Cash games in Daily Fantasy Baseball are essential for long-term success. In order to be a profitable player, you must play cash games. Ninety-five percent of the successful and high volume fantasy players are able to be profitable based on playing cash games. We all would like to hit a big score but it is not just realistic to play in only tournament or GPP games. The payout structures and winning percentage are not being set up in a way for that philosophy to work for almost all players.
What is a cash game?
It is a 50/50, double/up or head-to-head games. I am going to break down some very important steps on what I feel is needed to be successful. I will go over strategies for how much you should be playing in cash games, which contests should be entered into (contest selection) and how a person should go about building a solid cash game lineup.
CONTEST SELECTION
It all starts with contest selection. You can put together very good lineups, but if you don’t enter the right contests you can still lose. There are numerous players out there that build solid lineups on a regular basis but still can’t find a way to be profitable on a regular basis. It starts with how much of your daily play should be in cash games vs. tournaments. I recommend doing at least 80 percent cash games every single night you play. It gets tempting for even the great players to want to take more shots in tournaments but you have to stay disciplined. You will end up frequently depositing money if there is not a consistent philosophy.
There are two different types of cash games which are 50/50 (also called double-ups) and head-to-head games. There are many players that are fans of head-to-heads but personally I avoid them and don’t recommend newer players play them. This is where the professionals really make their money preying off new players. The best contests to enter are the cash games that are single-entry and have bigger fields. It varies site to site on the sizes that are available but every site has some available.
On the bigger sites like FanDuel and DraftKings, there is no reason you should be in anything less than a 40-person contest. There are multi-entry doubles but it is best to avoid those as the pay-line tends to be higher than in single-entry. This is mainly because they are filled with the professional players. There is no way to be able to completely avoid the “pros” no matter what contests you play, but get them in a one entry vs. your one entry situation for the best odds. The smaller sites are probably not going to have quite the same field sizes available.
Even the best players don’t win every single night. If possible, it is also best to play in the contests actually labeled 50/50. You technically don’t double your money but in a $5 contest you will get $9 back, and you only have to beat 50 percent of the field. In the contests that are double-ups, you actually have to beat 55 percent of the field, but you do win $10 for your $5 entry. This should help clear up the different labels you will see on 50/50 or double-up contests. It is helpful to not wait until the last hour of contests filling up as you don’t get as much choice in both size and value with last minute entries.
LINEUP BUILDING
Cash games lineups should consist of safe plays and you should always start with the pitchers selected first, then the hitters. I will explain some pointers on how to choose them later on in the article.
Player selection should be based on players with at least some sort of minimum expected score. Players with high on-base percent, some power and speed are a good starting point for hitters. For pitchers, someone with a strong K/9 rate, goes deep into games and a solid chance at the win are good to target. Baseball is not as bad as football or basketball where a player fails badly and you are done for the night. You can survive zero points from a player but it makes cashing much easier when production is more of a given from almost all spots in your lineups.
You shouldn’t ever worry about ownership percent of a given player in cash games. Just build a lineup that can beat half the field. It does not matter whether you finish 40th out of 100 or first out of 100. It is not about having the highest scoring lineup in cash games. There are too many people concerned about maximizing their points for the night instead of just winning.
PITCHER SELECTION
The cash game lineup starts at the pitching spot. It is the most important selection made when building quality lineups. A dominant pitching performance can carry the cash game contests as well as a pitcher blowing up can kill any chance of cashing. You can handle disappointments from the hitters, but the ability to cash goes down dramatically when you miss with your starting pitcher.
I will repeat again, don’t worry about ownership percent in cash games. Instead worry about taking the best pitcher or pitchers possible. You also don’t need to get overly concerned with the price of the pitcher unless that pitcher becomes super expensive. This typically isn’t the case early in the year but can become a factor as the season rolls along. If you like Pitcher A for $11k more than Pitcher B for $10k then always go with Pitcher A. This is not a position where you want to take chances. You want to lean on the Clayton Kershaw’s, Zack Greinke’s and Jake Arrieta’s whenever you can.
The key is to find pitchers who will go deep into games as you are rewarding for outs recorded, have a high probability to get the win, a high K/9 rate while taking on non-elite hitting teams. Each site has a different level of reward in their scoring system so knowing the value of an out, K or win is important.
Here are some other factors that are a great starting point to look at: Pitchers splits vs. expectant batting order including K/9 rate, BB/9 and wOBA (weighted on-base).
wOBA is a statistic, based on linear weights, designed to measure a player's overall offensive contributions per plate appearance. It is formed from taking the observed run values of various offensive events, dividing by a player's plate appearances, and scaling the result to be on the same scale as on-base percentage. It is one of the best indicators of a player’s true performance. Look at pitchers’ recent performance as you are searching for guys that have good form and that seem to have a good feel for their stuff at that moment. This can be even more important when you don’t have proven pitchers to choose from which can happen quite a few times throughout the season.
You also can take a look at a pitchers FIP, xFIP and SIERA. These can give you a better indication of a pitcher’s true performance vs. just looking at their ERA or WHIP.
Vegas odds can be helpful to which team is the favorite to win along with the over/under for runs in the game. This is not something I personally use much but others find it helpful. I prefer to weigh other factors more.
