Lazy Man and Money

The Epic Super Bowl Analysis Guide (Part 4)

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I try not to write too many articles that aren’t about money. However, I’ve had a rule over the last few years… when the Patriots are in the Super Bowl, I have to write an (obviously rose-colored) analysis.

I’ve written around 2500 articles about personal finance, so please excuse me while I use some publishing space for something off-topic. I understand if this isn’t your thing. I’m hoping to get a new article out late Monday or early Tuesday.

If you want to re-live the past, you can catch, the original, part 2, and part 3.

Typically these articles are 3000 words (i.e. very long). This is going to be very short because I’m writing this just a couple hours before game time. Let’s dig in:

Why the LA Rams Could Win

I want to start off with the Rams, because I don’t know them as well as the Patriots. I do remember the off-season thinking, “How are the Rams able to add star after star with the salary cap?”

As Mike Reiss notes, “The Rams went all-in this year in spending $221 million in cash to build their roster, which they had the luxury of doing with quarterback Jared Goff still playing on his rookie contract. That is about $50 million more in cash spent this year by the Patriots, who have traditionally focused on sustainability on a year-to-year basis.”

Having more money to spend on skill players gives the Rams a lot of room for extra star power. The Rams went all-in to win the Super Bowl now.

When it comes to winning, having the team with more star players has a big advantage. (I’m practicing trying to sound like Bill Belichick with an answer that is so common sense that it doesn’t give any insight.)

Why the New England Patriots Could Win

As you can imagine from someone who is a Patriots’ fan, I have a few reasons why the Patriots will win:

  • The Patriots haven’t been sacked in the postseason – They’ve faced some great pass rushers from the Chargers and Chiefs and the offensive line kept Tom Brady clean. The Rams have great pass rushers in Suh and Donald and this could be their biggest challenge. I think the Patriots have shown that they are their best against the best and I expect the same to continue.
  • The Patriots have been playing their best – Sometimes it’s most important to peak at the right time. The Patriots have had growing pains throughout the season, but they’ve played their best two games in the playoffs. The defense has played extremely well over the past 5 games. The team playing in the Super Bowl is very different than the one playing earlier in the season.
  • It’s a Patriots home game – It’s supposed to be a neutral field, but the crowd looks to be about 70% Patriots fans. Maybe the Rams are still trying to find their market in LA. Maybe the Rams fans in St. Louis dropped them after they abandoned the city to go to LA. Maybe New England fans feel that this might be their last chance to see Brady in a Super Bowl.
  • The Patriots have more experience – Many of the players have been to the Super Bowl. It’s a unique game with the extreme microscope and the longer halftime. It may matter much once the game starts, but I’d rather be the team with more experience.

Final Prediction

The Rams have the talent advantage. I’ve also jinxed the Patriots by legally betting on the Patriots.

The Patriots’ Super Bowls have all been close and nearly given me heart attacks. I think it’s going to be different this time. I’m picking a 31-20 Patriots win.

The Epic Super Bowl Analysis Guide (Part 3)

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When I started this blog in 2006, I left the door open for a few off-topic blog posts. Warning, this is going to be one of those blog posts.

You may have missed The Epic Super Bowl Analysis Guide from 2015 when I broke down the Patriots/Seahawks Super Bowl.

I wish I could have predicted the stock market as well as I predicted the game. Maybe I just got lucky as things rarely play out as they appear on paper. I had noted that Michael Bennett was going to be a key, but he got injured, which changed the game. I had a key to the game of “Don’t get beat by ‘the catch'” and Seattle did have that catch with a player on the ground getting the tipped ball. I predicted that Edelman and Vereen could do some damage. I didn’t get the score right, but I feel I got enough right.

You also may have missed The Epic Super Bowl Analysis Guide (Part 2). I got a lot of things wrong and a few things right. My conclusion was a mixed bag:

“I’m going with the Patriots 38-29. I honestly feel it could be a 6 point game, but I’m going larger because I think the Patriots could put Atlanta in a hole if they force some field goals.”

The Patriots ended up winning 34-28… a 6 point game. So while I got the score and the difference close, the journey there was very, very different as we all know.

