Anybody play fantasy sports for money?

[Yankuba]

Bloomberg ran a piece about Fan Duel and DraftKings - legal sites that let you set a fantasy lineup and compete against a pool of punters for cash prizes. The websites keep ten percent of the bets and pay out ninety percent. Of course the article quoted a bunch of guys who were able to quit their jobs because they were making so much money with fantasy sports betting. I am pretty good at fantasy baseball and was wondering if anyone out there has had any success with these sites or if I am better off with normal investments and LendingClub.

[cuethebrew]

I play. It's fun and I've had good success with it. But I would not, under any circumstances, count on it as an investment vehicle.

[hodedofome]

If you made it your profession and treated it like a business then I wouldn't see it being any different than a professional poker player. Otherwise it's just a hobby and hobbies usually cost money.

[TheThirstyStag]

I've done it in the past before for a trivial amount of money (coming in second place bought me lunch) among friends, but now I play for free.  I see it as a hobby that I can play for free, which I value more highly than a hobby I will likely lose money engaging in.

[robotclown]

I have with friends, so no company siphining off fees.  It's a one-time outlay and provides entertainment for months, and you might get your money back at the end.

[forummm]

I might do it for fun next year, but it's 1000 times easier to make much better money through working (and I never come home at the end of the work day with less money). I would never bet enough that I could quit my job. Professional sports is really unpredictable. Even the best professional gamblers are right about 54% of the time. If it makes the game more fun to have $25 on the line (or whatever small amount that you won't miss if you lose), and you KNOW it won't turn into a problem for you, then enjoy it.

[Daffy]

Yeah, I do it with an online buddy. We won over 75% of the time this season but I only played with a little bit of money. Not worth the risk playing with more, but it was fun to play and it made watching football more fun too. He played with more money than I did... finished out making several hundred dollars.

[pdxvandal]

I've made a little bit of money in friends' fantasy leagues. But it's just gambling, not investing. Although my cousin made $900 this past year on NFL betting. But he has lots of money to burn.

[Terrestrial]

I play in a couple of leagues with good friends/work colleagues....I don't play in the online type setups like draftkings. 

Counted as an 'entertainment expense' for me.  Some years I win some cash, some years I don't, and if I win I will usually buy something I've been wanting for a while but isn't 'necessary' so it feels like a sweet reward.  This year happened to work out very well...enough to pay for a nice mountain bike upgrade after subtracting my entry fees. 

I enjoy the competition and the camaraderie/bragging rights more than the prospect of winning $...I would do it for free because it's a fun thing to do with friends.

[Terrestrial]

Bloomberg ran a piece about Fan Duel and DraftKings - legal sites that let you set a fantasy lineup and compete against a pool of punters for cash prizes. The websites keep ten percent of the bets and pay out ninety percent. Of course the article quoted a bunch of guys who were able to quit their jobs because they were making so much money with fantasy sports betting. I am pretty good at fantasy baseball and was wondering if anyone out there has had any success with these sites or if I am better off with normal investments and LendingClub.

IMO anybody that regards this as an 'investing' avenue is off base.  It's entertainment/gambling, not something to consider as interchangable with other investment avenues like RE/stocks/funds/private lending.  You can find outliers in almost anything who can make big money at something, it's doesn't mean it's representative of the experience 99.9999% of the people who try it.  Every guy who 'quits his job' because he made 50k doing it means that 5,000+ other people probably lost everything they put in to fund that guys winnings.  Fantasy sites are no more of a valid investing avenue than lottery tickets or craps, regardless of the fact there may be a small 'skill' component to it.

On a side note, what a great business to set up, very much like the poker room at a casino.  When you skim your cut out of the pots it's guaranteed no-risk income regardless of who ends up winning, the house literally cannot lose in this setup as long as they can keep normal business expenses in check.  Unlike playing against the house where it's extremely unlikely but technically possible that they can get hit hard.  Very smart way to capitalize on the popularity of fantasy football (and gambling addictions).

