I’m not sure there’s a faster exploding DFS format right now than Underdog’s Battle Royale contests.

If you are unfamiliar, it’s like a best ball draft, except it only includes games for a single slate (i.e. Week 1 Main Slate).

The standard format is a six-round draft with six users, although there are also some six-round drafts with 12 users. 

The roster settings are simple: 1QB, 1 RB, 2 WR, 1 FLEX (RB/WR), 1 TE

The beauty of this format is that you can draft a bunch of teams without much of a time commitment. An 18-round best ball draft can take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour, but a Battle Royale draft takes 5-7 minutes at most.

Despite the simplicity of the game, it requires a good amount of strategy to position yourself for a top finish. It's like that 'ol poker adage: It takes a few minutes to learn, but a lifetime to master. This is especially true for the massive large-field contests, like the flagship Battle Royale contest that has around 68,000 entries this week.

To help get you up to speed quickly, I’m going to share five tips, nay, commandments, to drafting teams that can win first place in these big contests and then I'll share a few of my favorite plays in Week 1 contests.

These aren’t hard and fast rules, by the way, but you should know them before you try to break them.

1. Skinny stack your QB 

In this format we need to walk a fine line between enjoying the benefits of correlation (getting less things right) while also hitting the nuts. From what I've observed, most people overuse double stacks (QB + 2 pass catchers). Because we need to hit high-end ceiling outcomes from all six of our spots, a skinny stack (QB + 1 pass catcher) is the more optimal route. 

In fact, I want to stack my QB with at least one WR or TE at a nearly 100% frequency, unless it's a QB with monster rushing upside like Josh Allen, Jalen Hurts, Anthony Richardson or Jayden Daniels. 

Double stacking is great when we have more lineup spots (like nine on DraftKings), but it's trickier with fewer roster spots. Think about it this way: If one WR is having a monster game, it is less likely that their teammate is also having a monster game. 

The one exception I'll make to this rule is if both the pass catchers are mostly going undrafted, so I'm getting a huge leverage boost (more on this in a second). This is actually what I did last year when two of my CJ Stroud-Tank Dell-Dalton Schultz teams finished in the top 10.

2. Don't force bringbacks and mini-correlations 

This dovetails with the first commandment. A bringback is a player on the opposite side of your stack. A mini-correlation would be one player from each team in a game. Not only are bring backs overused, but they serve less utility with only six roster spots. The reason they are overused is because it's easier for our brains to gravitate to a single narrative ("this game goes off") than shrugging our shoulders and picking a "random" player.

But the entire point of correlating is to get less things right. When you force a bring back, though, you still need to get an additional thing right — your main stack crushing and the player on the other side of the game crushing. Bring backs are more viable in DraftKings lineups because you are hoping to land on an outlier game environment to buoy a large chunk of your roster. But on Underdog, it's better to just take another one-off piece from another game.

3. Scroll the eff down 

This might be the biggest pillar of becoming a successful Battle Royale drafter. Because only 36 players are drafted in each draft, everyone can build a superteam. But guess what? Outside of the top 10-15 players on the slate — who are elite fantasy plays — the rest of the pool is fairly similar projection-wise.

This creates a dynamic that demands we scroll past the shakier plays (in the 15-36 range) who are drafted in every contest. Because they don't project much better than the cohort of players going undrafted, it makes it very beneficial to scroll past them. 

The benefit of landing on a unique piece that can differentiate your roster from the thousands of other entries is massive in this format. I generally like having at least two players who aren't drafted in every contest, but at the very least aim for a minimum of one. 

For a deep dive into what it means to "scroll the eff down," check out this video.

4. Get unique … another way

There are two ways to get unique: 1) You can reach for players, which is what "scrolling the eff down" is or 2) You can scoop up ADP fallers.

My general rule of thumb is to always scoop an ADP faller in the first three rounds because that could result in a unique combination of elite players. And then I'll reserve my "reaching" for Rounds 3-6 where I'm not sacrificing much on the projection front.. 

5. Don't get too cute 

The biggest temptation in Battle Royale contests is either to be too conservative (anchored to ADP) or too cute (taking thin bets at the end of drafts). 

Because there are more than 36 good players on each slate, we can have our cake and eat it, too. You can get good players who also aren't regularly drafted. To identify the best hidden gems on a slate, use targets and touch projections as your North Star. Volume leads to TDs, and that's what we are after on a .5 PPR site like Underdog.

In future Friday columns, I’ll go more in-depth on my favorite DFS plays across Underdog Fantasy and DraftKings, as well as some of my favorite pick ‘ems and bets.

But because I’m incapable of leaving you empty-handed, here is a quick rundown of my favorite sleepers for Week 1:

  • Geno Smith stacks. Geno is going overlooked everywhere despite the Seahawks having the sixth-highest projected team total (24) on the slate. Skinny stack him with one of DK Metcalf, Jaxon Smith-Njigba or Noah Fant on Underdog and double stack him on DraftKings.
  • Underpriced bellcow RBs. This slate is super deep with 12 games, no byes and very few injuries. This means starting RBs who project for a ton of volume are going completely undrafted in contests. My two favorites in this mold are Devin Singletary and Chuba Hubbard. Both should have the entire backfield to themselves in close matchups where their teams will want to lean on the run game.
  • Pay up for TE. On the flip side, the upside at the TE position is tough to find this week outside of the top four options on the Main Slate (Trey McBride, Dalton Kincaid, Evan Engram and Kyle Pitts). I’ll be making all of them a priority in my drafts/lineups.

Good luck in Week 1. For more Battle Royale strategy, I’ll have an in-depth breakdown video on the Deposit Kingdom Youtube channel every Friday evening.