As I said in the guide last year:

“I don’t have too many rules in life, but one of them is that I have to analyze the Super Bowl when the Patriots are in it. I know that 44 states hate the Patriots…

However, I was a fan before their horrific 1-15 season was overshadowed by a Zeke Mowatt’s sexual harassment of a female reporter.

Imagine your team losing 15 of 16 games being the highlight of the season.”

This was before I can ever remember hearing the name Harvey Weinstein. Imagine how bad the harassment had to be to stand out more than 25 years ago. I hope you’ll excuse this New Englander for celebrating an embarrassment of riches over the last 17 years. I remember what it’s like to be a pauper.

This is going to be biased. It can’t NOT be.

However, before we get started, let’s reflect a bit on sportsmanship. There are a thousand stories going about these about these football teams. Now that I’m a father with kids in school, I recognize that side of things more.

So if you are an Eagles fan, I want to say this story about sending a bus driver is awesome! I love Philadelphia and been there a few times for a couple of days. I say Pat’s over Geno’s. My Facebook image is the First Amendment in People’s Plaza. I used to love playing Madden (92 I think) with the Eagles having a great secondary that could intercept anything.

On the Patriots side, this middle school rally is incredible.

However you feel about the teams, I hope we can focus on celebrating the wonderful ways that sports can bring a community together. It might not feel that way after the game.

However, I’d say that both teams are “playing with the house’s money.” The Patriots legacy was cemented long ago. The Eagles are in the Super Bowl with their back-up quarterback. Their future is bright and they should be in the playoffs for years. I totally understand if Eagles fans don’t feel that way, but when Wentz got injured, you’d take playing in the Super Bowl, right? I know if it was Brady who got injured and Hoyer picked up the baton, I’d feel that a win is a bonus.

Let’s dig in.

Super Bowl LII Analysis

In the first version of my Super Bowl Analysis, I broke down every area of both teams. It was a lot easier because I knew the Seahawks well as they had won the Super Bowl the year before. We know what Richard Sherman and Russel Wilson can do, right?

In the next version, it was more difficult. I didn’t know as much about the Atlanta Falcons. Matt Ryan had always been above average, but he was great last year. It can be hard to analyze when there’s inconsistent performance year to year.

I’d say that I mailed it in last year, but I fear the analysis here will be even worse. I haven’t had time to research the Eagles players to analyze the match-ups. I did find a little analysis of the game. Unfortunately, it seemed that most of the articles I read were about anything and everything except the X’s and O’s. I guess that’s what happens when you have a thousand writers focusing on stories that are applicable to those who aren’t football fans.

Eagles Offense vs. the Patriots Defense

The Eagles have a back-up quarterback, Nick Foles, but he’s not an ordinary back-up. He’s got some ups and downs. When he’s going well, he’s extremely good. If the Eagles get good Foles, they can score a lot of points. They got a lot of very good skill players.

The Patriots secondary is extremely good, but their front seven has a lot of journeymen especially with Hightower out for the season.

The Patriots are good at limiting teams to field goals and keeping the points down. They are probably the best at situational football and not making mistakes. That will help cover up some of the inexperience in the front seven.

Patriots Offense vs. the Eagles Defense

The Patriots offense is one of the best in football, as it’s lead by the best player to ever play football, Tom Brady. Unfortunately for Brady, his top receiver, Julian Edelman is injured for the season. Brady’s used to not having Edelman this year. He’s still got plenty of weapons.

It’s been said many times that the way to stop Brady is to get pressure from the front 4. If you blitz a 5th, Brady will find the open guy. The Eagles have the people to get there with their top 4, but the Patriots have been very good at protecting it lately.

The other big mismatch for New England is that one of their strengths, passing to the tight end and running backs, is one of Philly’s biggest weaknesses. This is major factor in my prediction.

It’s almost game time, so:

Final Thoughts and Pick

I watched ESPN’s 30 for 30 production, The Two Bills that debuted this last week. As I watched them show the mid-1980s NY Giants, I realized that Bill Belichick was possibly the best coach in football back then. He did things that football had never seen like use the dime formation all game.

