This article is part of our Ask the Shark series.
With the international break in full effect, I've recently dabbled in some daily fantasy NBA. It's a sport I don't follow in any way whatsoever, so my attempts have focused around translating fundamental concepts that apply to soccer and DFS in general: finding arbitrage opportunities in pricing, weighing the strength of positional pools for lineup construction and predicting ownership for GPPs.
While this sound generalist approach can get you a far way to being competitive in contests, I've found that the missing ingredient is truly understanding the "core concepts" of the particular sport at hand and having the experience to apply them correctly on a consistent basis. In fact, this is the broader subject of many questions submitted for this column, so I'd like to delve deeper into it.
Core concepts, as I'd define them, are variables of analysis that are extremely important factors impacting player scores and can only be utilized in the context of that specific sport. Sportsbook money lines, spreads and totals are bonafide go-to information for a slate, but not necessarily a core concept for any particular sport since it applies generally to all of them. However, how you utilize this information may be different between sports.
In my short time playing NBA DFS, I've learned that the games to target are ones with a high total and a low spread. The former was obvious - more scoring means more fantasy points players can attain. The latter, however, was directly oppositional to what I was accustomed
With the international break in full effect, I've recently dabbled in some daily fantasy NBA. It's a sport I don't follow in any way whatsoever, so my attempts have focused around translating fundamental concepts that apply to soccer and DFS in general: finding arbitrage opportunities in pricing, weighing the strength of positional pools for lineup construction and predicting ownership for GPPs.
While this sound generalist approach can get you a far way to being competitive in contests, I've found that the missing ingredient is truly understanding the "core concepts" of the particular sport at hand and having the experience to apply them correctly on a consistent basis. In fact, this is the broader subject of many questions submitted for this column, so I'd like to delve deeper into it.
Core concepts, as I'd define them, are variables of analysis that are extremely important factors impacting player scores and can only be utilized in the context of that specific sport. Sportsbook money lines, spreads and totals are bonafide go-to information for a slate, but not necessarily a core concept for any particular sport since it applies generally to all of them. However, how you utilize this information may be different between sports.
In my short time playing NBA DFS, I've learned that the games to target are ones with a high total and a low spread. The former was obvious - more scoring means more fantasy points players can attain. The latter, however, was directly oppositional to what I was accustomed to in soccer DFS. For soccer, the more lopsided the matchup, the *more* you want to roster the key players from that heavily favored team, as they'll see a hefty amount of possession, shots and attacking stats.
The primary reason for the conceptual discrepancy is the usage of substitutions in the sport. No matter how big the blowout in soccer, with only three substitutions, most of the leading side will still end up playing the full game. In basketball, however, with free usage of subs in and out, the leading side in a blowout will typically rotate more of their bench players on the court and therefore cannibalize minutes from the team's starters and their fantasy values. It's a core concept in NBA DFS that I didn't even realize, let alone completely understand how to weigh into my analysis for lineup construction.
So what then are the core concepts of soccer for DFS? I believe there are three primary ones: match location, player field positioning and set pieces. The first is fairly simple: the home side in soccer is expected to and typically plays with a more attacking posture. While there is definitely a home-field advantage in all sports, it is much more exaggerated in soccer because of the points awarded in the table for a win (three) versus a draw (one). The common parlance during the regular season is that teams aim to win at home and draw on the road. Even in matchups of relatively uneven strength, home sides will typically garner at least somewhat more possession and attacking opportunities. Weighing this into your selections for DFS can, at times, be only a small upgrade or downgrade for specific players and other times can lead you to a complete fade or an elite chalk play.
Player field positioning in soccer is immensely important when considering your lineup selections on specific DFS sites as the scoring systems are vastly different. On DraftKings, due to crosses being scored and defensive peripherals less so, players who line up wide in their team's formation have a higher floor value. On FanDuel, however, where crosses are not scored and more defensive peripherals awarded, it is the players who line up centrally in their team's formation who have higher floors. For GPP selections, everything ends up vice-versa, though. The safe floor plays on one site are many times the high upside ceiling plays on the other. Not recognizing these distinctions will likely lead to some hefty consequences in your results.
Lastly, and if you've been playing soccer DFS for any decent amount of time, you'd know the core concept that set piece takers are typically the top player selections for a specific team. Regardless of the matchup, the game will see an ample number of corners and dead-ball fouls, and these free kicks will nearly always be counted as at least a cross, if not a shot, and can easily lead to a goal or assist. As most teams have certain designated players who claim this responsibility, these selections in DFS typically provide the highest floor, and possibly also the highest ceiling plays on the slate.
Although this sounds like a simple core concept to exploit, much of the analysis needs to be made when there are multiple players on the field who can share these set-piece responsibilities. Sometimes it's two players, one for left-sided kicks and one for right-sided ones. Sometimes it's one player for all corners and one for all direct free kicks. A lot of the times, depending on how the team lines up on that day, it could be a hodgepodge of several players or one who ends up with a monopoly. One player's value may take a significant hit or bump depending on another player's presence or lack thereof on the field, so you must be very aware of these situations when starting XIs are announced an hour before kickoff.
Just as with my foray into basketball, these core concepts in DFS soccer may not be realized at all by many newer players (and there's the edge), or may not be truly understood well enough by those who have been playing for quite some time. Even if you consider yourself aware and experienced with these core concepts, it's never a bad idea to reassess how you're applying them on a day-to-day basis. Can you think of any other core concepts for DFS soccer?
If you would like to submit a question for this weekly column, feel free to either post it in the comment section below, tweet it to me @blenderhd, or email me at jordan@fantasyflush.com.
