Interview with WFBC, PBC Qualifier and Monster Winner Tinderella
When a daily fantasy sports player puts together an ideal lineup on a particular night of play, and spreads that lineup across major tournaments and qualifiers, it can lead to a pretty significant payday.
That’s what happened for FanDuel user Tinderella on Monday, who finished first in the Playboy Baseball Championship qualifier to earn a seat at that live final, tied for first in the WFBC qualifier, and tied for the top spot in the $300 Monster GPP. He was kind enough to give us his time to answer a few questions about his approach to DFS.
Tinderella, otherwise known as Vincent, is a former poker player, who like many from the world of online poker, made his way over to DFS after “Black Friday.”
“I played a high volume on Pokerstars up until Black Friday in 2011,” he told me. “If you spend any amount of time on the 2+2 forums (poker’s equivalent to RG), you’re usually pretty plugged into different areas of the gambling world. So I’ve been generally aware of DFS for 4 years now.”
But he didn’t immediately dive into DFS, instead opting to play live poker after the online game’s collapse. But a quick look around the tables he was playing at left him wanting to avoid a similar fate to the players he was competing against, and he decided to do some research into DFS rather than continuing to spend his recreational cash at live poker tables. It was then that he reached out to former poker colleague and FanDuel commercial star Erik “ehafner” Hafner.
“He was cool enough to respond, and we’ve been corresponding since then,” Vincent said of Hafner. “You know how athletes have a tendency to say they are “humbled” after success? Erik actually is humble. Sometimes I don’t even know if he’s had a big score or not. And when we first started chatting, he didn’t big time me at all. Really cool.”
So with the guidance of one of DFS’s leading players, Vincent dove into the daily game, and has built his way up to his big night on Monday night. Prior to his triple takedown of FD’s biggest contests, his biggest hit came at the end of the NBA season.
“I’m from South Florida and am a pretty big Heat or whichever-team-is-playing-the-Cavs fan, so I follow a lot of the beat reporters. That evening, I got wind of a relatively unnoticed Erik Spoelstra quote that insinuated that the Heat would bench all their starters. I was able to get good exposure to Michael Beasley (be right back, washing my hands) on a night he got 72 points for a minimum salary. My cash lineup chopped 7th in the Slam, and I hit a few of the high rollers with a derivative of it.”
With his big cashes in the Slam and Monday’s contest, it should be no surprise to learn that Vincent is a tournament player. “Not only do they offer more upside, but they are a lot more dynamic and interesting because you have to try and predict what your opponents are planning on doing, and then counter with the appropriate adjustment.” This feeds off of his poker background, because as he told me, “Poker players are really good at recognizing patterns and using that information to exploit inefficiencies of their opponent(s). Online poker players have even more training because the fast action does a good job simulating what it is like to construct lineups in a time crunch.”
So what about the lineup that brought him so much success on Monday?
“I had Kluber over Harvey over Sale for the evening, and my exposure reflected that. Kluber has great upside and was coming off of a historic game.”
We all know the importance of getting pitching right on FanDuel, and this lineup definitely got the pitcher position correct. But it’s the low-owned catcher option he selected that set him apart, and he landed on him thanks to his local announcer’s observations.
“Marlins’ TV color commentator Tommy Hutton has been raving about Realmuto’s ‘good at-bats’. I don’t really know what that means, but in the seventh inning he had what I would call a ‘good at-bat’ when he hit a home run.”
So what advice does Vincent have to offer for fellow tournament players? Find out who the popular plays are and learn how to use that information. “I would recommend fading the dfssports subreddit,” he told me. “Any time there is a website that perfectly exemplifies internet group think, and you work in an industry that rewards antifragility, you should skim it to see what ‘inside the box’ looks like.”
Oh, and as for his tie for the WFBC seat? He splits that honor with none other than his old friend Erik. “Despite having no correspondence for a few days, I tied with him,” he told me, and would explain that they plan on chopping the seat, but Vincent admits he’d rather have his name on it, since “Erik gets far too much face time.”