FFPC— Learnings From 2019
If you are a fan of the NFL, DFS, Fantasy Football or any combination of the three I recommend entering into the Footballguys Playoff Challenge through FFPC.
The FFPC playoff challenge format is very simple — You build a team with 12 players — 1 QB, 2RB, 2WR, 1TE, 4 FLEX (RB, WR, TE), 1K, and 1 DEF — The catch: You can only pick one player per NFL team.
The format is very unique because in order to construct a team that can place in the top 15% you need to have a view on how the playoffs will shake out. The primary reason for this is because as the playoffs roll on your players accumulate points and at most an entry will only have 2 players play in the Super Bowl (1 from each team). This is extremely important because points in the Super Bowl are doubled which in a tournament of 12,500 entries is where lineups either make it or break.
As a first time FFPC player this year submitting a single entry (for kicks) I thought it would be a worthwhile exercise to see what I could learn from the rosters and results from the 2019 FFPC contest.
Quick note: The original dataset was obtained through fantasymojo.com
2019–2020 NFL Playoff Results for Reference
Winning Lineups
Above is a snapshot of the original dataframe we worked with showing the 3 highest scoring lineup. Looking at these we notice a couple things right away.
- They all had the same two players from the Super Bowl — Patrick Mahomes + Raheem Mostert (this is true for the Top 10 as well)
- They all had 3+ RBs (9/10 in Top 10)
- PK + DEF eliminated in first two rounds
This is why it is important for us to have a view on how the playoffs will play-out, especially given that we plan on only having a single entry. In order to make sure we have the two highest scoring players in the Super Bowl we ideally will have A) a view on which teams will make it and B) be able to pick the best player from each team to perform well in that particular matchup.
Additionally, we need to burn our lower scoring positions (DEF and PK) on teams we do not think will go far (unless we predict they will perform abnormally well).
A final piece of the puzzle is the middle of the playoff picture. We do not need to necessarily know exactly who will win in the wildcard round and divisional round. However, the further we expect a team to go, the more avg. points we are going to need from that player in our lineup. An important distinction here is avg. points. We can take players with high ceilings and low floors as long as we get that ceiling game. That being said it’s always safer to go with the best player on the team which leads me to our next point — ownership.
2019 Player Ownership
The FFPC Playoff Challenge is GPP format meaning that if you want to get the big prize (which is exactly what we want) you have to be different and you have to take some risks. If you put together a ‘chalk’ lineup consisting of the best skill players on every team you will not get 1st. This was extremely clear in 2019 where 74% of lineups took George Kittle and 56% took Lamar Jackson (2019 MVP). It was the lineups that pivoted off Kittle to Raheem Mostert (11%) ownership that placed.
The question I wanted to understand was how ‘chalky’ were the top 10 lineups? All of these lineups had Mahomes and Mostert, most had Derrick Henry, Davante Adams, Deandre Hopkins, Alvin Kamara etc. but there were differences.
To do this I created a new dataframe with all of the lineups separated by position with room for all possible roster constructions in the 2019 format (4 RB, 4WR, 3 TE). I then mapped a dictionary which held each players name as a key and had their ownership percentage as a value on to the dataframe. I then created an interaction term, ‘Chalk’, by multiplying the ownership percentage of every player in a lineup and rescaling it (Note: nulls were filled with 1 so as to not influence the interaction term). The higher the ‘Chalk’ value, the more chalky the lineup was (i.e the more it consisted of highly owned players).
Now if we graph the Chalk and Point value for every lineup in the 2019 contest we get the below with the red points representing a top 10 scoring lineup.
As you can see above the lineups that were the most chalky (consisting of the more highly owned players) tended to score in the upper middle of the pack where as the highest scoring lineups clearly consisted of lower owned players. Zooming in makes the picture a little clearer.
Even zooming in on the lowest values on the x-axis representing the ‘least chalky lineups’ we see all 10 of the highest scoring lineups hugging the lower end of the range. The takeaway being that in 2019 it paid to fade. Let’s do the same thing but by calculating a ‘Chalk’ value for each positional group with more than 1 slot (RB, WR and TE).
The story here is fairly similar as we would expect given that the Top 10 lineups all had the low-owned RB Mostert and faded the highly owned TE Kittle.
2020 — More Options
With an additional 2 teams in the playoffs this year and only 1 team getting a bye in each conference the FFPC lineups have expanded to include 4 Flex spots. In 2019 participants had to choose between going with some combination of 2–4 RBs, 2–4 WRs and 1–3 TEs (with 7 total). This year the options expand to 2–6 RBs, 2–6 WRs and 1–5 TEs (with 9 total).
In looking at 2019 data I plan on leaning towards a more RB heavy lineup this year. In 2019, lineups with just 2RBs (none in the flex) averaged 334 points. Teams with 3RBs (1 in the flex) averaged 338 and teams with 4RBs in the flex averaged 352. Another reason I like going heavy RB is because there is a safer floor, a plethora of high ceiling options and less of an impact with weather.
In looking at 2019 data we see that lineups with varying amounts of WRs all averaged between 336–340 points holding all else constant and there was a negative correlation between the number of TEs in a lineup and average points.
Closing Thoughts and My Lineup
This year I think a lot of participants are going to be struggling with the same roster decisions being able to only take 1 player from each team.
Tyreek Hill vs. Travis Kelce
Davante Adams vs. Aaron Jones
Josh Allen vs. Stephon Diggs
Derrick Henry vs. A.J Brown
Alvin Kamara vs. Michael Thomas
As mentioned at the top I think in order to construct a winner of a lineup without slamming 100+ entries (like 6 people did last year) you have to have a view on who will be in the Super Bowl and who will be bounced early. With that, below are some of my picks based on my view pictured below.
Picks —
Jonathan Taylor — I think a lot of people fade JT because they think the Colts get bounced in Round 1 and they very well might (75% odds looking at Vegas). Either way I think he puts up a good game given the Bills defense is weak against the run (fraudulent last few weeks) and if they somehow make it to Round 2 he gets to go against the Chiefs D which is another great spot.
Ronald Jones — This is a pure fade of the TB passing attack. I think Brady and the Bucs will throw throw throw to the point were the box is empty and Rojo can be super efficient with the 12–15 touches he’ll get. He’s looked good all year and could earn more touches with a lead.
Aaron Rodgers — It’s a way to pivot off Davante Adams and still get exposure to the points. If the Packers make the Super Bowl I think it will be on the back of Rodgers.
Travis Kelce — Eating Chalk. With the format he will likely be the most owned player but I am a weak man and I cannot fade Kelce getting 3pt/reception in a super bowl I think the Chiefs will walk into. Maybe I freak out and put Tyreek in before the lineups lock tomorrow.
Allen Robinson — Pencil him in for 8–110 and a TD in a first round loss.
As for the others you can check out my singular entry FFBOSSE once the contest kicks off. Good luck to all.