[Yankuba]

Bloomberg ran a piece about Fan Duel and DraftKings - legal sites that let you set a fantasy lineup and compete against a pool of punters for cash prizes. The websites keep ten percent of the bets and pay out ninety percent. Of course the article quoted a bunch of guys who were able to quit their jobs because they were making so much money with fantasy sports betting. I am pretty good at fantasy baseball and was wondering if anyone out there has had any success with these sites or if I am better off with normal investments and LendingClub.

IMO anybody that regards this as an 'investing' avenue is off base. 

I guess I was kind of wondering what type of competition was out there online. I play fantasy baseball. My competitors are mixed - some good, some bad. I spend a lot of time on research (Fangraphs, Rotoworld) and as a result, I never finish outside the money (7 years running). If Fan Duel and DraftKings have a lot of duds - casual gamblers and/or people not into research and advanced statistics then it should be possible to consistently win money from these folks in the long run, much as my friend makes his living playing poker against weaker competitors. But if Fan Duel and DraftKings are filled with Fangraphs readers, quants and professional gamblers then success is a lot less likely.

[Psychstache]

Bloomberg ran a piece about Fan Duel and DraftKings - legal sites that let you set a fantasy lineup and compete against a pool of punters for cash prizes. The websites keep ten percent of the bets and pay out ninety percent. Of course the article quoted a bunch of guys who were able to quit their jobs because they were making so much money with fantasy sports betting. I am pretty good at fantasy baseball and was wondering if anyone out there has had any success with these sites or if I am better off with normal investments and LendingClub.

IMO anybody that regards this as an 'investing' avenue is off base. 

I guess I was kind of wondering what type of competition was out there online. I play fantasy baseball. My competitors are mixed - some good, some bad. I spend a lot of time on research (Fangraphs, Rotoworld) and as a result, I never finish outside the money (7 years running). If Fan Duel and DraftKings have a lot of duds - casual gamblers and/or people not into research and advanced statistics then it should be possible to consistently win money from these folks in the long run, much as my friend makes his living playing poker against weaker competitors. But if Fan Duel and DraftKings are filled with Fangraphs readers, quants and professional gamblers then success is a lot less likely.

I played on draftkings with no real amount of money. I have won most of my leagues that I play with friends/family, so I figured I would do okay. I got beat up pretty soundly.

I second the person who said it would be like being a professional poker player. You would need to treat it like a business, do your research, stay in top of the news (trades,injuries, etc), and take it seriously.

So more like a second/side job rather than an investment.

[Yankuba]

Bloomberg ran a piece about Fan Duel and DraftKings - legal sites that let you set a fantasy lineup and compete against a pool of punters for cash prizes. The websites keep ten percent of the bets and pay out ninety percent. Of course the article quoted a bunch of guys who were able to quit their jobs because they were making so much money with fantasy sports betting. I am pretty good at fantasy baseball and was wondering if anyone out there has had any success with these sites or if I am better off with normal investments and LendingClub.

IMO anybody that regards this as an 'investing' avenue is off base. 

I guess I was kind of wondering what type of competition was out there online. I play fantasy baseball. My competitors are mixed - some good, some bad. I spend a lot of time on research (Fangraphs, Rotoworld) and as a result, I never finish outside the money (7 years running). If Fan Duel and DraftKings have a lot of duds - casual gamblers and/or people not into research and advanced statistics then it should be possible to consistently win money from these folks in the long run, much as my friend makes his living playing poker against weaker competitors. But if Fan Duel and DraftKings are filled with Fangraphs readers, quants and professional gamblers then success is a lot less likely.

I played on draftkings with no real amount of money. I have won most of my leagues that I play with friends/family, so I figured I would do okay. I got beat up pretty soundly.

I second the person who said it would be like being a professional poker player. You would need to treat it like a business, do your research, stay in top of the news (trades,injuries, etc), and take it seriously.

So more like a second/side job rather than an investment.

