Choosing the Right Daily Fantasy Basketball Game
About the Writer: Allen “Tippy” Tippy operates Fantasy Basketball Daily where he covers the day-to-day fantasy NBA scene for season long and daily league players. He’s been participating in Daily Fantasy Sports since 2007 across all of the major sites; concentrating mostly on the NBA. He’s a huge Alabama Crimson Tide fan, Chicago Cubs fan and an avid poker player. Tippy day-trades the S&P 500 Futures market and foreign currency markets for a living. He lives in West Virginia with his wife and seven year old daughter.
Choosing the Right Daily Fantasy Basketball Game
First, I’d like to thank Cal and Cameron for the chance to share a little fantasy basketball with you guys. I’ll be posting on Wednesdays throughout the NBA season and you can always find me on the forums if you have questions or comments on my articles. Since it’s still preseason, I figured the best place to start would be to sketch out a map of the overall daily fantasy basketball landscape describing exactly what kinds of games are out there for casual and expert players.
Since all fantasy owners love rankings lists, I’ve previewed six of my favorite daily fantasy basketball games below. It’s a pretty diverse group and provides a lot of variation in structure to keep things interesting for both casual and expert level players. For each of the following games, I have tried to break down the basic game details, as well as give you some idea of the skill level, research commitment and time commitment required for each game. This list isn’t all inclusive, so experiment with different sites to find your favorite game structures!
FantasySportsLive Salary Cap Game
This game was the beginning of my daily fantasy basketball career and I think it’s still one of the best games out there. It’s played as a salary cap game with the following positions:
| Roster | 2 PG’s | 2 SG’s | 2 SF’s | 2 PF’s | 1 C |
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The player stats used are:
| Scoring | points (1) | rebounds (1) | assists (1) | steals (2) | blocks (2) | turnovers (-1) |
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A players salary price is a very simple calculation of the total number of fantasy points scored divided by the total number of games played, much like you would calculate Kobe‘s real life per game scoring average. The unique thing about this setup is that FSL offers several different skill levels for this game ranging from no cap, to loose cap to very tight cap. If you are a casual NBA fan who recognizes names like LeBron and Kobe, then the no cap and loose cap games are the way to go. The generous salary cap gives you the ability to play most of the better players in the league on a nightly basis. If you are one of those guys who wants to dig really deep into the Luke Ridnour’s and Anderson Varejao’s of the NBA world, then the tight cap game could be for you. The multiple salary cap levels offered by FSL let you choose how much time and research you want to commit.
FantasySportsLive Autopick Game
This game is played with the same positions and statistics as the FSL salary cap game, however rather than a salary cap, the draft process is performed by you and your opponent ranking your top players at each position and then the computer conducts the auto pick draft just before tip-off of that night‘s real NBA action. The game is attractive if you have limited time for research or if you don’t want to dig into the lesser known players. The game also has the distinct advantage that your team will always be different from your opponents team at every position.
Fanduel.com Salary Cap Game
The salary cap game at Fanduel is another favorite and it has it’s own personality that makes it different from the FSL salary cap game. Fanduel uses the same positions and statistics as FSL, however the main difference is the way in which the player’s salaries are calculated. Instead of using a simple average points system, Fanduel assigns dollar salaries on a weighted basis for their player pricing system. This adds an additional variable to the game and often creates situations where a player is mispriced due to their recent performance. The Fanduel game requires a little more attention to detail and recent past performance than other salary cap games. Due to the pricing mechanism, on any given night two players could be priced completely different on FSL and Fanduel. The real trick is to find the players who have been mispriced due to their recent performance. Fanduel has two salary cap levels, however both levels are generous in their amounts and allow for the selection of good players.
365FantasySports All-Star H2H
This is a fascinating game that is very addictive. It requires less time commitment than the salary cap games above, but it still takes a good bit of skill to play. If you are the type of person who likes to research your daily picks, this game allows you to focus your attention on a small group of players, therefore maximizing the efficiency of your research time. The best way to describe this game is that it’s like a multiple choice test. There are ten matchups where you either pick player A or player B. That’s it. You simply research the two player matchup and pick the best option. Repeat ten times to complete your fantasy roster. 365FantasySports does a good job of creating two player matchups that are fairly equal, so the game gets tricky!
DraftZone NBA Live Sit and Draft Game
For the guys who draft season long leagues and find live drafts to be the most fun part of fantasy basketball, this is the same type of setup, but on a daily basis. This is one of the harder games out there and the time/research commitment is pretty high, especially if you do a 5 or 10 team live draft. In addition to knowledge about the players, you also need to develop a unique draft strategy for that day’s games. The rosters are only broken down into Guards/Forwards/Centers and there is no salary to apply. DraftZone uses the following scoring:
| Scoring | points (.5) | three pointers (.5) | rebounds (1) | assists (1) | steals (1) | blocks (1) | turnovers (-1) | triple double (5) |
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The clock is ticking and you have to make the correct draft pick, be prepared and choose wisely!
FantasyFactor.com Factors Game
This game is perfect for casual daily fantasy players who like to pick from the best players in the NBA every night. The game is played like a no cap salary game, but instead uses a tricky thing called a ‘fantasy factor’. The game has 2 PG’s, 2 SG’s, 2 SF’s, 2 PF and 2 C. The first step is to make your selections at each position, much like a no cap game, and then you get two ‘double factors’ and one ‘triple factor’ to assign to the players of your choosing on your roster. The factors you assign then multiply that fantasy players score for the day. For example, if you choose Kobe at SG and he scores 25 fantasy points for the night and you have a ‘double factor’ assigned to Kobe, then you get 50 points for the contest. Choose wisely for the assignment of your three “fantasy factors”!
Those are my top six game structures and you will find me playing all of them this season. I’m sure I’ll be adding to the list in the weeks to come, so let me know if you find some other structures that you like and I’ll include them in my next article. If you have questions or comments, feel free to track me down in the forums. See you next week!
- Tippy