Using Field-Odds on NBA Wednesday
Wednesday is the day to get excited about for Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball. With most of the sites stepping up the guaranteed prize pools to entice action, there is a lot of money to be had for as little as $5. When working on your NBA Lineups to enter for a large-field contest (I consider 25 or more a large-field usually), one concept oft overlooked by newer Grinders when entering a field with so many teams is a term, I’m going to call field-odds. Below I’m going to cover the concept with an example, so that you can apply it while entering your lineups tonight.
What are Pot Odds?
First let’s discuss the term ‘Pot-Odds’. For those of you unfamiliar with the concept, here is how it’s used in poker: In poker you have three options after you have seen your hand: call, raise or fold. The amount to call and raise is determined by the bet sizes that have been put out ahead of you. The summation of every bet placed before your turn of action gives you the pot total. There are situations that arise in poker, where a player could think they have a worse hand than their opponent, but it is still technically sound to call. The reason for this is that the player is getting good ‘pot-odds’. Let’s use an example with the hand below:
In the above hand, let’s say you have the 7 Clubs and 8 Clubs, and for the sake of the example you just know that your opponent is holding Pocket Aces (two aces). Based on hand strength, you are about 40% to win the hand at this point – so, you are an underdog. Common sense would say that you should fold if he puts you all in…but that’s not always the case. This is where pot odds come in. In this example, let’s say that there were 5 callers pre-flop at 10,000 chips (pot now at 50,000), then on the flop the player with Aces puts you all in for 50,000 more chips (pot now at 100,000) and we assume all other players fold. Now it is up to you. Your pot-odds are 50,000 to win 150,000 (the 100,000 out there plus your 50,000) or about 33%. Your odds of winning the hand are about 40%. Therefore you are getting good pot-odds to make this call because you are putting in 33% of the total pot to win 40% of the time. In the long-run, even though you’ll win less than half of the time, this is a profitable play.
Field Odds
Now, let’s apply this to large-fields in Daily Fantasy. In Daily Fantasy you are competing against hundreds of different lineups, all choosing players from the same player pool. In the same way that making a play you’ll win 40% of the time is OK in poker at times, it is actually smart to select a player in Large-Field contests that is projected to score 25 points per game than a player in the same spot who is projected to score 27 points per game. Also, it can be correct to select a player that is priced higher than they should be based on their scoring output. The reason for this is field-odds.
Recently, DraftStreet made it possible to see what percentage of players in your specific large field contest are selected in lineups throughout the field – that players Field-Odds (note: these are only displayed after the contest begins):
In the example above, you’re looking at the winning lineup of a contest with around 100 players in it. You’ll notice that this lineup has a good amount of RED and BLACK percentages by the players as opposed to my lineup, which has too many BLUE percentages (see link above). This player did a good job of selecting players with good field-odds.
The field-odds tell you how valuable that player’s points are to your lineup. In the lineup above Al Jefferson had 42.5 points and was the second highest scorer for the winner, but 71% of the field also had Big Al. That means that these 42.5 points will only put you past 29% (100%-71%) of the field as Al outscores the teams that didn’t have Al’s respective centers. On the other hand look at Kevin Durant – surprisingly this top player was only on 6% of rosters! He was also the winner’s leading scorer (which is the main reason as to why he took home the $600 first prize that evening). So, what does this mean for you?
It is your goal to try to predict what each player’s Field-Odds will be, then factor that in when selecting your lineup. Here are a few things to keep in mind when trying to predict which players will have the lower field-odds, and thus higher value for you:
1) Popular Value Plays – Value plays are great at clearing up cap space, but be careful with the uber-popular selections. Right now, Jordan Crawford is a very popular value pick and he’s at the guard spot, where players already tend to go for value-picks more than at Forward or Center – I’m passing on him in large-fields tonight.
2) Unpopular Picks with a High-Ceiling – Kevin Durant (6%), Carmelo Anthony (17%), and Monta Ellis (9%) really stand out in the lineup above. Monta Ellis only had 20.25 points, but ‘Melo and Durant both topped 40 points. Does it surprise you that any of these players had good nights? Not at all. They all are top-players in real-life that have really, high ceilings. However, they are not the most popular picks because they are priced fairly and cost a lot. Why is that? Most players tend to reach for the two ends of the spectrum (deep value and the Dwight Howard’s at the top), however finding unpopular picks with the highest ceilings in the above-average range is a great recipe for success!
3) Depth at Position – Al Jefferson was on 71% of Rosters, but was still, I think, probably a good selection. Why? Because he was the only center capable of scoring 40 points-plus that night, and the next closest center was probably in the 30 range. That added 10 points is usually worth the reach. In general however, you want to avoid the ‘Blue grenades’ unless there is a lack of depth at that position.
I hope you enjoyed my introduction to Field-Odds in large-field Daily Fantasy. Now put them to the test! Check below for a list of contests that are going on tonight, and try some of what you just learned to win the up to $750 for first place.
Wednesday Guarantee Overview
DraftStreet
$1,000 Guaranteed – $5 Entry
$2,000 Guaranteed – $22 Entry
FanDuel
NBA Slam – $3,500 Guaranteed – $10 Entry
NBA Tip In – $1,000 Guaranteed – $5 Entry
Fantasy Sports Live
25 Player Wednesdays – $1 Entry
SportsGeek
$100 Guaranteed – $2 Entry
Cameron MacMillan
RotoGrinders.com Fantasy Content Manager