Thanks - this was exactly what I was hoping to learn. Sounds like the competition is stiff and it wouldn't be worth my time or money. I will stick to beating up on my friends!

[forummm]

I played in family leagues and listened to some expert podcasts throughout the year. The experts do ads for the fantasy gambling sites, so they also talk about their strategies on those sites. For the big prize tournament, I don't think there was a single week where any of the experts finished in the top 25,000 (where you make your money back). This is probably due to the fact that the sporting outcomes are so random, there are a ton of people playing, and the best combinations in any given week are the random players who each have 3 TDs that you wouldn't even own in a standard league. For example, the winning player would be starting Ryan Fitzpatrick that week when he had 6 TDs (and did nothing else the entire year before or after). It's only slightly less gambling than doing a Powerball quickpick.

There are smaller tournaments where they said it was easier to double up your money, but those were on the order of $10/week. Again, probably less money than you'd make from your job even if you placed a lot of bets each week.

[hodedofome]

I watched an interview of Billy Walters http://www.businessinsider.com/billy-walters-profile-2014-6 who has made hundreds of millions in sports betting over the years.

His edge is that he doesn't make an outright bet on who is going to win or anything like that. He just looks for spreads that are way off compared to what his quantitative system tells him the spreads should be. So he bets to bring the spread back in line to what he is expecting. He'll also push the spread in the wrong direction only to bring it back in line with a ton of money the other way. Just working the system. He has a network of guys that make the bets for him, as most Vegas casinos won't do business with him anymore. I listened to a podcast of one of those guys and it was pretty interesting.

Billy's edge is that he has an expectation of what the spread should be, and only bets when the actual spread is vastly different than his number. He probably is also very disciplined so he has an emotional edge over most other sports betters. You would have to know what your edge is in fantasy sports to have any hope of making money over the long haul.

[boarder42]

I play.  My friend and i are working on a system to make this a profitable business.  You need a model and you have to build and create lineups that should maximize profits.  We have a solid NFL model.  But the NFL is saturated with people that dont know what they are doing.  Signing up and just picking players like picking stocks is what makes pros and semipros like us able to do this and reap massive rewards.  Our NBA system is still getting the bugs worked out and we are down money trying to figure out what we're missing in our model.  There are consistent winners in every sport.  Develop a model and exercise it properly and you can make this a profitable avenue to "invest"...

To the people calling it gambling it is a skilled game in which you put money at stake to beat others and take their money.  Its gambling for the 99% but a profession for the 1%.  Its like poker there is skill it is not a scratch off ticket or the powerball.  Both of those require no skill.  Its not even black jack b/c even when played 100% perfect (not using a 2 player system casinos will kick you out for) you will lose money over time.

You can statistically win money if you develop a winning system or model. 

As a semipro in this i say yeah go ahead and play we need people like that to keep us making money.  As a mustachian i think you're pretty crazy to play and you fall in to the gambler category if you're just picking your team manually. 

Is there risk involved yes but so is there risk in buying stocks.  now are you going to lose everything you invested in under 24 hours like most bets placed in daily fantasy. no.... but it can be profitable.

The sports betting realm is a whole different world compared to daily fantasy.  1 its legal in almost all 50 states vs just 1.5(parlays are for suckers NJ)

[FSL]

I play.  My friend and i are working on a system to make this a profitable business.  You need a model and you have to build and create lineups that should maximize profits.  We have a solid NFL model.  But the NFL is saturated with people that dont know what they are doing.  Signing up and just picking players like picking stocks is what makes pros and semipros like us able to do this and reap massive rewards.  Our NBA system is still getting the bugs worked out and we are down money trying to figure out what we're missing in our model.  There are consistent winners in every sport.  Develop a model and exercise it properly and you can make this a profitable avenue to "invest"...