As a Patriots fan with my biases clear, you can probably tell that I’m going to take the favorite. A lot of people are predicting a close game because the Patriots Super Bowls are always close. I don’t think that’s intentional. I also don’t think what happened in 2003 is directly going to impact the play in 2018.

The top Patriots beat writer, Mike Reiss, has the Patriots winning 30-17. I really like that score. I don’t want to copy that, so I’ll add a field goal and call it 33-20. I feel like I should give more credit to to the Eagles as they are a very good team. I just think their coach/quarterback situation isn’t on par with the Patriots. I don’t know if it’s a 13-point difference, but sometimes things can snowball in football. I think this will be one of those games.

And if the Eagles’ win, their owner Jeffrey Lurie is from Boston and went to my alma mater, Brandeis. Silver linings for the win.

The Epic Super Bowl Analysis Guide (Part 2)

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I don’t have too many rules in life, but one of them is that I have to analyze the Super Bowl when the Patriots are in it. I know that 44 states hate the Patriots with the passion of some political candidates*.

However, I was a fan before their horrific 1-15 season was overshadowed by a Zeke Mowatt’s sexual harassment of a female reporter.

Imagine your team losing 15 of 16 games being the highlight of the season.

Now imagine that the history of your team was actually worse than that… yes it was truly that bad.

… and yes those bleachers at Sullivan stadium were really as bad as described in that article. When I was a kid, there were two classes of families, those who went to sold-out Celtics games to see Larry Bird in his prime… and those who went to Patriots games to freeze their behinds off sitting on snowy metal bleachers in the middle of December. I was the later.

So with no apologizes, I’m going to present an analysis of what I expect to happen in Super Bowl LI. Yes, it is going to be biased.

That said, I actually like the Falcons. They were a favorite of mine to play with in the early Madden games. Oh, they also have a Boston College quarterback, so arguably my local bias is in a no-lose situation.

I also know that my predictions may mean nothing, but my first Super Bowl Analysis Guide was almost perfectly dead-on, down to the amazing catch in the last minute. I specifically wrote:

“Don’t get beat by ‘the catch.’ The last two Super Bowls were highlighted by nearly impossible catches. The first the helmet catch by Tyree. The second by the long sideline catching by Manningham. By almost all accounts it is going to be a close game so a play like this could be the difference of whether we are talking about Brady being the best QB of all time or losing three straight Super Bowls. It’s insane, because he wasn’t on the field for either iconic catch. People magnify a few plays in a Super Bowl to overshadow a whole career with thousands of passes.”

Seattle made “the catch”, but Malcolm Butler made “the interception” which was the difference.

The Patriots couldn’t stop Bennett (one of my keys to the game), but brought the attack of the Lilliputians with Edelman and Vereen doing damage.

The disclaimers are out of the way. My chest-thumping for the one-time that a football game worked out as I thought it might is out of the way.

The only left is to dig into the actual analysis.

Super Bowl LI Analysis

If you thought the above was procrastinating you wouldn’t be entirely wrong.

For my last Super Bowl analysis, I spent at least 27 hours a day reading about the Seattle Seahawks to understand their depth chart… but I was already familiar with the team because they won the Super Bowl the previous year.

Falcons Analysis

These Falcons seemingly came from nowhere. They were 8-8 last year and 11-5 this year. It’s often said that the Patriots “failure” in the past 13 years is that they missed the playoffs in 2008 when Tom Brady got injured. They were 11-5, same as the Falcons this year. My point? Sometimes 11-5 gets you a playoff bye (i.e. Falcons this year), sometimes it’s good enough for a wild card (i.e. NY Giants this year), and sometimes it means you don’t make the playoffs at all (i.e. 2008 Patriots**).

Bill Parcells is famous for saying, “You are what your record says you are.” Allow me to suggest that the Hall of Fame coach was wrong. Wins and losses get you to the game… we can use statistical analysis to make some rough (and often bad) predictions on how that game might go.

The most basic analysis (Points Forwarded vs. Points Against… or “PF-PA”) of the Falcons says that they are great team. They scored 134 more points than their opponents. That’s the best in the NFC and second best to the Patriots 191 PF-PA. (The Patriots faced an easy schedule so that number might be inflated – which we’ll save for later). Only the Cowboys came close with a 115 number.

