The Greatest “Cheat Sheet” In DFS
Each week in The Oracle, OWS team members will take on the key strategy questions from that week’s slate :: sharing their thoughts on how they plan to approach these critical elements from a roster-construction, game theory, and leverage perspective.
NFL DFS on Thanksgiving can be a wild ride and extremely fun. Especially since the NFL moved to having three games on the day, it’s pretty much a full day of football and fun. The tricky thing about this is that it is such a unique slate and many of us have a lot of other commitments on this day. It is easy to be tempted by an extra day of football at this point in the season, especially with the monster contests that the sites offer, but the nature of the slate is so unique that there is a tight line to balance of playing too much and overextending the bankroll.
Considering the nature of the day, size of the contests, and small number of games – do you have a preferred approach from a contest selection (size, price, and format) and/or bankroll approach?
My answer to this question may not be directly applicable to you, but in a sense, there are some elements that copy/paste onto whatever your situation is.
For me, this is one of the busier work weeks of the year. This is less true now than it was in the past, as I handle a lot less of the “business” side than I used to, and with the Journal, I feel the squeeze/strain of content less than I did in the past. But the fact still stands that Thanksgiving is sort of our last big push on the site with sales/marketing, and with the popularity of the Thanksgiving slate, we essentially have a “Main Slate” to help subscribers get ready for on Thursday, and we I turn around on Friday and have to be ready for podcasts, Player Grid, etc., while making sure I’m not skimping on “along the way” thoughts in the Journal as well.
Because of the double-squeeze on this trip, all surrounded by travel, family, etc., I usually tell myself that I don’t have to play the Thanksgiving slate at all. I mention this every year in some form or other, and if you’ve been reading my content long enough, you know that every year, I actually do end up playing the Thanksgiving slate (I think there was one year when it was particularly ugly and I actually did take the slate off — but otherwise, I’ve played it every year I have played DFS), but even just giving myself permission to not play the slate takes a bit of the pressure/load off my mind and allows me to feel the strain of the week far less than I otherwise might.
When I inevitably do play the slate, I usually play about 25% of my normal Main Slate bankroll. To me, it’s a bonus slate, and I don’t want to stretch myself too thin by putting too much pressure on the slate itself.
Your situation is different than mine, of course; but also, there’s a good chance this is a busier-than-normal week for you as well (or at the very least: this is a week with a very different structure than your typical week). If you don’t feel like you’re gaining a substantial edge on this slate, I think leaning into a similar approach is wise.
At the same time, if you instead have more time than normal for DFS this week, and if you’re seeing angles on the slate you like, you can recognize that most people are shorter on time than normal, and this might be a reason to be a bit more aggressive than you might typically be. Don’t overextend yourself, of course! — but if you’re spotting edge, there’s no reason not to lean into it while it’s there.
I personally always set aside time on Thanksgiving for DFS (sometimes to my wife’s dismay) – to Mike’s point, a lot of people are playing very casually on this slate, they might set a lineup but they won’t check in throughout the day and late swap, and so to me this is one of the highest-edge slates of the season. That doesn’t mean you’ll always be profitable on it, of course, as sharp rosters flop all the time…but the EV is there.
Normally on a short slate, I don’t enter as much volume as I would on a main slate, but Thanksgiving is the exception to me here. Personally I treat it like a regular main slate and try to get around my normal full slate buy-ins, because I feel like the edge is great and I want to hammer it. That approach may not work for you, though! If you go this route, make sure you have the appropriate amount of time to dedicate to DFS, both in prep before the slate and then being able to watch the slate as it progresses – one of the biggest advantages of Thanksgiving DFS is how the games are spread out, which allows you to assess where you are and react by swapping, and if you aren’t able to utilize this edge, I would recommend either not playing or just playing a modest amount for fun.
TL;DR – Only enter as many rosters as you feel you can effectively watch and swap if needed.
First off, consider this – Thanksgiving weekend is the most viewed weekend of football outside of the Super Bowl. Now relate that to DFS – size of contests, skill of the average entry in contests, familial obligations, shortened week, time to prepare, etc. The edge is tangible this holiday weekend. That said, we should really be viewing this slate as another data point to amplify our expected value. As in, if you are a losing player, more volume simply means your money will bleed faster with an additional data point. But we here at OWS can use the additional data point to realize our equity sooner. All of that to say – nothing really changes for me outside of a few additional Milly Maker entries. Play your game and realize your equity faster!
For me, one of my greatest edges is my ability to see beyond the projections (ownership and otherwise) to be able to identify what the field is likeliest to see out of a slate. That edge is amplified on a short slate (although I haven’t quite perfected how to harness it for showdown slates just yet), meaning I’ll be looking to attack this weekend with little remorse. I plan on maxing the $5 Milly Maker.
Pricing seems far tighter on this year’s Thanksgiving slate than in past years, which to me is a very good thing from an EV perspective. Tighter pricing forces tougher decisions and tougher decisions are an advantage for those of us who go deeper and see both the likeliest scenarios and *how* games may play differently than the surface level analysis would suggest. As such, the next part of my answer gets a little more complicated.
The “optimal” approach to this slate probably involves a lot of rosters in lower dollar contests and utilizing variable probability and game theory strategies to late swap and make decisions to give ourselves a direct path to first place. These three game slates with staggered starts provide a greater opportunity to truly go down these rabbit holes and maximize EV and paths to first than any other traditional slate because of how much information we obtain in terms of ownership, player results, and positional scoring. The problem is time. Actually executing these strategies in the optimal way requires more than just checking your phone between games and, frankly, a family holiday is a tough spot for me to be doing that at this point in my life with two kids under 6 and grandparents with questionable health. With that in mind, I will probably limit my number of rosters this year so that I can enjoy the day but give those rosters the focus necessary to play in an optimal way. Not the most fun answer, but I am sure there are a lot of you who can relate.
The most common and comfortable way to build a roster on a slate like this with three games that all have relatively high totals and popular players will be to “account for” each game, and often each team. A quarterback with two of his teammates and one of his opponents, then one player from each team from each of the other two games, and a defense correlated with one of the running backs, is kind of the default “cover all my bases” approach that people will naturally gravitate towards. Another common roster construction will be a QB plus two teammates and two opponents accompanied by a “mini” from a second game, with a running back and defense being selected from the one remaining game. As I see it, there are three things that are psychologically very difficult for people to do on slates like this::
Putting all of those things together, we can see that leaning heavily into a specific game environment can pay off in a massive way if it comes together – simply because it is so hard to pull the trigger on. With that in mind, which game on the Thanksgiving Slate appeals to you the most from an overstack perspective and why?
