Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls — the time has arrived — the 2025 NFL season begins on Thursday night! The reigning-champion Eagles host the Cowboys at Lincoln Financial Field, a matchup that has generated a ton of daily fantasy interest.
The Eagles enter the season favored to win their second straight NFC Championship, and they're +700 to repeat as Super Bowl champions (the Bills and Ravens are both +600). Dallas, meanwhile, starts the campaign at +8000, with fans of "America's Team" still reeling from the Micah Parsons trade.
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Regardless of either team's long-term expectations, we can all expect an entertaining first night of 2025 regular-season football. Philadelphia has multiple elite players, including Super Bowl 59 MVP Jalen Hurts, reigning Offensive Player of the Year Saquon Barkley and three-time Pro Bowler A.J. Brown. Dallas counters with three-time Pro Bowl QB Dak Prescott, All-Pro receiver CeeDee Lamb and prized offseason acquisition George Pickens.
The points should be plentiful in this primetime affair, so it should be no surprise to anyone that the opening-night DFS contests have been loaded with entries. If you're getting in on the action, check out our optimal lineups for DraftKings Showdown and FanDuel single-game contests below.
Eagles vs. Cowboys NFL DFS picks: Optimal DraftKings lineup
Before we get into our lineup and strategy, here are the key scoring settings for DraftKings Showdown contests: They're full-point PPR, and they feature three-point bonuses for 300 passing yards, 100 rushing yards, and 100 receiving yards. The Captain pick costs 1.5 times a player's original price, but he also gets his point total multiplied by 1.5.
POS. | PLAYER | TEAM/OPP. | SALARY |
| Captain | Jalen Hurts, QB | Eagles vs. DAL | $16,500 |
| FLEX | CeeDee Lamb, WR | Cowboys @ PHI | $10,800 |
| FLEX | DeVonta Smith, WR | Eagles vs. DAL | $8,400 |
| FLEX | Jake Ferguson, TE | Cowboys @ PHI | $5,200 |
| FLEX | Eagles D/ST | Eagles vs. DAL | $4,600 |
| FLEX | Jake Elliott, K | Eagles vs. DAL | $4,400 |
Captain: Jalen Hurts, QB, Eagles ($16,500)
It's hard not to love the defending champions in the season opener, especially after Micah Parsons just got traded out of Dallas. Hurts had 258 total yards and four TDs (2 passing, 2 rushing) when he faced the Cowboys last year, and that was in Arlington. He feels like the best possible Captain, but we will mix things up when we arrange our FanDuel lineup just to diversify our portfolio.
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FLEX 1: CeeDee Lamb, WR, Cowboys ($10,800)
Lamb will always put up numbers, win or lose. If Dallas somehow wins this game, it will be in large part due to CeeDee's performance. If they lose, he will probably be busy as Dak Prescott will try to get the Cowboys back into the game. For the same reasons Lamb got picked in the first round of so many fantasy football drafts, he's a no-brainer as a FLEX option in all DFS formats.
FLEX 2: DeVonta Smith, WR, Eagles ($8,400)
It's difficult to have both QBs and both top wide receivers, so we opted to hold off on A.J. Brown and instead went with Eagles WR2 DeVonta Smith. He's not listed on the Eagles' injury report, so that's all that we need to hear ahead of this one. The last time Smith faced the Cowboys in Philly, he hauled in 6-of-7 targets for 120 yards and two TDs.
FLEX 3: Jake Ferguson, TE, Cowboys ($5,200)
Ferguson checks in as our top sleeper of this contest, coming in at a modest $5,200 despite the fact that he's arguably the third-best offensive weapon in Dak's war chest. With Lamb and George Pickens on either side for Dallas, Ferg should have plenty of open opportunities across the middle in a game that involve plenty of Cowboys passes.
FLEX 4: Philadelphia Eagles D/ST ($4,600)
The Eagles could very well bash the Cowboys on Thursday. Dallas has been listed by DraftKings as an 8.5-point underdog; it's the first Eagles game since they won the Super Bowl, and Philly won 41-7 and 34-6 the last two times these NFC East foes met.
FLEX 5: Jake Elliott, K, Eagles ($4,400)
One more Eagle, because why not!? You can't get too many sure things at $4,400, and we're not interested in taking a low-floor option like a Cowboys running back. We're getting guaranteed points with Elliott — Philly isn't getting shut out by these Cowboys in Week 1.
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Eagles vs. Cowboys NFL DFS picks: Optimal FanDuel lineup
Here are the key scoring settings for FanDuel single-game tournaments: They're half-point PPR with three-point bonuses for 300 passing yards, 100 rushing yards, or 100 receiving yards. The MVP pick multiplies that player's total by 1.5 and, for the first time, the MVP pick also costs 1.5 times that player's salary.
POS. | PLAYER | TEAM/OPP. | SALARY |
| MVP | CeeDee Lamb, WR | Cowboys @ PHI | $18,000 |
| FLEX | Jalen Hurts, QB | Eagles vs. DAL | $12,200 |
| FLEX | Dak Prescott, QB | Cowboys @ PHI | $10,800 |
| FLEX | DeVonta Smith, WR | Eagles vs. DAL | $9,600 |
| FLEX | Javonte Williams, RB | Cowboys @ PHI | $8,600 |
| FLEX | Jaydon Blue, RB | Cowboys @ PHI | $2,400 |
We took a different approach with our FanDuel lineup, primarily because we wanted to diversify our DFS portfolio a bit. We like the upside with Lamb in the MVP chair, and we love having both QBs in a divisional affair.
We also went with both Dallas running backs in hopes that we would monopolize the Cowboys' ground game. It's a risky but potentially lucrative strategy, and hopefully one of our two optimal lineups brings home the bacon on opening night.