Buffalo Hold 'Em

What an extremely interesting week it's been in fantasy world. Last night I got this thrown at me in an FSL hockey contest:



So... fill in the blank. (He's mad at me and I lost the contest!) Not the first time someone has tried to tilt me in a fantasy contest.

I'm guessing he's upset that I'm a fantasy expert, yet not playing nosebleed stakes. Well, I'll tell you why I'm not playing nosebleed games right now:

1) I can't afford it. I'm not bankrolled enough to play up there.
2) It's a dumb move, UNLESS... and this is important - you know you can get consistent, repeat action at those levels.

Let's say for argument's sake I play him 3 straight nights at $107 HU. And I manage to win all three contests. Does he continue to play me? Does he start to avoid me? Does he refuse to sign up 1st for any contests? We'll never know.

Since there is no guarantee of repeat action, there is no point in risking a large portion of my bankroll on one contest.

I never said to ANYONE I was the BEST fantasy player. However, I am a winning fantasy player. I have won on ALL of the daily sites I've played on - including the (*ahem*) "unbeatable" sites. I have won every year from 2006-2009. I'm one of the only players active in all sports currently being offered on the daily sites.

I cash out my winnings and I spend them. I'm not a wealthy man and I realize that $213 fantasy contests are play money games to some folks. Believe me, I'd like to get to those games, because I think there's a lot of dead money there.

If somebody wants to set up a HU challenge across ALL the sports, I'll take anyone on at whatever stakes I can afford. And I'll gladly post the results right here, win or lose.

I actually started my daily fantasy projections site to try and raise money to reach those expensive games. I figured it would be worth it for my opponents to find out who I was likely to pick each night. Basically, I've been selling some of my edge for a price.

Speaking of daily fantasy projections, I see that FSL has decided to offer free projections for football contests. It's a good marketing tool for them.

But I think that imitation is a sincere form of flattery! (I also think you get what you pay for!)

DFP offers projections for all team sports on all the best sites, every day.

While I do think there are excellent free player ranking out there, our football projections come from full game simlulations that include all stats used in scoring - Yds, TDs, Fumbles, INTs, Sacks, Safeties, 2 pt conversions, FG distance and accuracy.

It's important to have accurate projections, because that's how you know if you're getting good value for the cap space you are using.

My projections are back by 3+ years of WINNING results and are a tremendous value for the price.

One last thing - Any player good enough to beat me consistently wouldn't be crying for a matchup. They would be quietly pleased whenever I show up (at ANY stakes).

I'm surprised about how much feedback I got from my previous post. I didn't realize that many of my readers were avid auto draft fans.

Well, I'm going to compare FSL and Fan Duel auto drafts. Even though they shouldn't really be compared - they are very different games.

On Fan Duel the auto draft has a flexible player list. This means you can select a player (say Kobe Bryant), and put him as you 1st choice or 18th choice (or anywhere in between). You can choose the exact order you draft each player, regardless of their position on the field.

On FSL the auto draft has a rigid player list. You make your choices at each position, but the order that the players are drafted is pre-determined.

On Fan Duel the draft order is determined by which user signs up first. Users then alternate picks until the rosters are filled. Since opponents are randomly chosen, you have a chance of picking 1st or 2nd.

On FSL the draft order is determined by total cap points of your picks. The user with the lowest cap total picks 1st. (This method is explained in FAQ of the FSL site, but it would be nice if it was included on the contest page or rules page.)

On Fan Duel, it is a slight advantage to pick 1st, but I feel this advantage is minimized by the flexibility of the draft list.

On FSL, it is a huge advantage to pick 1st (or 2nd, depending on the sport). IMO, it should be your primary objective to get the superior draft position.

The best example I can give comparing the two sites is a basketball contest, on a night when both Kobe and LeBron are playing.

On Fan Duel, if each user drafts those players first, one will get Kobe and one will get LeBron.

On FSL, the user in the 2nd draft position will get BOTH Kobe and LeBron, while player 1 will get neither.

So use your own judgement over which game fits your needs.

I prefer the Fan Duel drafts, but that's just me.

I'm pretty much done talking about this, OK?

Let's get the results out of the way first. I had a losing Sunday. It was mostly football fail - I won 5 of 6 NASCAR events and was a slight winner in hoops. With the exception of the late games, I cashed in very few football contests.

I was going to write a strategy post (for daily fantasy projections) on auto drafts, when FSL decided to launch their version. After trying them several times, I can say this: It is NOT a true draft, because you cannot select the order you draft your players.