Last year, the following teams had a higher PF-PA than Atlanta’s 134… Patriots (150), Bengals (140), Panthers (192), Cardinals (176), Seahawks (146). The Super Bowl Champions (Denver Broncos) weren’t on the list. They got hot at the right time… and it’s all about the matchups. My point here is dual-fold:

1) Atlanta’s PF-PA is a better indicator than their record… and it’s top tier this year. They are deserving champions.
2) Sometimes teams catch fire in the playoffs… Denver last year. It seems that Atlanta has done that as well, which bodes well for them.

Last time I did an exhaustive analysis of the each team at each position. I don’t feel I know the Falcons well enough to do that. So I’ll take the “Lazy Man’s” approach and address the basics…

Falcons’ Offense vs. Patriots’ Defense

The Falcons have the top scoring offense in the NFL. That’s not fake news or alternative stats. They scored 33.8 points per game… that’s amazing.

They have an MVP QB*** and a great offense. I haven’t spent a lot of time analyzing the Falcon’s depth charts, but here are my basic (biased) thoughts.

The Patriots focus on stopping the run. Going into the AFC Championship, the Patriots hadn’t allowed a 90-yard rusher in last 24 games. It’s now 25 games. The Patriots always play a “stop the run first” defense. They are so focused on shutting down the opponents’ running game that they don’t rush the passer. This is why they have the #2 run defense in the NFL. Atlanta has the #5 rushing offense. However, a lot of that was behind a healthier Alex Mack. It seems he has a serious injury that limit him.

I’m tempted to say that the Falcons simply won’t be able to run the ball, because of the Mack injury and simply that no one runs well against the Patriots. However, the Falcons have great balance with their MVP-worthy quarterback and receivers. The Patriots can’t just focus on stopping the run or Matt Ryan will show them what 4 touchdown passes look like.

When I look at the Falcons passing offense, things get more interesting. Obviously Julio Jones is a superstar receiver, perhaps the best in the game. Mohamed Sanu is a great receiver as well. I don’t know much about Taylor Gabriel, but he seems to be the third WR on the depth chart.

I expect the Patriots to defend the Falcons by putting Eric Rowe on Julio Jones with a lot of safety help from Devon McCourty. The Patriots often “double team” the opponents’ best player with their 2nd or 3rd best players to take them out of the game. I expect the Patriots to put their superstar cornerback, Malcolm Bulter, on Sanu. There’s a huge size mismatch there (in Atlanta’s favor), so I could be completely wrong and they could go with the taller Rowe on Sanu. However, Butler has shut down better receivers (Antonio Brown), so it is worth a shot. Also, Sanu is from Rutgers and the Patriots are known for their Rutgers secondary… there’s history there.

This leaves the Patriots’ Logan Ryan on Taylor Gabriel. I don’t know much about Gabriel, but Ryan is a “red-chip” quality player. Patriots fans will take their #2 cornerback on an opponents 3rd WR all day.

The Patriots would have to use 4 players, but they’d have an advantage against the top 3 Falcon’s wide receivers.

However, Altanta likes to pass their running backs. Their two top combined for 86 receptions more than any individual receiver. It will be up to the Patriots’ Chung and their linebackers to cover them. That’s not a match in the Patriots’ favor.

If I’m the Falcons, I use Julio Jones as a decoy to clear two Patriots defenders (the cornerback and a safety) to one side of the field and try to find a mismatch with a running back on a linebacker with little safety help. In my opinion that will be the key match-up.

Patriots’ Offense vs. Falcons’ Defense

There’s a lot of talk about the Falcon’s Offense being the best in the NFL and it’s well-deserved. There’s much less talk about the Patriots’ offense being just a shade behind in points per game when Brady was the QB.

Having watched every Patriots game this year, there were many games where the Patriots ran out the clock with Blount. More than any other season, I’ve seen the Patriots manage games to limit injuries. With a lead they’ll run out the last 10 minutes of the fourth quarter and depend on the defense to get one stop or hold the other team to a field goal. The point is that the Patriots’ offense might be as good as the Falcons, but they never had to get in shoot-outs.

