This winter I dipped my toes into the world of NBA daily fantasy sports. While there are clearly a lot of differences between the NBA and NFL, I learned some things that I'll definitely be applying once September rolls around. While it's true that there's an element of luck involved in all fantasy sports, playing NBA enforced a belief that I had that there certainly are ways to tilt the odds in your favor. NBA DFS exposes those things much quicker because there are contests every single day. I've played for a little over two months and played in more contests than I would in four NFL seasons. That type of experience gives you a good look into yourself as a player, and the things you need to do to win. Below are what I think are the five most important things I learned in the last ten weeks.
- Success can be harder to deal with than failure. You'll find a lot of advice out there explaining how to avoid going "on tilt" after a night (or week) of bad luck. What I found much more challenging was managing my bankroll after a really good run. Daily Fantasy Sports are all about the law of large numbers. If you play every single week of the NFL season you need to expect outliers. You're going to have some weeks where you score terribly. You're going to have other weeks where it really feels like you've "figured it out". The truth is almost always somewhere in the middle. What's important is that you don't drastically alter your approach because of these outliers. If you double your bankroll in week 4 it's probably not advisable to turn around and put those winnings all on the line in week 5. You aren't as good as your best week or as bad as your last.
- You MUST have a system. My biggest failure during football season was feeling like I knew enough to not have a system. After all, I played in double digit leagues, wrote more than 80 articles, and probably dedicated more time to fantasy sports than 90% of the population. That doesn't mean you can wing it. Also, that system probably needs to be someone else's. There are people that spend hours every day putting together projection models, why would you think you could come up with better projections in the 45 minutes you have between work and your daughter's soccer game? My suggestion would be to find one person you trust and use their projections. That doesn't mean you always pick their highest projected players, but it gives you a baseline to start building your squad around. Also, remember that this person will not be 100% accurate, no one is. If you're looking for someone who publishes their results and is accurate, start with David Dodds' blog, and get ready for some awesome stuff we have coming out this summer.
- Beware of the noise. The market is quickly getting saturated with "daily fantasy experts". There's more noise out there than good advice and it's only going to get worse. This industry is exploding and anyone that's ever won a GPP wants to tell you how good they are. This goes back to the last point but part of your system needs to be reading 1-2 articles each week...and only that. My personal preference is to set my lineup using projections before I read any articles. In my experience the numbers are generally more reliable than the opinions but if someone (I trust) makes a really good argument, I'm not afraid to make a change to my lineup. What you don't want to do is listen to everyone and then try to sort out the good advice from the noise. That's a recipe for disaster.
- Know your strengths, and more importantly your weaknesses. There are so many different sites, and so many different types of contests on each site, that there are going to be things you are good at and things you aren't. Each site has a unique pricing system, position requirements, and scoring system. Try the different sites and see which one you're most successful at, then dedicate your time and money to that site. At the same time, there are different strategies for different types of contests, and you're likely better at one than the other. Some people are really good at playing contrarian GPP lineups and finding the right combination. This is a risky approach and one that can lead to great profit or several deposits. I found out quickly that I'm much better at making a profit in cash games (head-to-head, double ups, 50/50s) so that's where I've focused my efforts. I found this out because I track my results daily. When I find something that is making me money, I do more of it. When I find something that is costing me money I stop doing it.
- Get rid of the bias. Some biases we bring with us into fantasy sports. The most common has to do with which team we're a fan of, or certain players we dislike. These are the most obvious and should be the easiest to deal with. More difficult are the biases we develop throughout the season. If Peyton Manning wins you a big GPP, you're naturally going to want to play him in the future. Even more powerful is the sting felt when a player you felt strongly about completely lays an egg. You must take all of these emotions out of the equation in daily fantasy, and it's hard. One thing that makes it easier for me is to remember that everyone has value at a certain price. Don't think of them as players as much as a commodity that you have to pay a price for. Your only concern is whether the expected return justifies the price today.
Is this a guaranteed recipe for success in DFS? Not at all. You have to put in the time, and you have to continually work to get better. Hopefully this does make it a little bit easier though. If you develop a process, trust the process, track the results, and improve on the process I do believe you'll eventually find success.
Contact Heath at cummings@footballguys.com or on Twitter @heathcummingssr.