This week, we published a lot of content that will be applicable for a while. Within this FantasyLabs Friday Recap, you can find links to all of that content, for your weekend reading pleasure.
General
– Video: Introducing the FantasyLabs Vegas Dashboard
The Vegas lines have more value in baseball than any other sport, primarily because baseball is a holistic team sport that isn’t timed, so every good thing that happens for one player is good for every one of his teammates. I’ve created a tutorial explaining how to use the Vegas Dashboard and some of the insights I think we can draw from looking at the lines and real-time public betting percentages.
– Video: Using Filters in the FantasyLabs Multi-Lineup Tool
Adam Levitan shows how he uses specific filters when generating multiple lineups in the FantasyLabs tool.
– The Process of Not Being Awful at DFS, by Matthew Freedman
Each of us is responsible for creating our own process. My process involves heavily relying on people who know more than I do or who think about information in ways that I wouldn’t have considered. So I read John Daigle’s daily slate breakdown. I read each Trend of the Day and Plays of the Day article. I watch the CSURAM88 videos and the Bales videos. I read basically everything on the site. (And then I try to avoid reading as much as possible of the copious DFS bullshit that’s out there.)
NFL
– Why ‘Best Player Available’ Is a Shortsighted NFL Draft Strategy, by Jonathan Bales
Every team is going to try to select the “Best Player Available,” but we shouldn’t be so shortsighted as to think that always means the player highest on the board. Things like position scarcity, public opinion, and, yes, even team needs should be considerations. And, because it assuredly carries the least uncertainty, I think need should be a much, much larger factor for teams than what it seems to be right now.
– The NFL Draft, Why We Care So Much, and Why Rookies Win Us DFS Money, by Matthew Freedman
NFL rookies are more impactful than rookies in any other sport. They also play in the sport that has the smallest sample size of games, and so (in comparison to other rookies) they tend to be mispriced for the largest percentage of their rookie campaigns. And, as a cohort, rookies probably tend to be mispriced more than veterans (whose situations and prior production enable platforms to price them more accurately). For this reason, NFL rookies might be the most important professional athletes in the entire DFS industry.
– Ezekiel Elliott at No. 4, Compounding Mistakes, and 2016 NFL DFS, by Matthew Freedman
In DFS lineups (across a variety of sports), there are some positions that simply matter more than others. As someone attempting to construct a winning lineup, you are served best by devoting capital to the positions that matter. Also, don’t fall into the trap of trying to redeem yourself now for mistakes you previously made. By definition, the only people concerned with redemption are losers. Learn from your past mistakes but don’t try to pretend as if you can undo what you did.
– The Daily Fantasy Sports Roundtable: #13 – NFL Draft
Matthew Freedman is joined by TJ Hernandez, Kevin Cole, and Adam Levitan, who discuss the DFS importance of NFL rookies.
PGA
– Video: CSURAM88: PGA Lineup Review for the Valero Texas Open
Peter Jennings (CSURAM88) breaks down his Thunderdome PGA lineup for the 2016 Valero Texas Open.
– Video: My Player Model for the Zurich Classic of New Orleans (Premium)
Peter Jennings (CSURAM88) breaks down his personal PGA model for this week’s Zurich Classic of New Orleans.
– Final Thoughts on Vegas-Based Pricing, by Colin Davy
Golf, unlike other sports, is entirely forward-looking in its pricing when it’s based on odds to win. That’s why you can have players like Patrick Rodgers, who are priced $7,200 one week and $10,500 the next week when they play in much weaker fields and go from lower-to-middle players to tournament favorites. If you ever see analysis based on salary change or hear the phrase “His salary hasn’t caught up,” it’s based on a fundamental misunderstanding of how PGA pricing works and you should probably ignore it.
– Chaos Theory, PGA Adjusted Baselines, and More Chaos Theory, by Matthew Freedman
On the one hand, a course-specific Plus/Minus is based on a relatively small sample of past salaries and performances and thus might be a little too uncertain to trust for cash games. That’s an important caveat. On the other hand, a course-specific Plus/Minus (with all of its subtleties and potentially noiseless signals) could provide subscribers with a massive edge in tournaments. I believe that our course-specific Plus/Minus function is perhaps the most unknown and undervalued of our PGA tools.
– Using Vegas Implied Odds to Retrodict Pre-DraftKings PGA Data, by Bryan Mears
For PGA DFS at DraftKings, the correlation between implied Vegas odds of a tournament win and a player’s salary is strong enough that we could perhaps retrodict player salaries for tournaments that occurred before DraftKings even existed and, in doing so, further strengthen our findings of what stats are most important for players at a particular course and even for a particular salary tier.
MLB
– The Daily Fantasy Flex, MLB: 4/29/16 Main Slate
Peter Jennings and Jay Persson break down the 4/29/16 MLB DFS main slate.