On the flip side, the Patriots had a weak schedule. It’s easier to score points and prevent them when the competition is weak.

I don’t know much about the Falcon’s defense other than the stats, which aren’t too good. They are near the bottom of the league. From what I’ve read the Atlanta defense is young and they have some upside. The other problem is that Atlanta is terrible at tackling and the Patriots might be the best at forcing missed tackles and creating Yards After Catch (YAC). It’s a ginormous mismatch.

Final Thoughts and Pick

I simply see too many things going the Patriots way in this one. They’ve been healthy (minus Gronk), while Atlanta is injured (Mack). They have the defense they haven’t had in years and an offense that can arguably be as good as Atlanta’s.

My pick plays right into those thoughts and my obvious bias.

I’m going with the Patriots 38-29. I honestly feel it could be a 6 point game, but I’m going larger because I think the Patriots could put Atlanta in a hole if they force some field goals.

Notes and Further Biased Commentary

* Did you know that Patriots haters invented “alternative facts” and “fake news” years ago? There are still people (Marshall Faulk) who said that the Patriots taped the Rams practice in 2001. There was a story that ran after SpyGate, but it was quickly retracted as an attention-grabbing scheme. (And if the Patriots taped the Rams practice back then, the results should have showed it. The Rams had about 150 more yards of offense. Brady passed for 145 yards total. The Rams turned the ball over 3 times (their own fault). The Rams statistically dominated the game, but they made a few too many errors in a close game.

DeflateGate was the original “fake news.” The NFL planted a story about 11 of 12 deflated by over 2 each with a trusted ESPN news source (Chris Mortensen) which turned out to be completely false. The real facts were that the balls exhibited proper air pressure with relation to the ideal gas law. Scientists from top universities from all over the country weighed in to explain it. It would have been similar to the NBA punishing Michael Jordan (and the Bulls) for defying the law of gravity.

** Football nerds who are reading this might be interested in looking at that NFL 2008 season. The Patriots lead the division in point differential by a large margin, and were 6th in the NFL overall. They didn’t qualify for one of the 12 playoff spots, due to the 10th tie-braker or something like that. The 8-8 Chargers made the playoffs beating up on a very weak division, while an 11-5 team in a very competitive division went home. The Ravens and Steelers also beat up on a weak division. The 3rd best team in the AFC East (the NY Jets) had a 9-7 record, which was better than the Chargers that year… even in the Chargers weak division.

Miami, who won the division and got the home game got, predictably, blown out badly.

Yes, I’m a bit bitter. I think Detroit Lions fans can agree with me… that season never happened, right?

*** The MVP shouldn’t have been a debate. Ryan went 11-5 and Brady went 11-1. Ryan had his elite receiving weapon (Julio Jones) for almost the entire season. Brady lost his elite receiving weapon (Rob Gronkowski) early on. Despite that, Tom Brady was nearly perfect. Turn the tables, and ask yourself if Ryan would have put his numbers without Julio Jones and if Brady’s numbers would have been better with Gronk. Some may penalize Brady for missing 4 games, but the ideal gas law (like gravity) cleared him and showed measurements was just natural physics. If Brady played in those 4 games, we might presume that he’d have gone 4-0, arguably making him 15-1.

Some say that Brady’s contribution wasn’t of value because the team went 3-1 without him. That’s lazy narrative. The Patriots were shut out by the Bills in the last game because they were playing with an injured 3rd string rookie QB, who went on IR after Brady was activated. Brady clearly took the team from rock bottom to the #1 seed in the AFC. Brady’s value couldn’t be stated higher.

And for anyone who says that Tom Brady had zero value to the Patriots during those first 4 games (as I have read), you are completely wrong. Brady took the suspension rather than fighting for what’s right at the Supreme Court level, which was his option. The fight wasn’t about deflating footballs, but whether the commissioner of the NFL can do whatever he wants. Brady could have challenged it to that level, but then he might have missed the post-season. He took his unjust penalty early and helped Garoppolo get ready to lead the team.

Putting your team ahead of your personal reputation is a great sacrifice. I don’t think too many players in professional sports do that. I’m obviously biased, but that is a ginormous point in Brady’s favor that can’t be overlooked. It’s a feather in his cap that he came from it with no live action to exceptional performance.

