Aside from going 5-10 in a Pick Em’, not against the spread, I had a pretty good weekend. I played some 1-2 at Sugarhouse on Friday and ended up winning about $500. I was in for $700, so walking out with $1,200 felt pretty good. The next night I broke even in Pai Gow, lost $150 in Blackjack, and then bought into 1-2 again. In similar fashion, I was in for about $500 and walked out about with $1,000. For the amount of money I tip to servers and dealers, I should probably have another $200 in my wallet. Either way it was profitable. Without elaborating much on the session, people look at me as a drunk, loose cannon who is capable of showing up with any 2. This tends to throw them off their games whereas this literally is my game. I get killed in games where people are coming over the top of my loose opens and it causes me to tighten up and essentially be a losing player. In these smaller games, people just let me rule the roost and I win the most pots and show down well when I get my money in.

I also managed to post a win in Draftkings for the first time this year. Sure it was only $30 but at least it was a winning week. I will be going 3-1 in fantasy and a shot at 4-0 if Witten drops less than 4. Combine that with a 3-0 NFL week for 20 units to make up for some goon texting me Eastern Micigan on Saturday and the account is juicing. Going to make a play tonight for at least 10 units and I’m leaning towards the Cards if anyone cares.

I’ll be heading away for a large part of this week so there’s a chance this is the last post until next Monday. We’ll see.

Without a doubt, utilizing your free auction dollars in fantasy football can be an edge. I’ll add too that if the league is still using rolling waivers, it’s an inferior way of justice towards who gets the player. Let’s look at a few bids by people in my leagues this week and i’ll throw around my opinion because I can.

Evan’s League

• Chris Thompson was won by a bid of $15, while Sam and I bid $5. This back field is unclear with Rob Kelley being bad and Thompson producing. $15 seems like a reasonable price to pay for a position that seems exceptionally hard to fill these days.
• I bid $8 on JJ Nelson and Evan bid $4. This is where Evan’s bid of $56 for Tarik Cohen leaves him out of the running. If John Brown continues to ail, and there’s no reason to think otherwise, I like JJ’s potential. I also have no idea how no one else in the league thought of putting in a bid for a guy who just went for 120 and 2. If I really thought a defense had a PREMIUM matchup, I may bid $6. However, there is no reason to think that Eli can’t burn the Eagles.

• Alex bid $6 for the Eagles D and Evan bid $2. Streaming defenses is a good strategy, but spending this much on the Eagles doesn’t make much sense.
• Jason Witten for $14 and…. there was 1 bid for 0. Overpaid for a TE where you can find a streamer option every week.

Alex’s League

• A player not only dropped Chris Hogan, but they won a bid for JJ Nelson for $25. Sheesh on all fronts.
• This same player spend $25 for Jermaine Kearse and the next bid was $5. Sheesh.
• Jason Witten went for $22. Ed Dickson will replace Olsen and could have been gotten as an FA. Witten will regress.
• The Eagles and the Falcons D’s were picked up for $14 and $10 respectively. I don’t get it but the same player who bid $6 in the other league, bid $14 here. Confusing.
• Marlon Mack was also released, who after spending the day with Bud (who has way more knowledge on upcoming player than any normal human should), will be bid on by me.

Steve’s League

• This is an old waiver system but I was in the 3 spot and got Chris Carson. Shout out to Adam for having him the week before in Evan’s league.

I was going to write this post yesterday but didn’t have the time which makes the timing of this release poor.

I missed Thursday night’s game by choosing the Bengals. They were giving 6 points at home and covered for exactly 0 minutes of the game. I’m in 2 pick em’s and obviously missed them both. The game was atrocious by the way. Almost unwatchable. After suffering through 3 and half quarters, I was waiting for Andy Dalton to bring the action at the end and it never came. Punt after punt. Horrible football. I have had a weird Andy Dalton feeling throughout his career, at first I thought he was garbage, then I thought he was underrated, now he’s garbage again. I have this same career arc with Flacco.

What I want to touch on this post is getting the Thursday night game wrong is the absolute worst. It sets up the weekend in a bad light when I miss. This game was the epitome of too easy. The Texans are trotting out a rookie and the Bengals are at home after an embarrassing shut out. Perfect time to rise to the occasion and make a statement. Apparently if I think it’s the perfect time, I should go against my “perfect” feeling. When I miss the Thursday night game, not only do I most likely lose money which rarely makes me happy, but I feel like an idiot until Sunday when I get another shot to lose that feeling. Not fun.

