Interview with TPOY Contender AshyL4rry
The RotoGrinders rankings and Tournament Player of the Year list are often full of grinders we all know very well, and who we see pass us on leaderboards every night, or that we avoid in head-to-head contests. Everyone knows STLCardinals84, maxdalury, theclone and SteveAvery. These are names we’ve become accustomed to seeing associated with success.
But one name, the name that spent most of the first few months of the year atop the TPOY list, stood out to me. AshyL4rry had an incredibly strong start to the year, and quickly found himself flying up our rankings. At least 30 of his biggest scores since he began tracking his DFS results through RotoGrinders have come since the start of 2015. So who is this relative newcomer to the tournament scene, and what can we learn from his success?
I was able to get some questions answered by AshyL4rry, and he shared some of his insights that reveal his perspective on daily fantasy sports.
Tell us a little about yourself.
My name is Shane Sleek and I work full time in the accounting field. I have always had a passion for mathematics and probability and that is what led me to pursue a bachelor’s degree in Finance and Economics. Throughout high school and college, I derived my sole source of income from trading stocks and playing poker. The same skills that are required to be successful in poker can easily be translated to DFS. Bankroll management is perhaps the single biggest key to success in poker and in DFS. Other factors that I attribute my success to are game selection, psychology (ability to control emotions during swings), game theory, and even the metagame aspects when factoring in your opponents’ strategies.
How long have you been playing fantasy sports? How long have you been playing DFS? What initially got you interested in DFS?
I started gaining an interest in sports statistics at age 10. I would write down the box scores and statistical leaders on a daily basis from the USA Today newspaper to see trends and fluctuations on players and to watch player development. Now, this is all done systematically through a term the sports industry is becoming very familiar with, sabermetrics. I started playing season long fantasy leagues in 2006 during my first year of college. I knew after the first year playing that all of my prior knowledge of sports and statistics would translate extremely well. I only played in two leagues my first year and won both of them. I then added more and more leagues and types of leagues in the following years, with the same level of success.
I didn’t start playing DFS until the end of 2013. My brother had been talking to me about FanDuel for months and how I absolutely needed to start playing daily fantasy sports. I kept pushing it off as I was spending so much time with my season long leagues that I didn’t pay much attention to his recommendation.
He finally talked me into it and I made a deposit to FanDuel in December of 2013 and played in an NBA tournament my first night.
I didn’t know a single player on my roster that night. I went in completely blind and was not aware of the numerous sites dedicated to researching DFS plays and strategies.
I remember starting off extremely well that night and thinking I would just be raking in money left and right in this daily fantasy sports stuff. Reality quickly set in as I had only players in the early games in my lineup and there were still 8 games left to play. I also then realized I had rostered a player that was injured and out for the next few weeks. I ended up not cashing for anything in that lineup, but I could tell after one night, with the right amount of research, there is a considerable amount of money to be won in this. After a few weeks learning and playing as much as I could, I discovered RotoGrinders and everything took off from there.
What sort of DFS player would you consider yourself to be? Are you more of a tournament player, or do you follow the “rules” with heavy cash game play and bankroll management?
I primarily am a tournament only player. It just suits my approach to the game much better. Through my poker background, I discovered the power of game theory and its vast applications to any game of chance. In its most basic form, game theory is the study of strategic decision making. The great thing about DFS tournaments is that the landscape is constantly evolving and changing and being one step ahead of the competition is the key to being a successful player.
When was your first big cash, and how did it change your approach?
My first big cash came in March of 2014. I had only been playing DFS for 3 months at the time so I was still relatively new. I was sitting in a great position in multiple lineups with my heaviest exposure being with Steph Curry still to play in the last game of the night. As soon as the Golden State game started, I remember refreshing my FanDuel browser after every point Curry scored and the adrenaline rush was incredible.
He ended up having a monster game with 31 points and 10 rebounds and I had a slew of top 10 finishes across all of the NBA tournaments on FanDuel that I played that night. That was really the breakthrough that led me to being able to play a wider range of tournaments and increase the amount of lineups I could play on a nightly basis.
