Knowing all of the NFL games for each week is one of the easiest things you can do to help your fantasy team and daily fantasy team. It’s not just the player, it’s the matchup.The matchup itself is often the deciding factor – not just the player – in a season-long lineup or in a scratch-built team. We have combined live Vegas odds, implied team totals and win probabilities for all games on the slate in our NFL matchups hub, giving you a quick way of knowing which team’s offense has been set up for a big day, and which one is on a long uphill climb.

Instead of flipping through various betting sites or stat pages, you have all the information in one place: point spreads, over/under and team-by-team scoring projections updated as the lines change over the course of the week. Tap on any matchup for more details, like head-to-head trends, recent form, and situational factors that should be taken into consideration when playing fantasy baseball.

Why NFL Matchups Matter More Than You Think

Every matchup is unique in its own way. Each game is special because of the players.

Sometimes, it’s easy to build a fantasy team based on name alone and then the matchup environment can either make or break it. A star running back going up against a stacked front seven on the road is a completely different situation from a star running back at home against a run defense that’s leaking. All that context — injuries, pace of play, weather, motivation, and more — is all baked into Vegas odds and implied team totals in a single, easy-to-read number.

That is why good fantasy managers do not neglect to look at the NFL matchups page as their starting point for every research session, but rather as a starting point. Knowing which teams are likely to score points before you ever turn to target shares or snap counts gives you a place to focus your attention.

How to Use Vegas Odds to Sharpen Your Fantasy Strategy

When it comes to scanning the week’s slate, the three numbers do most of the work:

• Point spread – This is the name given to the list that indicates the team that is favored and by how many points. Seven points or better typically indicate a real talent disparity and can usually lead to a more offensive-oriented run game for the favorite, and a more frequent passing game for the underdog, as they attempt to take the lead on the scoreboard.
• Over/under (total) – This is the number of total points that oddsmakers think will be scored. High scores indicate high tempo, scoring environment for both rosters.
• Implied team total – The number that is most useful of the three. It makes it possible to determine the number of points that each team will score on the spread, in addition to the total, making it much more practical than a combined over/under.

For instance, a 54 point over/under could be a tight game at 27-27 or a blown-up game at 43-11. If a team has a high percentage of outs, they are in “stack the offense” territory, and if they have a low percentage of outs, they are one to fade.

Nothing of this is guaranteed — upsets, injuries, game-script surprises all occur every week — but a line is set by professionals who are playing for real money and a meaningful gap between two teams is seldom a coincidence. Use it as one aspect of your process, not the entire strategy.

Create Complete Day Game Plan

Matchup data is best combined with the appropriate tools. After you’ve done the fantasy game and team research, add our player projections to the mix and figure out which players have the best chance to deliver value on the individual player level, and then run your short list through the NFL lineup optimizer to maximize value with your entire fantasy budget. Matchup-level knowledge and player-level projections are the key to winning DFS week in and week out.

Take a look throughout the week, odds can change drastically when injury reports, weather predictions and the general public’s betting interest come into play — all of which can make a huge difference in the winning line.