To add insult to injury, Bud comments on my last post needling not only my post, but my incorrectness and my bank account. Brutal. Week 5 already has a big red bulls-eye circling it. Onward to some misery.

To go along with the shock of the Patriots getting beat at home in the season opener, with a 9 point spread, I managed to to last exactly 0 games in the losers pool which I decided to play for the first time. There were 3 9 point spreads (Pats, Steelers, and Bills) and I figured that the Pats were easily the best team and would have no problem defeating the Alex Smith led Patriots. Obviously that was incredibly wrong and it cost me $50 for the losers and $70 on the game. People are supposed to last the entire SEASON in the loser’s pool and I couldn’t make it 1 game. I hope this is a sign of “it can’t get any worse” instead of a “dude, give up.” Fortunately I didn’t get hurt too much in fantasy as only one guy I played had Gillislee to go along with Cooks and the Pats D. The 7 unit loss puts me back at even for the season as we plod on to week 1. This game is the perfect example of if you are so sure something is going to happen, do the opposite.

Who doesn’t love a nice Sat & Sun sweat? For me I have about 3k of sweating to do over this weekend if all goes right. Let’s dive in:

• Frank Paone hosted a Fantasy Golf Tournament that revolved around the 5 majors (including the Players). 40+ people entered at $75 each creating a nice little prize pool. Each low aggregate of the tourny wins $375 and the winner of the lowest score of the 5 combined wins $750+. I’m currently ahead of the 2nd place guy by 20 strokes for the low round aggregate with a chance to win this tournament outright. Since I passed 5 guys, I don’t get hit with a major penalty of missing the cut. As it so happens, the guy in 2nd place is also in 2nd outright. We share 3 of the same golfers in ZJ, Fowler, and Finau. He needs Rory and Patrick Reed to beat Paul Casey and Adam Scott by 20 strokes for me to lose the $775. For 1st place of the PGA, it’s still to early to call but I’m obviously in a nice spot in 1st (same scenario with Rory and Reed to beat Casey and Scott)

Total Win Percentage: 98% 

PGA Win Percentage 33%

• I had a bye in week one of the fantasy baseball playoffs and am currently in the Semi Finals against a guy who I’ve had some history with. This scenario is a bit odd but I’ve been taking the short end of the stick over and over again. Let’s start with me dropping Bellinger earlier in the season (I read he was being sent back down to Triple A and Adrian Gonzalez was coming back up) and this guy picking him up. Then I dropped Dylan Bundy 3 weeks ago and this guy scooped him and hit me for 20 with a start on Monday and he gets another start today. In what I thought was a good move on my bye week, I picked up Andrew Cashner for a double start this week who then scratched. Last night I felt like I had to stream so I picked up Edwin Jackson who is an RP, SP (instead of an SP, RP) and this caused me to drop one of my RP’s (Raisel Iglesias) who went for 9.9 points last night and Edwin got PPD (he pitches today but still). My catcher, Wilson Contreras, went to the DL as well this week. So as all of these things are going against me, I’m going to need my bats to show up. He has 4 pitchers today and then 2 tomorrow including Chris Sale (he can also stream once). I’m spot starting James Shields today at +130 which is a huge if, but I have to have some luck on my side. I’m looking at another stream tomorrow and I have Ervin going on Sunday. So it’ll be my 4 pitchers against his 6 (7 if he streams).

Chance To Win: 35%

• I have more action on the PGA as well. I put 10 dollars on Louis at 70-1 and 5 more at 40-1. He’s currently in 5th place at 14-1. I also have 4 on Henrik Stenson to win 600 which is unlikely. I did mange to pass all 6 people in 1 DK team which is always a good chance to cash. The lineup is Cantlay, Kuchar, Lovemark, Matsuyama, Reavie, and Stenson. Xander Schauffele and Daniel Berger prevent 2 other teams from passing 6 so I’m hoping for maybe a min cash on those ones if I get lucky.
• I played some Bovada Blackjack today for the fun of it and saw I had a $150 bonus. Nice. After playing about 10 hands of blackjack I was curious how long it would take me to earn the bonus. I was greeted with this message.

Almost there!

