This summer, I’ve been looking for salary sweet spots in MLB DFS — the price ranges that have historically offered value. I started by looking at salary trends for batters but have recently shifted my focus to pitchers by examining the DFS importance of the moneyline to the position. This piece is a continuation of my previous work.
This is the 70th installment of The Labyrinthian, a series dedicated to exploring random fields of knowledge in order to give you unordinary theoretical, philosophical, strategic, and/or often rambling guidance on daily fantasy sports. Consult the introductory piece to the series for further explanation.
Pitchers Aren’t Batters
Banalsysis at its best: Thanks for reading.
Pitchers aren’t batters from a salary-based perspective. Not only are most pitchers more expensive than most batters, but they also don’t possess throughout their salary spectrum the relatively smooth and distinct pricing tiers that we see with batters.
It’s not that pitchers entirely lack pockets of productivity. We can identify salary ranges in which pitchers have historically returned excess value. It’s just that (unlike batters) pitchers don’t have clear tiers upon tiers with distinct and unique trends unto themselves.
One of these isolated salary cells in particular caught my attention: The cheap pitchers on FanDuel.
The Difference Between ‘Cheap’ and ‘Inexpensive’
I’ve written before about the difference between ‘cheap’ and ‘inexpensive’ in DFS. Oftentimes, it’s easy to look at a player with a low salary and think that . . .
— Because he doesn’t cost much to acquire, he must suck.
— Because he must suck, he probably won’t return value.
— Because he probably won’t return value, you don’t want him in your DFS lineups.
Clearly, I’m speaking in generalities — there will always be times when you roster cheap players because of the salary flexibility they afford — but in general you don’t A) assume that players with low salaries are a fantastic and consistent source of value and thus B) seek to roster those players on a regular basis.
For instance, when was the last time that you actively targeted pitchers on FanDuel priced no higher than $5,000?
Cheap FanDuel Pitchers Who Don’t Suck
Since 2012, FanDuel pitchers have historically had a -0.06 Plus/Minus with 50.1 percent Consistency. Those numbers will serve as our baselines.
Across that same period of time, cheap pitchers on FanDuel have done noticeably better. They have perhaps been more inexpensive than cheap:
What’s especially intriguing is the tournament value that these pitchers might have.
Note that their collective Plus/Minus is superior to the baseline but their Consistency isn’t. That means that these players are somewhat volatile. They don’t reach their salary-based expectations as much as they probably should — but when they do they tend to exceed those expectations to a significant degree. And that makes them naturally suited to guaranteed prize pools.
Additionally, these low-salaried pitchers — the anti-#TurboTrends of the world — aren’t highly desirable. At worst, they tend not to be rostered in lots of lineups. At best, they’re rostered in almost no lineups. They present the opportunity to practice ownership arbitrage in a way that likely yields a number of unique lineups.
Why is it that low-salaried FanDuel pitchers provide value whereas cheap DraftKings pitchers tend to suck?
I think that the answer probably lies in the 12-point victory bonus at FanDuel.
W = 12 pts
If you look at FanDuel’s MLB Rules & Scoring, you’ll see that at the very top of the pitcher scoring matrix is this line:
W = 12 pts
On FanDuel, pitcher victories are literally at the top of the list. Of course, if you look at the MLB Scoring Rules on DraftKings, you’ll notice that pitcher wins are worth only four points.
Here’s my working theory: Some of these low-salaried pitchers win more games than people expect them to win. And when these pitchers win, those wins mean more on FanDuel than on DraftKings.
When a low-salaried DraftKings pitcher is favored, he outperforms his salary-based expectations by 5.91 percent:
(In case you’re wondering about the math: (0.67/11.34)*100 = 5.91 percent)
Exceeding salary-based expectations by that percentage is good, especially for a pitcher from whom not much is expected — but that outperformance isn’t great compared to what we see on FanDuel:
Low-salaried favored pitchers on FanDuel exceed their expectations by 14.67 percent. Given that wins on FanDuel are worth almost triple what they are on DraftKings, we should probably expect to see a wide difference between the sites when it comes to pitchers who are favored.
