Ambiguity in Best Ball, similar to DFS, is extremely leverageable. The better educated guess in an obscure situation that identifies the correct arbitrage value, usually goes a long way towards a winning lineup construction.
Now that the dust has finally settled on the Darrell Henderson situation we can speculate on how best to attack it going forward.
I currently have 51% Darrel Henderson in 21 lineups on Underdog. In my last article before the Akers injury, I talked about why I decided to draft Henderson. The main reasons to fade Akers:
His high ADP
We have historically seen volatility in Sean McVay backfields
Taking a chance on Akers being bad chalk would be a strong way to gain leverage and win equity in my portfolio on Underdog
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One of the main decision points now and going forward will be trying to figure out how much more Henderson I want. The best way to do this is to take the macro perspective and try and gauge how the industry is viewing the situation. As of right now, Henderson has bumped up five rounds from his original tenth-round ADP. The Industry consensus seems to be that the Rams will likely bring on another back before the beginning of the season. So it remains to be seen if Henderson’s ADP will bump up further. With already having a good amount of exposure to Henderson, I believe the best situation for me is to draft Henderson until the Rams sign or trade for a quality backup and his ADP officially normalizes. I am prioritizing members of the Rams passing attack and potential backups the Rams might eventually bring in, in drafts where I do not draft Henderson. The reason being having exposure to the high-powered Sean McVay offense at a potential value is worth the bargain basement price tags I can receive on players that might be used to eventually pick up the slack and usage left by Akers.
One of the players I will be targeting is Van Jefferson. I don’t mind stacking Van with Stafford. While I would prefer to stack Cooper Kupp, Robert Woods, or Tyler Higbee with Stafford and I will draft those players when I can. Van Jefferson is a guy that should be relied upon more in his sophomore season, and a player that is potentially being overlooked with the likes of Gerald Everett, Josh Reynolds leaving the team along with the slight usage uptick he should see as a result.
The other big piece here is Stafford. I think Stafford is going to be a stud in LA! The recency bias toward Stafford may not be great as he didn’t have many winning seasons in Detroit, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say Stafford will be a top-five QB in the league this year and potentially even top-three now that he will have to be relied upon more due to the Cam Akers injury.