To the people calling it gambling it is a skilled game in which you put money at stake to beat others and take their money.  Its gambling for the 99% but a profession for the 1%.  Its like poker there is skill it is not a scratch off ticket or the powerball.  Both of those require no skill.  Its not even black jack b/c even when played 100% perfect (not using a 2 player system casinos will kick you out for) you will lose money over time.

You can statistically win money if you develop a winning system or model. 

As a semipro in this i say yeah go ahead and play we need people like that to keep us making money.  As a mustachian i think you're pretty crazy to play and you fall in to the gambler category if you're just picking your team manually. 

Is there risk involved yes but so is there risk in buying stocks.  now are you going to lose everything you invested in under 24 hours like most bets placed in daily fantasy. no.... but it can be profitable.

The sports betting realm is a whole different world compared to daily fantasy.  1 its legal in almost all 50 states vs just 1.5(parlays are for suckers NJ)

boarder42, this is something my husband is also exploring. have you found any good resources about the taxes for this activity? appears taxes can be quite punitive (gains above the line, losses only as itemized deductions), that it may set AGI so high that deductions are phased out. or, instead, as a side business, are you trying to report this as Schedule C income?

[boarder42]

What you just wrote is wrong. You get a 1099 misc if you net over 600 at one site. We only play one site so I don't have to worry about losses on one and winning on another.  We will setup a company if we start winning decent amounts. Make it an s corp and pay ourselves next to nothing.

[GoCubsGo]

I've  played large buy in roto leagues in baseball and football for about ten years.  I've tracked it and I've come out ahead by a solid amount but I use it for fun and as a hobby (it's a blast to take a spur of the moment family vacation based on a big pot win which I've done a couple times). 

My brother plays daily leagues using a quant-based system he's developed and he is up $25K+ this year (mostly basketball).  The daily leagues (FanDuel, Draftekings) have revolutionized fantasy sports and I'm not quite sure if I'm ready to jump in as there ARE many technical and quant-based players that treat it as a full time occupation (lots of work in keeping up on daily lineups/trends/injuries etc). I bet more and more jump in as it matures.

I prefer big buy in dynasty leagues as I can get to know and "read" the owners in my leagues and have been able to stay near the top long term (a couple teams are habitually dead money and rarely win which helps my odds greatly).  In the end it's gambling no matter what "system" you have. As long as your comfortable losing the money (and the value of your time which can be a lot) then enjoy it for what it is. 

[boarder42]

I've  played large buy in roto leagues in baseball and football for about ten years.  I've tracked it and I've come out ahead by a solid amount but I use it for fun and as a hobby (it's a blast to take a spur of the moment family vacation based on a big pot win which I've done a couple times). 

My brother plays daily leagues using a quant-based system he's developed and he is up $25K+ this year (mostly basketball).  The daily leagues (FanDuel, Draftekings) have revolutionized fantasy sports and I'm not quite sure if I'm ready to jump in as there ARE many technical and quant-based players that treat it as a full time occupation (lots of work in keeping up on daily lineups/trends/injuries etc). I bet more and more jump in as it matures.

I prefer big buy in dynasty leagues as I can get to know and "read" the owners in my leagues and have been able to stay near the top long term (a couple teams are habitually dead money and rarely win which helps my odds greatly).  In the end it's gambling no matter what "system" you have. As long as your comfortable losing the money (and the value of your time which can be a lot) then enjoy it for what it is.

yeah i look at daily as the early stages of where online poker was 10-15 years ago.  its only going to grow and the more people who come in and dont have a system and are just "doing it for fun" will only help fuel those who have systems.  We're working the bugs out of ours still.  but i can see 2015 being a 6 figure year for us if baseball goes like the NFL and the NBA now that we finally figured it out.

[aceyou]

Like Boarder, I play as a source of income, but I don't consider it investing, I consider it a job.  It's not passive.  You have to put in your time every day or you don't get paid. 

Daily Fantasy Sports is a very beatable game, but you have to have a lot of qualities that many on this board likely have:

1.  very good at applied statistics.
2.  very smart at managing a bankroll.
3.  non-emotional.
4.  willing to work, because like I said, it's a job, not investing. 
(weirdly, a strong knowledge of the sport is not that important, but it helps)

If you don't have all four of those things, find a different way to make money.