Even without that option, is it a fair draft? On the surface, it appears so - players take turns choosing in a snake draft fashion.

However, the order of the selections are predetermined based upon who signed up first. This is where the fairness of the draft is skewed. Let me give you some examples:

NASCAR draft: Player 1 is always guaranteed first Sprint Cup pick (i.e. Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, etc.)

NBA drafts: Player 2 is guaranteed first SG (Kobe), SF (LeBron) and C (Dwight Howard).

NHL drafts: Player 1 is guaranteed first C (Crosby, Malkin, etc.) and first LW (Ovechkin).

NFL drafts: Player 1 gets first QB and first RB choices, usually the highest scoring positions.

MLB draft: Player 1 is guaranteed first P selection. This pretty much makes the auto draft not worth playing on nights when a stud pitches.

Now it's possible to get the good slot and still lose. That's just variance. I lost 3 of 4 football drafts yesterday and I picked first.

Here's the rub - if it is OBVIOUS that's it's better to be player 2, why would anyone sign up first? (or vice versa?)

IMO, Fan Duel has superior auto draft because you're allowed to select the order you choose your players. This allows you to be competitive regardless of your draft position.

Fan Duel will get all of my auto draft play from now on.

I still think FSL has a superior ranking cap game and I will continue to play those contests.

After my big Sunday, I am wallowing in a three day losing streak.

Monday was another decent winner, but a last second meaningless "surrender" goal (it was not an empty net goal) cost me several contests on Tuesday - and I managed to avoid a winner.

Then the next few days were mostly fail. However, my huge day was on the 1st of the month, so I'm still way up in November. (Accentuate the positive.)

I experimented a little with my ranking cap picks by scouring the player pool for "value picks". I noticed Kaiseroll13 had most of the same choices. But our choices mostly didn't pan out.

While I believe it's necessary to have an obvious bargain on your roster, I think it's better for your score to pick the top (projected) performers and work your way down.

I have a busy day ahead with daily fantasy projections for basketball, hockey and football, plus a strategy post on auto draft games.

Football Picks: CFL, Calgary @ Saskatchewan (-1.5). I'm expecting the Riders to redeem themselves. NCAA, LSU (+7.5) @ Alabama. The Tide plays too many close games. NFL, Dolphins (+10.5) @ Patriots. Strictly a cover play. [2009 YTD 14-16.]

It's been a while, but I finally had a day where I clicked on all fronts. Just like last year around this time, I had a huge Sunday.

I managed to cash in 19 of 21 football contests on FSL, winning 17. I also cashed in all nine hoops contests, winning eight.

Overall I was 29 of 33 on FSL for an ROI of +209.60%. A nice bankroll boost. (It might have been even better if the NASCAR contests did not get rained out!)

On Fan Duel I swept my NBA contests and I'm on pace to win all five of my NFL duels, depending on the outcome of Monday Night Football.

I'm also in line to post another winning day on Snapdraft, although I am beginning to phase out my play on that site. (I'll discuss this more in the future.)

I don't know how often I can say this: My daily fantasy projections really work!

Finally, I won only a single football pick. I blame this on not taking any time with my choices(and it showed).

Pressed for time... here are the picks with no explanation:

CFL: Saskatchewan (+1) @ Hamilton.
NCAA: USC (-3) @ Oregon.
NFL: Miami (+3.5) @ NY Jets.
[2009 YTD 13-14.]

This is the third season I'm trying my hand at fantasy basketball. The previous two years, I just felt I didn't have any edge over the competition, and it was a "rolling dice" scenario at best.

From the first to the second year, FSL changed their roster size from seven to nine. This helped reduce the possibility of duplicate rosters, but it still seemed all the regulars had several similar players each night.

Now going from the second to third season, I have the added advantage of my daily fantasy projections to help choose the best roster. I'm hoping my mathematical model will give me an edge this season.

However, there's going to be those nights where everyone picks the same. Just two nights into the current season, I've already seen exact duplicate rosters from two of the best opponents (with 12 games on the schedule, no less)!

I've been playing both salary cap and auto draft over on Fan Duel, and I think auto draft is a superior product for basketball. With a 9 player roster and no overlapping picks, I feel this is a much more skillful game. Even though there is no cap, there are some great disparities between 1st and 2nd (or 3rd/4th) choice at a given position.

It is a different skill than picking 9 players to neatly fit into your cap, but I think it's a stronger component to success, making cap games seem more luck oriented.

Maybe I just like the fact that there will be 9 unique players on each roster, and I won't have seven identical players as Tippy, Bonds, Kaiseroll13 and Primetime420. That gets old pretty quick.