You Don’t Want to Read This

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Seriously… go back and read the title again.

Still here?

A few times a year, I have to write an article for me. This is one of those articles. The vast majority of my articles are for you, the reader. (And I have around 2100 articles here: Archive.)

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Something didn’t happen more than 500 days ago and it’s still making news.

As Boston Globe article states, “… fatigue is setting in here in New England, and the rest of the country is downright comatose. ‘Enough is enough,’ is all I hear from people on the street.” (Are you still doubting this article’s title?)

We like to think of the legal system as just and right, but the more I look at it, it seems very flawed. I find this frustrating because it seems easy to fix if we could just get rid of the red tape and use some common sense.

I’m going to write a little bit about football, but that’s just necessary background. This transcends football. (I don’t say that lightly because I love football.)

If that link above didn’t give away by now, I’m writing about DeflateGate… the NFL’s accusation that Tom Brady orchestrated a scheme to deflate footballs for some alleged performance enhancement.

As nearly 2 dozen scientists have put together in legal brief the “deflated” footballs are due to the Ideal Gas Law.

How would we feel about the NBA suspending Michael Jordan for 20+ games for defying gravity? At least in that case you could place some kind of direct causation.

Even if you don’t believe in the laws of physics, you are looking at a scenario where you are accusing of a person of orchestrating a scheme to take 0.02 PSI out of footballs (by Peter King’s math).

This is like convicting Bill Gates on no evidence of creating an elaborate scheme to rob a bank to steal 13 cents.

It seems that, legally-speaking, DeflateGate has become about whether an employer can arbitrarily take a person’s paycheck away by being the judge, jury, and executioner. That’s an over-simplification, but it’s a complex topic that would take more than 2,000 words to explain. (Also, I’m not a lawyer, but that’s my understanding from more reading on the topic than anyone should ever do.)

The impacted person of this legal matter (Tom Brady) has no ability to say, “Hey, this is banana pants crazy… can I have a fair trial on the merits of what I’m being accused of?”

That’s what I mean about things being “just and right.” Everyone seems to be arguing about whether an arbitrator can be obviously biased and whether we can create a subset “system” to deny people of their core legal rights.

And that’s probably why the biggest labor union in the US filed a legal brief explaining how the court was wrong and was “lacking in procedural fairness.”

I heard a convincing argument on the radio the other day. It was something like, “If you don’t side with labor unions you are against America.” That’s over the top, but there was grain of truth to it.

These amicus briefs are interesting. These are people who aren’t involved in the case who are saying, “Hey, you got this wrong.”

Scientists and labor unions are on the side of Tom Brady. Anyone else? Yes.

The New England Patriots also filed on the side of Tom Brady. That might seem like common sense to the general population, but this is like Marvel’s Civil War. The Patriots are an NFL franchise and the NFL enjoys a monopoly of televised professional football in America. The Patriots can’t go anywhere else with their business.

Are there more people going out the way to support this injustice? Yes.

Kenneth Feinberg filed a brief as well. Like you, I’ve never heard of him. It seems like his the top arbitrator in the nation. His resume includes arbitrating September 11th terrorist attacks, the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster, the Boston Marathon bombings, and the Zapruder film sale. It seems that Kenneth Feinberg is “kind of a big deal“, to borrow a phrase from a friend.

Did anyone else join the party? Yes, 10 law school professors decided to go out their way to side on Brady’s behalf.

Science and scientists, labor unions representing hard working Americans, the top expert in arbitration, and the legal experts (10 law school professors) are all on Brady’s side.

When I look at the NFL’s side, I can’t find anyone who isn’t paid by the NFL supporting it.

Did the laws of physics fail? Are nearly two dozen scientists wrong? Did the alleged infraction matter when Brady followed it up with an MVP-worthy season? Why did the Patriots cause a rift with the NFL for one player? Why are law professors and an extremely distinguished arbitrator upset about this?

I think I know the answers to these questions. Let’s discuss it in the comments. But first, please allow me to bring money into the discussion (this site is about personal finance).

