Daily fantasy sports, especially daily fantasy football has come on strong recently in the fantasy industry. I have been attacking this unique format for the last two years. I am hoping I can transfer some of the strategies I have learned along the way over to you guys.

Each week I’ll be posting two-to-three articles with information regarding tournament plays, cash game plays, and a recap of my prior week in daily fantasy football. I’ll also be including screenshots of my bankroll along the way so you can track my progress throughout the season with me.¹

If you haven’t signed up for DraftKings or FanDuel yet, you can receive a deposit bonus of up to $600.00 on DraftKings by signing up with this link. You can also snag a deposit bonus on FanDuel here.

Daily Fantasy Football Bankroll Management

As professional daily fantasy sports player Drew Dinkmeyer points out in episode 10 of our podcast, RotoViz Radio, one of the misconceptions about DFS professionals is that people assume they win every night. While they typically win more than they lose, they go through losing streaks just like everyone else. I fully expect to have weeks where I don’t profit, that’s the nature of the beast. That’s why it is important to stress proper bankroll management when trying to make money and become a long-term winner. I tend to view it as a marathon, and not a sprint. The goal is to see a profit after the 17-week regular season. Bankroll management allows you to absorb some of the losses during this 17-week daily fantasy sports grind.

I can’t stress bankroll management enough when it comes to playing daily fantasy sports. During the NFL season, I recommend utilizing no more than 10-12 percent of your bankroll in play in a given week. For this series, I will be depositing $1,000 on to DraftKings and FanDuel. So, for the first week I’d have roughly $100 in play on each site.

One thing I learned from Jonathan Bales’ books “Fantasy Football for Smart People,” is that you should consider your bankroll anything that you’re comfortable losing. If you deposit $100 and plan to withdraw your funds if you fall below $50, then your bankroll would be $50, not $100. Deposit whatever you’re comfortable putting at risk, and then use 10-12 percent of that as your money that you put in play every week.

However, it should be noted that I am not playing the first week because I will be out of town and I don’t typically like to play unless I can monitor my lineups until rosters lock. I don’t look at DFS as just gambling, I don’t play it for the exhilaration. However, I do enjoy it very much and I look at it as another source of income–just as you would look at any job.

Game Selection

To grind out a steady profit throughout the season, the foundation of your games should be made up of head-to-head and 50/50 cash games. An ideal spread of games would be 70 percent of your bankroll going to head-to-head and 50/50 games, 20 percent into any combination of three, five, 10 or 20 man games, and 10 percent into tournaments, also known as guaranteed prize pools (GPPs).

By mixing up your games, you’re able to minimize your risk, while also having a relatively high ceiling. If you’re rolling out half your bankroll into GPPs, you’re going to bust very quickly. I did that when I first started playing DFS two years ago. You see those giant prize pools and you get all wide-eyed looking at the first place prize and think to yourself “hey, I know a lot about football. I can do that easily.” It sounds like a great idea until rosters lock and things don’t pan out how you imagined.

The optimal thing to do if you want to profit long-term in daily fantasy sports is to focus on head-to-head and 50/50 cash games as the foundation of your daily fantasy sports play, while supplementing that with GPPs and smaller tournaments.

Stay Tuned

Each and every week I’ll be posting the recap of the prior week and my strategy heading into the coming week for daily fantasy sports. I’ll also be supplementing that with my tournament and cash game strategies for the upcoming slate.

ICYMI:

DraftKings is rolling back their Millionaire Maker again this week. I interviewed DraftKings professional Jonathan Bales  about how to attack this tournament. I also interviewed 2011 FFFC champion, Chris Prince about how he approaches large field tournaments like the Millionaire Maker.

Check out DraftKings sign up & receive FREE ENTRY into the Millionaire Maker with your first deposit

 

 

1. Pressure is on now . . .  (back)