to pay off his salary with ease.
Finally, Zach Wilson ($6,400) gets his first soft matchup of the year against the Titans. While it certainly takes some guts to throw Wilson out there after his abysmal start to the year, he could be a difference-maker in a tournament lineup if he can throw for 300 yards and two touchdowns.