This thing that scientifically never happened has come to an estimated (by ESPN) cost of 22.5 million dollars. That’s just legal fees from the lawyers, I don’t think it counts the costs to the public of the judicial system (the salaries of the judges, for example).

Imagine how much good we could with 22.5 million dollars! How many hungry people does that feed?

Why Is The FBI Investigating Fan Duel and Draft Kings?

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Back in August, Lazy Man gave us a tip – avoid DraftKings and FanDuel.  I won’t recap the entirety of his article (I may get paid by the word, but I have scruples.  I’m getting paid for this parenthetical explanation, though.  Jackpot!).  In a nutshell, you create a fantasy team (staying within a “salary cap”) and your team competes against millions of other entries.  If your collection of players does really really well, you win money.  Otherwise you lose your entry fee.  Because of the number of competing entries, you have to do amazingly incredibly awesome to cash in.  Having a team that is merely “great” won’t be enough.

Gambling or not gambling

There’s been  lot of discussion about whether daily fantasy sports (DFS) such as DraftKings and FanDuel are gambling.  It’s very clear cut to me.  It’s definitely gambling.  Gambling does not always mean a contest of pure chance (slot machines) – gambling can also be a contest with a large element of skill.  Poker and horse racing fit this mold.  Horse racing is unequivocally gambling, but it’s clearly not a game of pure chance.  Someone who has expert knowledge is going to do far better (over the long run) betting the horses than I will.  Daily Fantasy Sports is basically betting the horses, but swapping out humans for the horses.

The question of whether DFS should be legal or not is an entirely different question.  Currently, Daily Fantasy Sports are legal in 45 states.

FBI Investigation

Several days ago, the FBI began an investigation into DraftKings and FanDuel.  The event that triggered this was a DraftKings employee winning $350,000 in a contest on competitor FanDuel.  Until recently, employees were banned from competing in contests run by their employers, but not those run by competitors.  They are now banned from competing on contests on competing site.

How much do these employees win?  At a conference last month, the co-founder of DraftKings bragged that some employees made more from contests on other sites than they did from their salaries at DraftKings.  A FanDuel spokesperson recently said that DraftKings employees have won 0.3% of the money the company has awarded in its history.  This might sound like a small number, but bear in mind that there are millions of people playing and that this relatively small group is winning 1 of every $300.

What’s the Problem?

These employees are probably winning because they’re huge sports fans, right?  Well, not necessarily.  Some of these employees have access to ownership data – they know how many people have selected each player.

How does this help?  Let’s look at a completely hypothetical example.  Let’s say that Tom Brady and Peyton Manning have the exact same salary and are projected to have the exact same value in the coming week.  It’s a coin flip.

Let’s also say that 100,000 people picked Peyton Manning and 200,000 picked Tom Brady – and as an employee with access to ownership data, you know this.  Why the disparity?  Perhaps non-football reasons that are not obvious to the casual fan.  Peyton’s brother Eli threw four interceptions last week and is pulling Peyton down with him.  Meanwhile Giselle was in a popular commercial and Tom got a bit of a boost from that.  These are obviously stupid reasons to pick Tom over Peyton, but subtle things often affect us subconsciously.

Who do you pick?  You pick Peyton.  Why?  Because the projected payoff is exactly the same, but you get a better boost with Peyton.  If Peyton outperforms Tom, you get a boost that you have to share with 100,000 people.  If Tom outperforms Peyton, you get a boost that you have to share with 200,000 people.   Tom helps you less.

If the point isn’t clear, perhaps this will help.  You’re in a March Madness pool with 20 people.  There are two equally dominant teams – Lazyford and Kosvard.  Since Lazyford’s campus is twenty miles away, 16 people have picked them to win.  Which team do you pick in order to maximize your potential payout?  Kosvard, of course.  It’s the same basic concept – when the projected cost/reward ratio are the same for teams/players, pick the least popular one.

What Does the Future Hold for DFS?

Honestly, I don’t know.  While employees of the sites are now banned from playing on competing sites, this really doesn’t fix the problem of ownership data being used to optimize lineups.  An employee could simply share (or sell) this data to family and friends, have them play, and take a cut.  If they are smart enough – playing medium-sized games and spreading out the people geographically – they can probably get away with it.