So far this year, I counted at least 17 first-place finishes in fields with 1000 or more players. And those have come across different sports as well. (We were joking about you chasing me down on a PGA leaderboard on Victiv, as well.) Do you have an overarching approach to DFS that you feel benefits you?
Using statistics and probability can lead to success in any of the sports. There are a lot of overlapping strategies and keys to success in all of the sports. One reason I feel I have been so successful across all sports is that I am constantly aware of the current state of the DFS environment and aware of what my opponents are thinking each and every game slate. With the amount of information that is readily available at anyone’s disposal, you must find ways to diversify yourself from the field in order to be successful in large field tournaments.
However, no matter how much you know about a sport or can predict a player to do in a particular night, it is still a game of chance. You are going to be wrong on a player’s performance more than you will be correct. Any time a human element is involved, as is the case with sports, there are always opportunities to stray from the expected outcome.
What would you say is your strongest sport, and what approaches do you take to that sport to have so much success?
I would say my strongest sport is NBA. It’s really funny to say that now because 2 years ago I couldn’t name more than 5 players in the entire NBA. It just really fits my strengths with using statistics and probability to create optimal rosters.
NBA is by far the most predictable sport. Minutes are everything in NBA and nearly every night a player is presented with the opportunity to increase their workload due to injuries or ineffectiveness from the other starting five. However, usage rate must also be taken into account. Minutes are everything but if you take a player like Courtney Lee for example, an increase in minutes may not necessarily lead to more fantasy points.
Team situations are critical in NBA. Say a team like the Atlanta Hawks or San Antonio Spurs are playing a back to back in a meaningless game. The starters may start as usual, but to expect them to play their full allotment of minutes would be silly. These are the situations where proper research will find the backup SG or SF that may get a 6-8 minute boost above their average playing time and hit 7x value at min salary. I’m always searching for situations where value can be found each and every night.
Each sport has their own intricacies that really make DFS fascinating. Like I mentioned above, NBA is easily the most predictable sport on a nightly basis. Using statistical models to analyze the results for each sport would lead to the lowest standard deviation in NBA than any other sport on a short term basis.
Long term, season-long MLB is going to provide the lowest standard deviation when the season is over. This is why the most knowledgeable player in a season long MLB league generally will always finish in the top 3. Players will generally be right around their normalized statistical results year after year with a slight arc between their peak ages of 26-30.
However, daily MLB is going to show the most variance of any sport without question. A hitter only has 3-5 opportunities per night on average to create fantasy points. That may mean 5 hard hit balls to the warning track that will grace you with -1.25 points on FanDuel. It’s just the nature of the game.
Do you believe that apart from knowing every sport, there’s a certain element of just being a good DFS player and understanding the theory and metagame in addition to just picking players?
I believe once you understand the theory behind being successful in DFS, those skills will eventually translate to any sport. The metagame aspect of DFS is very interesting. Using a poker example, suppose you have an opponent to your left who has been 3 betting you constantly and you have folded each time. At first you may expect his range to be 1010-AA and AKs. After each subsequent raise you may reduce your view of his range, perhaps to the top 15% of all hands, even though he may just be running above expectation with the deck. Let’s say, after the third time he 3-bets you, you get frustrated and 4-bet shove all in with AJo. In the opponent’s perspective, who is familiar with metagame, he knows that you think he is 3-betting with a wide range and thus can reduce his range to get all his chips in. He gladly calls all in with AKo in a spot where he normally would not risk it. Due to the particular situation and the metagame behind the hand, he is now in a great situation to win a monster pot.
In DFS this is prevalent in many ways. Take for example a Coors Field game; you know the game is in a perfect situation to be high scoring, like most Coors field games are. However, you know that your opponents know this as well. So, factoring that in plus the likelihood of the players’ salaries being much higher than normal, you decide to go contrarian and fade the game. Next level thinking would be that you know that your opponents know that the game will be highly targeted so instead of fading yourself, you expect them to fade and then you target the game. There are so many interesting aspects just like these in DFS to consider. The Coors Field situation in MLB DFS is one of the most interesting topics in the entire DFS world. The first question that crosses any knowledgeable players minds on a nightly basis – Do the Rockies play at home? It’s super fascinating how one game can change the entire landscape of the slate.