By Brookes Britcher

There are generally 3 elements to success in a fantasy baseball season: (A) 1st & 2nd round draft picks, (B) identifying undervalued middle-to-late picks and (C) intelligent waiver wire workings. (B) and (C) can be a bit more dynamic and fluid. Drafting VMart or Ortiz in the late rounds paid major dividends last season. As did finding some early gems like Velasquez off the early Waiver Wire or drafting Justin Verlander late.

However, none of those moves can exist without strategy – and that begins at the top of the draft. Like some variation of the “Butterfly Effect”, the first two moves you make will ripple and determine the rest of your draft, how your team is constituted, and how often you need to dip your toes into the FA or Waiver Wire pool.

The first pick of the draft is often where players make the biggest mistakes, and set their team down a poor draft process. It seems easy. Just take the best player with the best numbers available. It all depends on your league, league settings, etc., but for this discussion I’ll be entertaining a draft strategy in a H2H, Total Points / Week, Snake Draft league – the most common format available on ESPN.

THINGS TO CONSIDER WITH YOUR 1ST PICK

Position (and draft position depth).

• This is probably the most important, as I listed it first. How many OF’s are playing in MLB? Roughly 90 starters over 30 teams. Starting pitchers? Roughly 150. How many 3B, 2B or SS are starting in MLB? Roughly 30. Which of these positions do you imagine will be easier to fill with a quality, continually productive player after the 1st round?

Lineup

• Who do they play for? Who else is on the team? If you choose to draft a pitcher, are they going to get run support to turn their QS outings into W’s? If you are drafting a field player, where do they bat? Who else is in the lineup? Do they bat 3rd with 2 guys ahead of them with suspect steal ratios? Great players become superstars if they are in the proper scenario. I would take Edwin Encarnacion every year over the past 6 years in the late first round. Never got the “superstar” moniker, so always fell to late 1st round or early 2nd.

Multi- Category 

• Your 1st pick is precious thing. But don’t cherish it like losing your virginity. It could be a beautiful sequence of events where the player you want is there – or not so much.
• Ideally you want to obtain the most metrics out of this pick as possible. There is a reason why Chris Carter waited and waited to get signed to a one year deal. How is that possible? In 2016 he scored 84 R, had 94 RBI and hit 41 HR. Great numbers – until you look at how many “outs” he contributed to. 206 SO, .222 BA and a .321 OBP. A lot of negative numbers for your team. For all of the great things Carter does, he hurts the team equally. If you are going to spend a 1st round pick on a player – make sure they will help you in multiple categories. If they go into a power slump, are they still walking on base? Can they hit for average? Are they solidified in a lineup position to get RBI’s even when the team is scoring less runs? Embrace diversity.

WHO TO NOT DRAFT WITH YOUR 1st PICK

• Don’t draft a 1B with your 1st pick (maybe Goldschmidt). Why would you do this? Because you want HR’s and you don’t want to worry about where they will come from later in the draft. You get to check it off your list. Until injuries happen. Then the 30-40 HR’s you were counting on are suddenly gone. Plenty of people hit HR’s – and you will most likely get next to nothing beyond that in points categories from this position. I promise, someone this year is going to hit more HR’s than someone thought. So be diligent on the FA pool. You’ll find your HR’s.

• Don’t draft a Pitcher with your 1st pick (except maybe Kershaw…). That’s a lot of pressure to put on a player. You’re drafting on the bet that a player (given 1-2 opportunities to play per week) will outperform a player playing 6-7 days per week. There are exceptions, but you are also then tethered directly to the lineup behind the pitcher. Ask Cole Hamels how one of his many brilliant seasons for the Phillies went when they couldn’t score runs and he hovered around a .500 pitching record. If you take a pitcher in the 1st round, it’s kind of like marrying your in-laws too. Know the family too.

• Don’t draft an OF with your 1st pick (…maybe Trout…). OF is one of the most plentiful positions in MLB, and usually the first place top-talent gets promoted to play. Unless you are in love with a player, there is no real reason to draft an OF player until the 3rd or 4th round. Chances are whoever you drafted will get replaced in your lineup by the end of the season. Major value position, so don’t waste your 1st on one.

• Don’t draft a C with your 1st pick. This should go without saying, but some people just love Buster Posey. Don’t do it.

WHO TO DRAFT WITH YOUR 1st PICK

I’m not going to go into numbers here as this post is already setting length records for this blog, and we all know about Google and BaseballReference at this point.