You should also research the opponent’s splits vs. that-handed pitcher for the season.
I think one of the most important tools to look at is the opponents wOBA in the last week to a month overall. This is something at Fantasy Alarm we have used with great success. I will downgrade a pitcher a little if the opposing team is hot. Baseball can be a streaky game and there is a mental side that can’t be measured.
Lastly, take a look at the Umpire Report in the Fantasy Alarm DFS Playbook. This can really help separate pitchers you are trying to sort through. Some umpires will really squeeze pitchers which can really frustrate the pitcher and lead to major struggles even for great hurlers.
Some targets you can use on the major sites are the following:
Seven innings, 2 ER or less, 7 K’s and a win on FanDuel, will put you in good shape.
On DraftKings, if you can get 13 innings, 12 k’s, 5 ER or less at least one win from your two pitchers combined you are on your way to cashing.
HITTER SELECTION
Once you have locked in your pitcher, you must finish out the roster with hitters. Consistency is the key when looking for hitters. The high risk/high reward hitters are not necessary. A bunch of guys who go 0-for-4 on a regular basis are terrible in the lineup. I prefer guys that have some power and speed potential so they can contribute in multiple ways.
Hitters that have a high wOBA and on-base percentages are always on the radar.
Pure power hitters like Pedro Alvarez are guys that I avoid because players like him bring such a low on-base percentage so there are far too many games where a player like Alvarez produces nothing. A player having power is great but speed can be underrated as well. The key is a strong on-base percentage.
If you choose a guy like Dee Gordon, he can be a useful player because even though he lacks the power his speed brings added benefits. Billy Hamilton, on the other hand, can’t be used in most cases since his on-base percentage is terrible no matter how much speed he has.
You will also need to target players that hit higher in the batting order. An acceptable spot in the order who would be 1-6 as the away team or 1-5 as the home team. In a perfect world the 3 or 4 spot brings the most upside but those players tend to be priced higher. You want to make sure you get at least four at-bats out of your players, which higher spots in the order will bring. It is important, however, to avoid choosing guys who are going to be pinch-hit for.
If the player is a cheap value play, you can maybe take a chance on one, but too many can really hurt the scoring potential of the lineup. A key to building a quality lineup can be found in value plays that can really open salary to choose some high quality bats. A few points in finding some would be guys hitting at the top of the order that normally don’t. If the site doesn’t penalize for outs or strikeouts, a hitter moved to leadoff can have a ton of value since he is getting more at-bats. Hitters that have been in a prolonged slump but showing signs of coming out of it. If a player had a rough month but has picked it up in the last week those players are underpriced. Hitters that specialize in hitting left-handed pitching are nice, but you need to be careful with these as they are the ones I mentioned that do get platooned for.
I do tend to avoid the most expensive bats on most slates as they are just not realistic to fit into your lineups while trying to build a nice balanced hitting attack. There can be exceptions to this “rule” depending on the pricing of the given slate. If you have paid up for pitching, which I mentioned is the best thing to do in cash games, the expensive bats are nearly unplayable.
You should avoid stacking in cash games if you want to do 2-3 players from a given team that is fine but I don’t recommend more than two in most cases. Even bad pitchers can throw a good game, you are almost guaranteed to lose your cash games if you have loaded up on one team.
There are few specific statistics I am looking to target when choosing hitters. You will want to look at the opposing pitcher’s splits vs left-handed and right-handed hitters. It is then time to look at the specific hitter splits vs. left-handed and right-handed pitchers. It will then be time to take a look at the recent trends of the opposing pitcher that they are facing. Has the pitcher been getting slapped around or have they shut down opposing teams? You will then take a look at the hitter’s recent trends in “last week to a month” games along with recent swinging miss percent. The swinging miss percent helps you avoid hitters that seem lost at the plate. You can utilize Vegas lines once again to see what the expected run totals are for each team.
Target players who bring more run and RBI potential in a higher scoring game. Is the game in a hitter friendly environment like Coors Field or in a pitching friendly park like San Diego? There is always higher scoring games in certain ballparks.
There is a section in Draft Guide that actually talks about each park’s hitting factors.
Check out the Umpire Report in the DFS playbook as you want to find the hitter friendly umpires that leads to be walks, hitter’s counts and run scoring opportunities.
The most debated statistic to look at is batter vs pitcher. Plenty of analysts hate this but this plays into the mental part of the game which is hard to judge. Some hitters dominate some pitchers while certain pitchers own some hitters. You don’t want to use small sample sizes but to me anything over 15 plate appearances for hitter is at least worth a look.
This is all about finding the most positives about a particular hitter. Just look at that day’s batter vs. pitcher columns and choose directly off them. These are some of the statistics I use when trying to sort through the hitters on a given day.
FINAL THOUGHTS
When constructing cash lineup and being a profitable player, you have to stay disciplined and not take unnecessary risks. There is no reason to chase the low-owned pitcher who lacks consistency or the player who you think might hit multiple homers. A balanced lineup that has production from multiple hitters, along with a solid performance from your starting pitcher, will cash 75 percent of the time. There are occasions where things don’t work but in DFS it is unreasonable to expect to cash every night. If you can finish in the top half four or five times a week there is no reason you can’t be profitable. The key will be to stick to a good balance in cash games vs. tournament play.