My goal is that within 12 months it will be my primary source of income, while also working as a math teacher.  I'm on track for that to make that happen right now, but it's no guarentee, and it will depend on a successful transition from NBA to MLB.  I just signed up for a sabermetrics coruse through Boston University, and am looking forward to it.  As a teacher, I'll have 3 months this summer to really hit MLB hard.

My school offers a 403 and a 457, both can have 18000 contributed in them.  If I can get my DFS income high enough, I want to max out those accounts each year plus my Roth IRA and put myself in a position to be able to quit and walk away from my pension.   Fantasy sports are a big part of my plan to FIRE right now. 

Wish me luck!

[goodrookie]

No and No. Fantasy sports is not investment by a long shot.

[boarder42]

Like Boarder, I play as a source of income, but I don't consider it investing, I consider it a job.  It's not passive.  You have to put in your time every day or you don't get paid. 

Daily Fantasy Sports is a very beatable game, but you have to have a lot of qualities that many on this board likely have:

1.  very good at applied statistics.
2.  very smart at managing a bankroll.
3.  non-emotional.
4.  willing to work, because like I said, it's a job, not investing. 
(weirdly, a strong knowledge of the sport is not that important, but it helps)

If you don't have all four of those things, find a different way to make money.

My goal is that within 12 months it will be my primary source of income, while also working as a math teacher.  I'm on track for that to make that happen right now, but it's no guarentee, and it will depend on a successful transition from NBA to MLB.  I just signed up for a sabermetrics coruse through Boston University, and am looking forward to it.  As a teacher, I'll have 3 months this summer to really hit MLB hard.

My school offers a 403 and a 457, both can have 18000 contributed in them.  If I can get my DFS income high enough, I want to max out those accounts each year plus my Roth IRA and put myself in a position to be able to quit and walk away from my pension.   Fantasy sports are a big part of my plan to FIRE right now. 

Wish me luck!

Yeah we are still struggling with our NBA model.  I think our MLB model is stout and our NFL model is better.  But for some reason our NBA model is missing something and i cant put my finger on it.

[GoCubsGo]

I'm heavily involved in daily roto leagues in baseball and after talking to my brother the last few days, I'm going to do a trial run in baseball.  He has built a great model for basketball and has been doing very well (in the top 100 on Rotogrinder). He watches a ton of basketball and has a great stats based model built.  I watch a ton of baseball and love sabermetrics so it'll be interesting to see how I do using some of his ideas. 

I find football to be a bit too random but it seems like some people have figured it out.  I love football but wouldn't even know where to begin as it has sooo many variables.  I would think basketball would be the easiest given the advanced data and small lineups no?

[Yankuba]

Very interesting - good luck to those doing this for income. I would love to see updates in this thread.

[boarder42]

I'm heavily involved in daily roto leagues in baseball and after talking to my brother the last few days, I'm going to do a trial run in baseball.  He has built a great model for basketball and has been doing very well (in the top 100 on Rotogrinder). He watches a ton of basketball and has a great stats based model built.  I watch a ton of baseball and love sabermetrics so it'll be interesting to see how I do using some of his ideas. 

I find football to be a bit too random but it seems like some people have figured it out.  I love football but wouldn't even know where to begin as it has sooo many variables.  I would think basketball would be the easiest given the advanced data and small lineups no?

See thats what all the rest of the PROs say... that basketball is the easiest.  but for whatever reason we have found the opposite to be true for us.  our model just doesnt consistently produce lineups properly..

1 question how many lineups are you doing a day? not contests.. but different lineups.   

[boarder42]

So i think we have been applying our lots of lineup strategy incorrectly to basketball ... we just went back and re-evaluated and found that the top few lineups we create typically place where as the rest are a crap shoot... so we need to scale back lineups for the NBA

[aceyou]

Didn't know there were fellow Mustachian DFS players, that's awesome. 

