DFS Picks: Our Favorite Picks For Today (2024)

Written by: Adam Spencer | Last Updated: August 18, 2024

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Our Favorite DFS Picks Today (August 18, 2024)

In this section, we’ll post our favorite picks for each day. Sometimes those will be player picks for pick’em contests. Sometimes they’ll be value options in best ball tournaments or DraftKings/FanDuel salary lineups.

Just make sure to bookmark this page so you can follow along all year with our favorite picks of the day!

These are our favorite picks for Sunday, August 18, 2024, via Underdog Fantasy:

I’m going with 3 picks from today’s MLB action, starting with the Mariners visiting the Pirates. I’m going with Seattle starter George Kirby to look sharp, recording 6+ strikeouts in this interleague showdown. Next, I think Kutter Crawford will struggle against the Orioles when the Red Sox visit Baltimore this afternoon. I’ll take the Boston starter to allow 3+ earned runs. I also think Colin Rea will allow 3 or more earned runs as his Milwaukee team faces a tough Cleveland Guardians offense.

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Introduction

When we talk about DFS “picks” on this page, we mean more than just pick’em contests (though those are big parts of the DFS scene). In this space, we’ll also discuss who to draft in daily fantasy contests and how to set your lineups in salary contests (such as on DraftKings).

Pick’em contests have become increasingly popular in recent years. Why? Well, it helps make every pitch, every pass, every 3-pointer, every slapshot more exciting when you can win real money based on the results of your favorite games of the day!

There are so many great DFS apps out there on the market today. Underdog, Sleeper, Betr, Boom, PrizePicks, Thrive, Vivid Picks, Jock MKT, DraftKings, FanDuel, ParlayPlay — the list goes on and on. There truly has never been a better time to get in on the action, but you need to know what you’re doing. All of these apps have different specialties, so as you get more involved in the DFS scene, you’ll find the ones that work best for you and which ones you have the most fun playing contests on.

So on this page, we’re going to walk you through a few strategies, both for beginners and for more advanced players in the daily fantasy sports space.

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Strategies for DFS Picks

These are some strategies to consider for making picks on whatever DFS app you like best:

1. Understand Player Stats and Game Scripts

Ask yourself how you think each game will go. If you think the Kansas City Chiefs are going to blow out a team like the Chicago Bears, then you’ll probably want to have the Chiefs’ top running back to exceed his rushing yards total. When teams are ahead, they run the ball a lot more.

You also need to be able to identify lines that are too low. Tyreek Hill has been dominant to start the 2023 NFL season. Through 6 games, he’s posted 150+ receiving yards 4 times. That’s incredible. What does that mean for you?

Even if Hill’s higher/lower line is at 97.5 receiving yards (which it is for Week 7), it’s probably worth it to pick his “higher” option and go from there. It’s a high-value play. Understanding which lines have the highest probably of success is crucial.

2. Understand Key External Trends

There are tons of things that impact how a player will fare in each game. If you ignore weather for any event that takes place outdoors, you’re putting yourself at a disadvantage. If you don’t factor in the opponent a player is facing, you’ll harm your chances of winning.

If an NFL quarterback is playing in a snowstorm, he’s probably not going to throw for as many yards as he normally would. If an MLB player is hitting in cold weather, the ball isn’t going to fly as far as it does in the summer heat. If a college basketball player is going up against a team that plays at a very slow pace, he or she likely won’t have as many opportunities to hit the “higher” option on their points scored totals.

These are all key things to consider before you finalize your pick’em contests or enter a weekly DFS draft.

It’s super important to have a clear picture of everything surrounding a certain game’s environment before you pick a player to either succeed or struggle. Check weather reports, injury designations, coach comments, etc. before putting your hard-earned money into a DFS contest.

3. Season-long Unders are Strong Picks

Underdog offers season-long pick’em contests for NFL players, NBA players and others. Because of injuries in the NFL and load management in the NBA, unders hit at a higher rate compared to overs. Nobody wants to root for an injury or bad performances, but statistics show you’re better off taking unders in many situations.

This isn’t to say you should never play “higher” options on season-long totals; you just need to pick your spots very carefully.

Advanced Strategies

1. Stacking

If you want to win big in GPP tournaments on Underdog, DraftKings or other DFS apps, you need to understand stacking. What that means is landing 2 or more correlated players for your team.

For example, if you wanted to do a Miami Dolphins “stack,” getting QB Tua Tagovailoa and WR Tyreek Hill would be a good strategy. If Tyreek has a big-time game, catching 10 passes for 150 yards and 2 touchdowns, it stands to reason that Tua is also having a huge performance. So getting both of those guys in your lineup is crucial.

