Join the Splash X RotoGrinders $15K CFB Playoffs Pick'em ATS Contest!
College football expert Jon Schiller discusses Round 1 strategy for the CFB Playoff Pick’em contest on Splash Sports.
$15K CFB Playoffs Pick’em ATS Contest
The college football regular season may be wrapped up, but thanks to Splash Sports, the action is far from over! Enter our CFB pick’em ATS contest for a chance at some serious cash. Click here to sign up for Splash’s $15K CFB Playoff Pick’em ATS contest.
Contest Breakdown
I was hoping we would have some bracket-style pick’em contests for the CFB playoff, and Splash Sports is coming through with guaranteeing a lot of these contests on their site. They are definitely innovating over there, and it’s something to look into, especially considering the contest would only have a 10% rake if filled. In contrast, the industry standard for DFS contests seems to be around 15-20%.
Effectively, you will pick against the spread on every single game that is played during the CFB playoffs in an attempt to accrue the most number of points in the pool. The points per round are 1 for the first round, 2 for the quarterfinals, 4 for the semi-finals, and 5 for the championship game. I like the championship game only being 5 here, as it being something like 8 could really shake up the standings and make the first couple of rounds less relevant.
There is also a “best pick” available for both the first and the second rounds, which can give you an extra point in the first round and two extra points in the second round. This should obviously be used on the highest-confidence pick as it is integral to get as many points as possible with only 11 possible games to generate points.
Picks are made against the spread, and the spreads for the contest will lock on Tuesdays at 12:00 p.m. ET. If you make a pick before then, the spreads will continue changing until that time. Picks will also lock at the start of each game, so your pick can be changed until game time.
Contest Strategy
The first thing we want to do is look at the payout structure – we have 20% going first to first place. While the 20%, 15%, 12%, and 8% payout structure isn’t the most top-heavy we see in DFS land, it still is fairly top-heavy, and we want to focus on how to win first place.
We are going to be using game theory a lot towards the end of the contest, but over-relying on it in the first round is likely a mistake. We want to get the first-round picks right, and if we assume that the markets are fairly efficient, we should see a mostly even distribution of picks early in the contest. The one caveat is that if there is large line movement after the Tuesday spread lock, we are likely to see a higher percentage of the field follow that value, which could open up a chance for us to get different than the field. However, if we are towards the top of the contest, we would like to take the higher probability outcome. (I.E., Will Howard picks up an injury in practice on Wednesday after spread locks; Tennessee moves from +7.5 to +3.5 by Saturday night – we have won our first 3 games, and we likely will take the Tennessee +7.5 pick purely for value.) If we have lost our first 3 games, we need to catch up, considering we are likely toast anyway, so we would grab OSU -7.5 and hope to gain a point on the field.
Another thing we can do here is to look at the handle on each game over at ScoresAndOdds. It’s not going to tell us everything about how the contest is going to play, but it’s going to give us a little bit more information. Right now, for example, it has 70% of bets AND 70% of the money on Indiana +7.5. Now, we would expect if that continues, and the sharps are on Indiana, we will see that line shift a little bit closer to 6, but if it remains at 7.5 during spread lock and the handle remains the same, we can infer that Indiana is likely to have more picks in this contest making Notre Dame -7.5 a reasonable pick, assuming we do not have a strong conviction on Indiana.
The “best pick” here throws another little bit of strategy into this contest. Ideally, you would like to use this in one of two spots – the highest confidence play you have and/or the highest leverage spot if you need to make up ground. With only one extra point in the first round, it’s less imperative to use it in a leverage spot, but in the second round, it does make a lot of sense to use it where you are most contrarian. If you didn’t have a good
In addition, we can also profile our opponents in the late stages of the contest. If we are 1 point behind first, but we can infer that they have only taken dogs the entire playoffs, it stands to reason they are more likely to take a dog in the championship game, and thus, we should likely go with the favorite. However, we must also accept the fact that they are also looking at what we have done, which convolutes the strategy a bit, as you want to ensure you are unblocked in that case. All these small things add up to a small edge that some of your opponents may not be using, but it’s definitely worth it to maximize expectations.
The winner of the contest is going to mesh both hitting on a lot of picks while also maximizing the wins when they are in contrarian spots. Doing rough math, there is only a 0.2% chance (.6^11) that a single user picks every single game correctly, assuming a 60% win rate on their picks, so it would be foolish to ignore game theory completely.
First Round Strategy
Indiana vs. Notre Dame
When the spreads opened for the playoffs, I immediately liked every single dog except for SMU, and it seems like the public is agreeing with me. According to ScoresAndOdds, right now, we are looking at 75% of bets and money on Indiana +7.5 and 72% of bets and 62% of money on Tennessee +7.5. Texas is getting 80% of the money on -11.5 and half of the bets, and the SMU/PENN game is split.
I’ve seen a lot of chatter about liking the dogs in this spot, so my guess is we do see a higher percentage of this contest rolling with the dogs, especially in the Indiana and Tennessee games, which those two teams seem like consensus public plays. I think the other 2 games remain fairly split, so I will be going with my gut on those. Starting off, I do like Indiana in this spot, as I think they are still a very strong team despite their weak schedule. I think they are a comparable team to Notre Dame based on results, and I think the line should be closer to 6.5 in this spot, especially with Rourke having a few weeks to rest. I trust Curt Cignetti more than I do Marcus Freeman, despite Freeman’s incredible year (I’m not sure how Cignetti made perennial bottom-feeder Indiana into a contender in one year, but whoever can do that must be a magician), so I will be rolling with Indiana in this one unless the spread drops down to -6.5 before lock.
Pick – Indiana +7.5
SMU vs. Penn State
I’ve been down on Penn State all year, but I think they take care of business here against SMU at home, as the Mustangs have to travel to Happy Valley and play in very cold weather. While the weather isn’t anything to write home about (no snow and just about freezing), I think it’s likely too big of an adjustment for the Mustangs, especially considering how poorly they started the game against Clemson. SMU’s defense has been playing better lately, but they really struggled to contain the Clemson passing game, and I think Tyler Warren can go nuts against this SMU secondary.
Pick – Penn State -8.5
Clemson vs. Texas
The CLEM/TEX game is the one I have the least confidence in of the slate. If this was a different contest that I didn’t have to pick every single game, I likely would not be playing this one. However, we must end up picking this game, and it likely depends for me on what happens in the beginning 2 games and where the money lands before the game. Texas has what it takes defensively to shut Clemson down. The Clemson passing attack has been what has brought them to this spot late in the season, but we are looking at the top pass defense in the nation in the Longhorns, and I think they really make it difficult for Clemson to move the ball, especially considering that Phil Mafah has struggled to rush the ball as of late. I lean toward Texas here, especially considering the breakout of De’Andre Moore to go with Matthew Golden and Gunnar Helm. Still, Clemson’s defense has been playing better as of late, holding an elite offense in Pittsburgh to 20 points, South Carolina to 17 points, and making a few solid plays against a very dangerous SMU team. Overall, I still lean Texas, but this play could change with the wind depending on how the first two games go, as 11.5 points is a lot.
Pick – Texas -11.5
Tennessee vs. Ohio State
The last game of the day is going to be where I save my “best pick.” I have the most confidence in Tennessee covering +7.5 against an Ohio State team that just doesn’t seem to have the moxie this season. I expected them to be dominant in most of the games they lost, but they looked horrific against Michigan, being completely unable to provide any sort of clutch play, and Ryan Day’s continued stubbornness to run the ball when it does not work appears to hurt them. Tennessee is a very strong analytical team with one of the best running backs in the nation and a guy in Nico Iamaleava who isn’t always called to make the hero play but can do it. I think this game should be closer to a pick’em, and I am happy to go along with the field on this with my best pick here unless I’ve lost the first three games of the day. I like saving the best pick for this game because if I’ve lost all three early games, I likely need to catch up, and I’m happy flipping my pick and using the best pick on OSU to gain a bit of ground in the event my read on this game is wrong.
Pick – Tennessee +7.5
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