Financials:
Someone asked for $ stats, so here's where I'm at:
Bought in in December for $1500. 
Balance at end of December: 1500
end of January: $1000
end of February (as of today): $5400

Started out betting 200 per day, i'm at about 600 right now. I'll update periodically to let you know how it's going. 

Boarder, you asked about number of lineups.  That's been the big question the past couple weeks.  Somewhere between 10 and 40 is where I'm at each day.  I've no idea where the optimal number is.  People like Ganandorf have tons of them, other pros appear to have less.  I'm honestly leaning towards thinking that either way can work. 

I don't consider basketball to be easy at all, because injuries come out right before lock, forcing you have to be so nimble.  In football, as long as the player can stand upright, he's gonna play.

Regarding MLB, that's awesome that you have a model already built.  That's going to be a big job over the next couple months.  My hope is to have my account up to at least 10-15K from basketball or so by the time the school year ends, and to have a reasonably good model built for MLB so I can justify putting 1-2K on games each day. 

question for boarder42: have you researched any of the more obscure sports.  For example, maybe fantasy golf or something like that is really where the money is at? 

[boarder42]

We dabbled in golf. Decided to focus on the big 3. Still don't have a solid NBA system. Constantly tweeking. And as others have stated this isn't an investment it is a job. Unless you can get it automated. And its hard to automate. Last minute players who are healthy scratches etc. Its tough

[boarder42]

Oh and are you betting 10-40 different lineups. Or 10-40 different contests with the same lineup

[The Beacon]

While I am a futures trader myself, I often tell people not to for their own good.  Same goes here for people who fantasize about making a consistent profit from playing fantasy sports.

This line of "work" is as hard as trading if not harder. I think it might be harder because you do not have any really good tools and a massive amount of detailed historical data down to every tick like securities.

[Yankuba]

While I am a futures trader myself, I often tell people not to for their own good.  Same goes here for people who fantasize about making a consistent profit from playing fantasy sports.

This line of "work" is as hard as trading if not harder. I think it might be harder because you do not have any really good tools and a massive amount of detailed historical data down to every tick like securities.

Everyone here says not to actively trade stocks - it's better to buy the indexes because over time the indexes beat a huge percentage of active traders. Yet you actively trade and are probably successful otherwise you wouldn't do it. With fantasy sports the platform is putting a dollar value on each player and you have to pick a basket of players who will accumulate enough stats to beat your opponents. If the platform does a poor job pricing players and people can develop a more accurate model then over time I would expect the player to do well. And if there are arbitrage opportunities (the prices aren't updated after players are scratched) then I would imagine the savvy player has much better odds of beating less informed competitors.

[boarder42]

Its not a fantasy and the money put at risk for this is much less than what most active traders have to have.  Correct me if I'm wrong but no matter how good your futures system is you can't but 2 dollars worth of something tonight and have 5k or 40k tomorrow.

[aceyou]

Boarder, I am using between 10 and 40 unique lineups right now per night for GPP.  Tonight, I had 20 unique lineups in 330 contests.  Like I said above, I don't know what the optimal number is right now.  My guess is that when I branch to multisites, I won't need as many lineups, because the multisite playing will naturally create lineup diversity. Took a $600 hit last night when Taj Gibson was injured, so subtract that from whatever total I had posted previously:)

Sounds like we are taking the same path in focusing on the big three, although I suspect you are much farther along than me, both in terms of earnings and knowledge.  I think I'm getting in close enough to the start though that the window is still open wide. 

[The Beacon]

Its not a fantasy and the money put at risk for this is much less than what most active traders have to have.  Correct me if I'm wrong but no matter how good your futures system is you can't but 2 dollars worth of something tonight and have 5k or 40k tomorrow.

