Hedging = The Shortstacking Of Fantasy Sports

It's been a good month, my best since December. I'm at a +20% ROI with two days left in June.

In the past, I've discussed whether varying your rosters is a good idea. IMO, your best guess to score points should be the same throughout all contests (of the same cap). After all, why would you want to stray away from your best projections?

I learned quickly that daily fantasy baseball is a completely different animal. It is a high variance game, mostly because one player (pitcher) usually accounts for a big chunk of your total score. (33-60% of your score on average, depending on the site you like best.)

Previously, the problem with hedging was diminishing returns. Since most of the games were heads-up (HU), you could not win a full buy-in for every entry fee. Therefore, to maximize profits, you take an all or nothing approach: Put up your best guess across the board.

Now there is a new variable added to the mix - the proliferation of multi-player contests. It seems this year I can enter 10-20 multis on a daily basis, without fail.

All of these multis allow me the opportunity to win multiple buy-ins on each contest. Therefore, I can vary my pitchers throughout my contests and still have a profitable night. (A good example of this was Sunday, where I only cashed in 6 of 17 contests, but won enough cash to sport a ROI around +13%.)

I don't frown on hedging. It's not a pariah like shortstacking is in poker. I just think it's a strategy that can only be successfully used in certain situations.

For today's Trailer Park Monday, here's Randy evicting J-ROC, who's none too happy:

Are Daily Fantasy Sports Really Growing?

I've been knee deep in some technology special olympics for the last 10 days. After having intermittent web access for an extended period, I finally got our cable lines replaced here and appear to be back in the 21st century.

I've had to hustle to keep my fantasy rosters filled out, which gave me mixed results. I've been a loser in 5 of the last 7 nights, bringing my June ROI down around +10%. It can move around a lot in the next week, but should end up in the black.

I read Blinders' post RIP GGD and FSEX, where it appears two more sites have bit the dust. Blinders really tries to spin these developments as a natural result of his superior product, but it was more a result of gross mismanagement by his competition.

I will say I played on GDD long before FSL. I never had the site crash on me, nor ever had a cashout issue. But they redesigned the site and never re-launched.

My point here is that the original GDD site was fine. It was just a different style of game than what FSL offers.

What's more interesting is his next post on the economy, where some Matt Maroon fanboy comments about the state of daily fantasy games:

"Also, congratulations on your "dominance" in the weekly fantasy sports market, or rather, being the big fish in a microscopic pond. I'm actually surprised with all your economic and business genius that you haven't figured out that this market isn't "high growth"."

Now, Matt was the superior mind behind Draftmix, which only offered live draft fantasy contests. Most of the daily fantasy players I've talked to didn't like waiting for the drafts to fill/start.

If you remember, this is how Matt feels about the types of contests run by FSL & Snapdraft - the biggest players still kicking. (BTW, Draftmix has been dormant for almost 7 months.)

From my experience, FSL and Snapdraft have been steadily growing, even in this shitty economy. As someone who checks out their offerings daily, I can say they both offer more contests and more opponents each month. Obviously, there are ups and downs as the different team sports seasons begin/end.

Do you really think that NBC Universal would invest in that rotoworld/fanball/instantfantasysports/snapdraft/NCFFB clusterfuck if it wasn't a "growth market"?

The main reason daily fantasy games haven't experienced "skyrocketing" growth... Is that most of the sites are run by techie folks who have failed to market IRL. Nobody is crossing over to market their games in MSM. Not even NBC.

Food for thought: Over 80% of all my affiliate referrals were closed in person, not online.

I hope it grows. I want it to grow. However, casual players need to know it exists, it's LEGAL and cashouts are easy. We've established those folks don't read this blog.

Mostly Offline TPM

Ever since the switch to DTV on Friday, my Internet and cable has been out (except for a few hours each night).

I seriously think our local operation is run on a hamster wheel and rubber band. I may find out tomorrow when the cable guy shows up.

I had to scramble Friday, Saturday and Sunday to fill out my fantasy rosters. Friday was a horror show, going 0 for 14 when Halladay pulled a groin. However, Saturday and Sunday were redeeming winners.

I sit on the halfway point of the month with an ROI above +25%.

Here is one of my very favorite TPB clips, Bubbles getting high before they try to steal some meat. (My favorite quote, "Meat dicks - meat dicks!")

As usual, likely not safe for work.

Busy Month So Far, Short TPM

It's been a surprisingly busy week, I haven't had much time to blog.

I've been fortunate to have another good start to the month. Thanks to a big Sunday, I'm sporting an ROI above +15% to date. It's a nice feeling when your roster clicks and performs above expectation.

I'm still playing within my bankroll and siphoning off a percentage of my profits as a reward. The drawback, of course, is this strategy grows the bankroll slowly.

NASCAR was a slight loser this week. Everybody was bunched together and Denny Hamlin's poor day sunk me in 3 of the 5 contests.

Here's Bubbles discussing why Julian is so sensitive about Patrick Swayze:

A New Month (And Trailer Park Monday)

I finished May with an ROI of +10.20%. No love from NASCAR this week shot me down a couple points.

I noticed that FSL has started to offer "three way" (aka "triple up") contests. These are 3 player, winner take all. I find these to be a good value on Snapdraft.

Here's a short clip where Sarah and Lucy discuss their theory on how much gay everyone has in them: