Setting Goals & Lineups: Cash Games
If you have played daily fantasy sports before then you know that there is an inherent difference between cash games and tournaments. The payout structure is vastly different in the two types of leagues, which makes it important to adjust our lineup building strategy to the type of league that we are playing in.
You will often hear the terms ‘floor’ and ‘ceiling’ thrown around in this industry. A player’s floor is the number of fantasy points you can expect him to score in a bad outing. Some people like to use the term floor as a player’s absolute minimum possible fantasy point total, but I use it in a broader sense. In general, a player that is consistent has a higher floor than a player with high variance in his fantasy point outputs.
A player’s ceiling refers to the maximum amount of fantasy points a player can score in a given matchup. This is also referred to as upside or potential. Ideally, we want to target players that have both a high floor and a high ceiling, but that combination is rare.
The ultimate goal in a cash game is to create a lineup that will finish in the top half of that contest more often than not. Double-ups, Head-to-Head’s, and 50/50’s are the most common type of cash games and they all pay out close to 50% of the entrants. Our goal is to finish in that top 50% as often as possible. In order to achieve this goal, we need to maximize our team’s floor. Doing so allows us to produce more consistent results, which gives us a better chance to finish in the top half of the field.
In the previous lesson, we simplified the value system approach by using a goal of 250 points. This is a good goal to use to because with a salary of $50,000, we basically need 5 fantasy points for every $1,000 of salary that we spend. If we get that type of production from our entire lineup, we will arrive at our goal of 250 points.
In general, 250 points is the total that I shoot for in cash games. It’s high enough that it will place in cash games more often than not, yet it’s not too high that we are forced to take too many chances. It’s extremely important to set a realistic goal in cash games, because if you set the bar too high, you will find yourself leaning toward players that have a higher ceiling, rather than those that have a higher floor.
Using the precise method of value, the production from each player needs to equal 4x his salary plus 6 fantasy points (simplified from the 6.25 in the previous lesson). This gives us a baseline to use when selecting players, both as an entire lineup and as individual players.
I always start my cash game lineups from the bottom up. The reasoning is simple. We want to have as much exposure to the players that have the best chance at out-producing their salary. While it’s certainly possible for Anthony Davis to score 80 fantasy points on any given night, it’s more realistic for a backup point guard to score 30 fantasy points.
I have an entire course dedicated to injuries, so I won’t dive into too much detail here, but injuries are the best source of value. If you can find one, two, or even three players that are expected to see an increase in minutes and production, your lineup will have a great chance to exceed your goal of 250 fantasy points.
After you have your value plays locked in (assuming there are values that night), it’s time to surround them with a good cast. This is where you have to decide if you want to take a more balanced approach with the rest of your lineup, or whether you want to employ a stars and scrubs approach. Both are viable strategies in daily fantasy basketball – it all just depends on the slate and the pricing.
A lot of fixed DFS content tries to set rules for you to follow in each sport. When trying to give advice about a sport, it’s easier to make generalizations about certain positions or situations. However, it’s important to keep in mind that every day is a new slate. Every single day is a new puzzle that we have to piece together. There are new salaries, matchups, rotations, and injuries. For that reason, I always let the slate dictate my lineup building. If there are three obvious value plays that night, take all three and go from there. If LeBron James is hurt, we can expect Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving to step up in his absence.
Treat each night as a blank canvas. It is up to you to paint whatever picture you’d like, but let the pricing be the paintbrush and the injuries to be the paint. Start with a realistic goal for cash games and use the value system to determine whether or not you think a player can reach his needed fantasy point output.
In The Most Valuable NBA DFS Course: All About Value, you’ll learn:
• The theory behind value systems and their use
• Why value and production is more complicated than you think
• How to use value to make cash-game lineups
• How to use value to make tournament lineups
Want to keep reading? Purchase the course and learn from the best!