Looking over some of the rosters from your big scores this year, I didn’t notice a ton of super contrarian plays on rosters that finished first overall. Some guys who were 5-10% owned but nothing crazy Do you go out of your way to pick contrarian plays? Do you just look for the best values? Does it differ based on slate and contests?
I generally let the type of slate and situations decide. There are some nights where a particular contrarian play is in a perfect situation. Earlier this year, when Taj Gibson got injured and Nikola Mirotic assumed the role of being the first big off the Chicago bench, I immediately knew he was a target of mine that night.
He had not had much fantasy production thus far due to the miniscule amount of minutes he received on a nightly basis. However, I knew from watching Chicago games and looking at his peripheral stats and fantasy points per minute, that any time Mirotic gets minutes, he will produce.
This was also a night where there were a large amount of other value plays so Mirotic would most definitely go overlooked. He was min salary on DraftKings and just above min salary on FanDuel. I had him in the large majority of my lineups and he ended up posting a monster 42 DK points and was only 4% owned. I won multiple GPP’s that night thanks to him.
Had this been 2 weeks later, after it was known Mirotic had posted 42 DK points when Taj was out, my exposure to him would have been drastically different. It is all about the perceived value on any given slate. It is constantly fluctuating and that’s what makes the game so great.
The one player I noticed that was particularly under the radar was Seattle’s Jermaine Kearse against Carolina in the division round of the playoffs. Do you remember what led you to rostering him?
I was actually very heavy on the SEA passing game in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs. I centered my teams on Brady and the Pats receivers and Russell Wilson and the Seahawks receivers.
On most weeks, targeting the SEA passing game in DFS is usually going to be a poor decision as they are simply not a great passing team. However, everyone was heavy on Lynch that week and I knew this was a perfect scenario to go contrarian. I figured the Panthers would do everything they could to shut down Lynch and contain the running game and make Wilson beat them through the air. The salaries for the WR’s made this a perfect scenario, with Kearse being a just a notch above min salary on FanDuel. Kearse was always the home run threat on SEA as he had multiple deep pass opportunities throughout the regular season and Wilson was always willing to give him a chance for the deep ball. It ended up paying off in a huge way with a 63-yard touchdown reception in the 2nd quarter.
By going heavy on the SEA receivers, it allowed me to roster Gronk and Murray in nearly every lineup. It was a situation where the contrarian play paid off huge and all of the top teams had a piece of the SEA passing game. I ended up winning or chopping nearly every major tournament on FanDuel that weekend.
Do you have any general advice or recommendations for players who are new or struggling to find success in DFS?
The first thing I would recommend doing is deciding if you have a tournament mindset or a cash game mindset and specialize in the area you feel most confident in. I see it numerous times where a great cash game player is trying to win large field tournaments or a great contrarian tournament player is playing 50/50’s and heads ups. Decide if you want to focus on building the best optimal lineup and grinding your profit slowly or if you are willing to withstand the brutal variance that tournaments will surely display for the possibility of the large payday.
Another piece of advice I cannot stress enough is the importance of bankroll management. Quite often, the difference between a profitable player and a recreation player is the understanding of proper bankroll management. I recommend everyone research the Kelly Criterion to determine how much of their bankroll they should be willing to risk on a nightly basis depending on the types of games and amount of diversification they are willing to do. Also, try to control your emotions during the inevitable downswings the game will present. No matter how much research, time, and dedication you put forth, there will be times where the outcome is simply unpredictable. Master the psychological aspect of the game and your bankroll will prosper.
Plan ahead, set goals and stay organized with your approach to DFS. Always think one step ahead of the competition and be ahead of the upcoming transformations of the DFS landscape. We are approaching the next wave of growth and the most successful players going forward will be the ones that are prepared and disciplined. Anyone reading this has already taken steps to becoming a better player by finding RotoGrinders. I wish everyone the best of luck!