You are correct about my system. There is no way I can have that kind of risk and reward ratio. But what are your odds of having a RRR of 2 to 5k?    How about Powerball? You only need to risk 1 dollar for a possible few hundred  million. That is a superb RRR. But what is the probability there?  We all know that.  It is a game for the gullible. 

It does not matter what kind of system/model you have. It is just pure math. For a winning system, these 2 go hand in hand. Lack of either one will make a system total junk.

[aceyou]

Question for Sharpy: WHAT ARE REALISTIC RESULTS FOR DAY TRADING? 

My short term goal is to beat Daily Fantasy Sports, which I am highly confident I can beat.  However, like the poker bubble, the DFS bubble will eventually burst as more and more people learn how to beat it, and the loser's money runs dry.  At this point, I hope to have a sizable stash from DFS. 

My question is this:  If I turn my efforts to day trading, what is my potential.  I am very good at math/applied statistics.  However, I do not have experience in trading/markets.  So, try to answer my question from the perspective of a person who would need to learn all that.  How much of a learning curve would I be looking at? 

[The Beacon]

Question for Sharpy: WHAT ARE REALISTIC RESULTS FOR DAY TRADING? 
So, try to answer my question from the perspective of a person who would need to learn all that.  How much of a learning curve would I be looking at?

The learning curve for trading is very STEEP other wise everyone would be in this business. If you Google "trade for a living", most of them fail. All blogs/Websites out there that claim they are successful and try to sell you snake oil are actually owned by failed traders. It is like if you can not excel at acting then you can make a living by teaching acting.  My advice is to stay away from day trading.

However, if you really like games of chance such as poker or fantasy sports, you stick with what you like. For me, I like trading. So spending all my spare time to improve my systems is really nothing. I started it way before my FIRE journey.

So if you can quantify every aspect of your game (fantasy sports) such as probability, risk reward ratio, risk of ruin, Calmar ratio, draw downs, position sizing(bet sizing in your case), you might stand a chance. While those terms are all from trading, I believe they are applicable to any game of chance. As I said, it is all math. You absolutely do not want to place a bet just because you have a hunch or you feel good about a team. You want to back that bet with hard and cold numbers.

Good luck! 

[pancakes]

I have a family member who for a long time was making more money betting online (sports, poker, etc) than in their day job. The approach was similar to CC churning by taking advantage of promotions and sign up bonuses to swing the odds in their favour, it was a very elaborate set up. With at least the poker side of things, it helped that they were a very good mathematical poker player. I believe that eventually the sites worked it out and blocked them.

[aceyou]

Thanks Sharpy,

That's not the answer that I was exactly hoping for, but it's what I expected. 

Talk for me a bit about Investools.  If a non-investor who is very very good at math/statistics learned their system, to what extent is it profitable, if at all?  Or is the whole thing a pile of shit? 

[boarder42]

Thanks Sharpy,

That's not the answer that I was exactly hoping for, but it's what I expected. 

Talk for me a bit about Investools.  If a non-investor who is very very good at math/statistics learned their system, to what extent is it profitable, if at all?  Or is the whole thing a pile of shit?

So Ace.  I dont think there is going to be a sizeable bubble.  Loser money will continue to flow.  The "poker" bubble was caused by a US law change making it illegal.  And with the NFL/NBA lobbyists knowing how much fantasy brings to their viewership fantasy sports for money wont get cancelled.  And money can still be made sports betting and playing poker at casinos and online if you play offshore.  there isnt really a bubble in gambling... people will continue to give us their money at the hopes of winning a 25k tourney. 

[aceyou]

Boarder, those are good points, and that's what we are going to find out. 

My concern is that DFS will bring it's own unique problems that poker didn't, creating a different kind of a bubble.  You can only play so many tables at a time in poker.  In DFS, Condia is putting 300K/week on football, and an insane amount on other sports too.  As time goes by, two things may happen.  First, lots more pros will likely join the games, and second, pros will build enormous bankrolls, and may flood the games with their lineups. 