Note that the Consistency for these cheap pitchers is remarkably similar across the platforms. What this means is that the cheap pitchers essentially are looking to cross a threshold correlated with wins. When a pitcher is victorious, he’s likely to cross the threshold regardless of platform — but doing so just happens to result in much more value on FanDuel.
Pushing the Boundaries
All of this is to say that low-salaried pitchers on FanDuel have historically provided value, probably because of the outsized bonus they receive when they win games. Clearly, not every pitcher in this cohort who exceeds value wins his game — look at the recent performance of Anibal Sanchez (+17.6 Plus/Minus in a loss on 7/19/2016) — and not every winning pitcher exceeds value. But wins for cheap pitchers are important.
And if we are to target cheap pitchers, FanDuel is the platform to use.
But how far can we push the boundaries with low-salaried FanDuel pitchers? Are there other factors that can increase the Plus/Minus even more? Yes, there are.
The more factors we add to the trend of cheap pitchers who don’t suck (+3.19 Plus/Minus, 55.8 percent Consistency), the smaller the sample is, the less reliable the trend is, and the fewer trend matches we will see in the future. So we want to be sure not to overload this trend . . .
But if we wanted to push the boundaries . . .
Add Only K Prediction
— Minimum of 4.0 K Prediction: +3.87 Plus/Minus, 57.9 Consistency
— Minimum of 5.0 K Prediction: +5.10 Plus/Minus, 64.2 Consistency
— Minimum of 6.0 K Prediction: +8.84 Plus/Minus, 80.0 Consistency
Add Only Weather
— Minimum of 20 Weather Rating: +3.49 Plus/Minus, 56.9 Consistency
— Minimum of 40 Weather Rating: +4.35 Plus/Minus, 58.8 Consistency
— Minimum of 60 Weather Rating: +4.88 Plus/Minus, 60.0 Consistency
Add Only Park Factor
— Minimum of 30 Park Factor: +3.74 Plus/Minus, 57.6 Consistency
— Minimum of 50 Park Factor: +4.57 Plus/Minus, 60.5 Consistency
— Minimum of 70 Weather Rating: +4.64 Plus/Minus, 57.9 Consistency
Add Only Pro Trends
— Minimum of Four Pro Trends: +3.69 Plus/Minus, 56.9 Consistency
— Minimum of Six Pro Trends: +6.15 Plus/Minus, 62.2 Consistency
— Minimum of Eight Pro Trends: +6.38 Plus/Minus, 62.3 Consistency
Add Only GB% – 15
— Minimum of 40 Percent Recent Ground-Ball Rate: +3.81 Plus/Minus, 63.6 Consistency
— Minimum of 50 Percent Recent Ground-Ball Rate: +4.71 Plus/Minus, 65.8 Consistency
— Minimum of 60 Percent Recent Ground-Ball Rate: +6.07 Plus/Minus, 73.3 Consistency
I know what you’re thinking . . . what if we just . . .
The Black Swans
I’ve written before about the DFS Black Swan. I’ve speculated as to what the Black Swan looks like. My fellow degenerates, THIS is what it looks like:
Yeah, that’s a sample of four. Here’s the thing:
— Black Swans are supposed to be rare.
— Every factor in the trend is defensible and the minimum thresholds for the factors are individually reasonable.
What we see in this trend is the convergence of a low salary and a lot of small edges that collectively form the razor-sharp curved blade of a samurai sword.
These aren’t just cheap pitchers who don’t suck. They’re cheap pitchers who win GPPs.
They’re not just Black Swans. They’re katanas.
———
The Labyrinthian: 2016, 70
Previous installments of The Labyrinthian can be accessed via my author page. Thanks to FantasyLabs co-founder Kevin Cassata for helping with the research for this piece and FantasyLabs writer and all-around ace ‘Sheriff’ Bill Monighetti for providing feedback on my initial thoughts.
If you have suggestions on material I should know about or even write about in a future Labyrinthian, please contact me via email, [email protected], or Twitter @MattFtheOracle.