Game stacks are also important. Let’s say you manage to draft both Tua and Tyreek on a week when the Dolphins are playing the Buffalo Bills. A “bring-back” option would be a guy like RB James Cook or WR Gabe Davis for the Bills.

Why not Stefon Diggs? Well, if you’ve drafted both Tua and Tyreek, chances are you either don’t have enough remaining salary to pay for Diggs or Diggs is already off the board in your draft. Cook and Davis both might be available later in your drafts or at a lower salary when building your roster.

Almost all of the top lineups in GPP tournaments have game stacks, so this is a strategy you’ll want to make sure you use.

2. Contrarian Plays

When you’re entering large Guaranteed Prize Pool (GPP) tournaments, you need to have some differentiation in your lineup. If you’re rostering players who 30-40% of the field is playing, that’s fine. But you can’t ONLY have players that are popular picks.

The top lineups in large GPP fields almost always have a few guys who are rostered at 5% or less. That doesn’t mean the guys who are not being rostered that much are bad — they’re just overlooked at times.

For the NFL Week 7 main slate for the 2023 season, for example, the Chiefs are playing the Chargers. That’s the game with the highest expected point total of the weekend, so you can expect many DFS players to build stacks around Patrick Mahomes and Justin Herbert. Geno Smith of the Seattle Seahawks is also getting plenty of attention against the Arizona Cardinals.

So what would be a contrarian play? Maybe you look to a game like Detroit-Baltimore and consider building a lineup around Jared Goff or Lamar Jackson. They’re both incredible players, but their roster percentages might slip in Week 7 because other games and QBs are drawing more attention. Jackson is capable of having huge performances, so if you have him on your GPP roster and he explodes, you’ll have leverage on the rest of the field.

Common mistakes

1. Drafting Well Over ADP

One big mistake we see people make in DFS drafts on Underdog is taking a player way too soon. ADP (average draft position) shouldn’t be something that you exclusively pay attention to, but you should use it as a guide and not completely ignore it.

Here’s what we mean: Pretend you’re doing a daily NBA draft for that night’s slate of games. You think Kristaps Porzingis of the Boston Celtics is going to have a big performance, so you draft him in Round 2 when he’s actually rated as a Round 4 pick by ADP. That’s a mistake.

Sometimes you do need to draft a player above ADP if you want to ensure you get them, but for the Porzingis example, he would likely still be around in Round 3 for you to draft if you have to have him on your team. That’s when a slight reach makes sense instead of a big multi-round reach.

2. Not Understanding Roster Construction

This is something I see time and time again on Underdog, especially when it comes to MLB daily drafts. In a daily GPP contest on Underdog (like Walk-Off Wednesday, for example), you get to draft 1 pitcher, 2 infielders, 2 outfielders and 1 FLEX position that can be either an infielder or an outfielder.

Let’s say it’s a 6 person draft and I have pick No. 6. I take a pitcher early and thus cannot take another pitcher. Now let’s say we’re down to the last couple of rounds. I have the sixth pick in Round 5 and the first pick in Round 6. The person who has the fifth pick in Round 5 and the second pick in Round 6 still needs a pitcher. What should he or she do?

All too often, that person will draft a pitcher in Round 5. Why would they do that?

Now they’ve given me 2 opportunities to draft position players that they could have snagged with their Round 5 pick. Whatever pitcher they took in the fifth round was guaranteed to be there when it looped around to them in Round 6 because I’d already drafted a pitcher earlier.

It’s little mistakes like that that can ultimately cause you to miss out on winning even more prize money.

3. Setting Lineups Too Early

If you’re entering a weekly NFL contest on Underdog, Sleeper or any other DFS app that lets you draft teams for GPP tournaments, there’s no reason to set your lineup on Tuesday. That’s well before final injury designations are made, in addition to many other reasons you shouldn’t set a lineup that early.

Yes, you’ll need to monitor the tournament you want to enter to make sure it doesn’t fill up before you have a chance to draft a team or set a lineup, but I’d advise against setting lineups or entering drafts for a Sunday contest any time before Thursday. Even Thursday is too early, in my opinion.

4. Saying You’ll “Never” Draft a Player

Maybe Jalen Hurts burned you 1 week. He struggled, threw 3 interceptions and cost you a chance to win some big-time money. If he has a matchup that projects favorably the next week, don’t be afraid to go back to Hurts.

All too often, we let our (understandable) biases against teams and players affect our strategies when it comes to setting DFS lineups, doing daily drafts or even making picks in pick’em contests. It’s really tough to set those biases aside (that’s what sports fandom is all about, after all), but you need to be able to keep an open mind. That’s how you win big.

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