However, you bring up really good points too.  As big as Condia and those like him are (you and I included eventually), we aren't as big as the NFL, and we never will be.  So we'll just have to see how this shakes out.  The major sports have a huge incentive to keep people gambling on the games.   

What we both can agree on though, is that if a bubble is created and DFS eventually bursts, there will still be millions of people around the world who will want to bet on whatever the next new thing is, and that we can just figure that out too.  The beauty of math.

[The Beacon]

Talk for me a bit about Investools.  If a non-investor who is very very good at math/statistics learned their system, to what extent is it profitable, if at all?  Or is the whole thing a pile of shit?

I am not qualified to comment on Investools because I never used it. However, i believe you could learn some basic stuff from them. But again it is not different than picking up a few good trading books on Amazon.

if you like math, you have an edge there.  I am not trying to discourage you.  if someone comes to you and try to convince you to trade for a living, run and keep running.

[aceyou]

Month #3 of Fantasy Sports has been an upward time for me.  Here's the new updated progress:

Start of December - $1500
End of December - $1500
End of January - $1000
End of February - $5400
End of March (well, March 29) - $30,200

DFS has become the main source of income for me so far in 2015.  My plan is to start shoving as much of my teaching salary into 403B, 457, and Roth IRA as possible to keep income down for tax purposes, and live off the DFS winnings, which cannot be sheltered anyway.  With my wife and both working as teachers, and I also coaching two varsity teams, this is giving us a variety of ways to bring in money.  Looking forward to really working on the Stash in 2015. 

In a few weeks, I will have to pay quarterly taxes, something I've never done before, since taxes are always deducted from my employer for as a teacher/tennis coach. 

My wife going to be induced to have our second child on Tuesday, so I could see April being a light month for playing Fantasy Sports.  Plus, I have to acknowledge that I ran pretty well this Month. My ROI was about 30%, which is unsustainable.  Matching March's success could be unrealistic.  The advantage I have in April is a much larger bankroll, so I may be able to pull in equal or greater total winnings with a lower ROI, simply through the ability for increased bet sizes. 

Regardless, life is good and these are fun times.  I found this website in November, and it has changed my outlook on everything.  Very excited to make this year and the ones to come rock!!!!

[boarder42]

we struggled with our NBA model finally think we have one that works well... its consistently placing in the GPPs now and some days it gets near the top ... we won 40 yesterday on 3 dollars in bets.  and typically at least double up.  keeping bets low as we are testing systems.

[aceyou]

Solid work Boarder!! Despite my strong month, the past 10 days has been a huge downward trend for me.  Got the account up to 42,000, then took a 12k hit the past 10 days:)  Betting 4k/day, this isn't actually really that big of a deal statistically, but being so new to it, it's gotten me wanting to really see what's going on.  It has coincided with the start of march madness, so I'm questioning whether many fish have recently diverted their attention to college, making the game less fishy right now.  More likely, it's just variance.  So basically, it's reassuring for me to hear that you have had recent success. 

A new challenge has been rostering, which you may likely experience soon as you get confidence in your model and up your betting.  There are only so many contests to enter, so you have to enter each contest multiple times to get money on there.  I've found that this greatly reduces ROI to enter contests multiple times, especially in GPP's, where you can only take first place one time. 

[boarder42]

yeah we have been winning alot recently.  we are around 70% ROI in the last week.  variance seems to be high but our new model is awesome and places just about every time.

[aceyou]

That's very good.  Throw a reply on here ever few weeks or so and keep me posted with your progress. 

[boarder42]

the only issue with it is its high variance.  so last night we finished close to dead last.  we either place near the top 50% of placers or we finish dead last its pretty crazy

[TheAnonOne]

Your better off counting cards at blackjack...

[boarder42]

even if you're correct in your bold statement.  one will get you thrown out of a casino and many casinos have mostly eliminated the ability to count to a high level.  the other is a perfectly expected practice by the top performers in daily fantasy and as can be seen above for AceYou and myself has been very profitable for us at very low risk.