– MLB Plays of the Day: 4/29/16, Main Slate
Ramsay Bolton was lucky to shed the suffix “Snow” (even though this change didn’t benefit Sansa Stark). The entire cast of Ocean’s Eleven was lucky that (the character played by) Andy Garcia hired only incompetent staff at all three of his casinos. But no one is luckier than Juan Nicasio.
– MLB DFS 4/29/16 Slate Breakdown, by John Daigle
Corey Kluber’s production has been the opposite of what was expected in his last two starts — he got pelted despite being in a terrific spot, then followed that up by shutting down one of the better offenses in all of baseball —but there’s no reason to consider him anything other than chalk tonight. Not only is his $11,000 salary at FanDuel entirely too cheap (in comparison to DraftKings), but he’s projected to allow only 3.2 runs. He’s also the only pitcher that’s allowed a single-digit line-drive percentage (8%) in the last 15 days.
– Video: How I Build MLB Lineups on FantasyLabs (Premium)
Jonathan Bales created a long-ish video walking you through a typical lineup creation process. There’s a whole lot of stuff
– Adjusting to FanDuel’s New MLB Scoring Changes, by Bryan Mears
So do you still want to target guys with RBI and run potential? Of course, and probably even more so. However, once you start docking the other categories for not increasing, that’s where you can find some discrepancies. For example, guys who steal bases and draw a lot of walks as a large percentage of their fantasy value will see a slight hit in value. It will slightly adjust the value ratio of batters to pitchers. It will slightly decrease the value of home runs, although that’s probably so slight (because home runs also naturally include an RBI and run) it’s not worth adjusting for.
– Regressing to the Mean: The KBXE Review, Vol. 1, by Mitchell Block
Being able to pinpoint potential indicators of future regression is an attribute that can be incredibly profitable in the world of daily fantasy sports. Fading a high-owned player on a hot streak or targeting a struggling low-owned option can make or break your night. With The KBXE Review, I’ll do my best to identify pitching options who are due for regression, both positive and negative, with the use of KBXE, a statistic that I created in the hopes of quantifying many of the components we put into consideration when rostering a pitcher.
– State of the Stacks, Vol. 1, by Mitchell Block
In this space each week I’ll take a look at which teams, as a whole, are trending up through the lens of of our advanced stats. Understanding which teams are hitting the ball hard, and whether they are producing or not, is a great way to determine which lineups may lend themselves towards stacking.
– Rowdy Roddy Piper, Maria Konnikova, and the Jake Arrieta Experiment, by Kelly McCann
Why is it hard for me, a contrarian, to be a contrarian when it comes to daily fantasy sports? As a tournament player, I want to hate the chalk but so many times my brain gets in the way. What I know in theory will win tournaments and what my brain thinks will actually happen in the games are two exceedingly different things.
– On the Contrary: Shhhh, Jose Fernandez Still Has Upside, by Brandon Hopper
Looking at Jose Fernandez’s advanced stats gives me some hesitancy. His strike ratio is down two percent in the last 15 days. Also, his pitch speed is down 1.4 miles per hour and his opponents’ exit velocity is up three MPH. Despite this, the distance batters have hit the ball is down nine feet and the hard-hit percentage is down five percent. Both of those stats rank fifth among pitchers in today’s slate.
– MLB Trend Testing: wOBA & Salary Change, by Bill Monighetti
In this week’s article, I wanted to try to use wOBA splits along with Salary Change to create a trend to be used for FanDuel cash games in MLB DFS. I generally create trends for FanDuel anyway, but with this trend in particular, I think it is important that we are looking at FanDuel.
– MLB Recent Form Report: 4/25/16, by Bill Monighetti
There’s been a lot of talk this season about Madison Bumgarner, particularly whether or not his lingering foot issues are going to have a strong impact on his performance. I personally started to worry when this FanGraphs piece told me I should start to worry a couple of weeks ago. Since then, though, Bumgarner has exceeded value in two of three games against the Dodgers (twice) and Diamondbacks. Let’s use our advanced stats to take a look at Bumgarner’s recent performance.
NBA
– NBA DFS 4/29/16 Slate Breakdown, by John Daigle
I don’t know about you, but I’ve learned my lesson in fading Paul George. He’s mandatory at FanDuel given his 97% Bargain Rating, but even at DraftKings (where his salary is now $10k) I wouldn’t look to avoid him. DeMarre Carroll, on the other hand, is clearly hobbled and ineffective. His time in their rotation is still cutting into the prospects of Patrick Patterson logging 30-plus minutes, but I would much rather pay down for the latter than worry about Carroll in any format.
Trends
– MLB 4/25/16: Favored Pitchers With Decreasing Velocity, by Jonathan Cabezas
– MLB 4/26/16: April Stacks with Low Vegas Totals and Hidden Upside, by Matthew Freedman
– MLB 4/27/16: How Altitude Affects Fly-Ball Hitters, by Jay Persson
– MLB 4/28/16: High Upside Pitchers at Coors Field, by Bryan Mears
– MLB 4/29/16: Elite ISO with Negative ISO Split, by Mitchell Block