Only Arenado can plank in mid air.

If I had a Top 5 pick in a draft, these are the players I would take. Duh, huh?

#1 Arenado (3B)

#2 Machado (3B)

#3 Correa (SS)

#4 Goldschmidt (1B)

#5 Kershaw (P)

The only real advice I can provide is to draft high in the weakest positions, draft for players who can consistently impact multiple categories, take risks on players you like and enjoy watching, ride with a rookie you have a feeling about. Take Trout with your 1st pick if you’d like, but I’ll guarantee your SS or 3B productivity will suck all year.

One last thing…

NEVER draft for Steals or Saves. Outside of the “elite”, you can find them anywhere. Closers rarely finish a season, and another player will take their place. At 1 point, Steals are practically worthless. Take a player who hits doubles. Less chance of getting thrown out at 2nd for negative points.

STEAL OF THE DRAFT: Andrew McCutchen (OF) [2nd or 3rd round…] / Hunter Pence (OF) [5th or 6th round…]

I’m not alone with this feeling about DraftKings Golf. Currently all 3 of the tournaments I joined are going to fill up completely and we’re still 17 minutes from tee-off. For the next who knows how many months, i’ll be entering a lineup into the $33 Dogleg, $3 Birdie, and $4 Casual Fore. This is a $40 a week allowance and I can say full on that it’s the best money I’ll spend all week.

Fantasy golf has more excitement than football. There I said it. Here’s why:

• 4 days of enjoyment
• You feel like a genius passing 6 guys
• The excitement level comes in 2 doses when your player is going – 1) He doesn’t screw up 2) He hits a great shot
• You get to root for your non-players to screw up which is more fun than hoping your guy does well

Did you just see that?
Yes.
He just got a hole in one on a par 4.
I know. I said I saw it.

Tell me that this week’s 10th hole isn’t exciting.

I joined FantasyGolfInsider for the month to get some tips on players to look for. They whiffed on my main lineup last week with a Willie McGirt double on 18 to not make the cut. If he bogeys, I pass 6 and cash. I’m also learning a lot about what these guys are looking for and it’s fun to use my intellect and agree or disagree with what they say. They suggest about 30 players so it’s easy to pick your own unique lineup. Like this week, everyone is all over Adam Scott’s nuts and I hate the mofo and he’ll never make my lineup. Same goes for McDirt. People don’t forget.

Anyway the guy who was writing for FGI wrote how the spread out nature of the tournaments are why they are so good. The first day you hope your guys get off to a fast start. The 2nd day you start praying that they all make the cut. Then you have the weekend to sweat for real if they pass. Huge amount of fun. I can’t remember the last time I watched a golf tournament, that wasn’t a major, from start to finish like I did last week at Pebble. I will add though that it was anti-climatic when a golfer runs away with it. Not nearly the same sweat I had with Louie last week. If DFS golf hasn’t already exploded with popularity, I think it will in the near future. Here are this week’s lineups.

I was hurting after our 2v2 basektball games to the point that I haven’t worked out since last Friday. Going 4 days without exercise is pretty unusual for me but I was feeling strain every time I made a move so it wasn’t happening.

I’ll update the fantasy football season now that it has concluded. I was in 2 finals and ended up winning one and losing the other. The one I won was the bigger of the 2 leagues and my first championship in 7 years (with 3 runner ups). So I was pretty pleased to take that down. The following story is how I lost the other one:

On December 23rd, I went to the Sugarhouse to play cards until 3 in the morning. I woke up at 10am on Christmas Eve to make sure Jordan Reed was out of my lineup. The following text conversation occurred.

For some inexplicable reason I took Adam’s wind message to heart. I look back at that moment in time and have no clue what I was thinking. I exchanged Clay for Hunter Henry who went for a goose egg. How I could think that moving to a 2nd string TE on the Chargers was better than Charles Clay in the wind still boggles my mind. The story moves in an odder path as I was playing Adam’s brother, who told Adam that there was wind in Buffalo. Now I can’t possibly say that Adam wasn’t trying to be helpful but the whole turn of events was bizarre as I only had Clay on my roster to play. I picked up Hunter Henry at 10:40 on that same morning as Reed and Clay were my only options.

I included the idiot on top who is making moves with nothing to play for.

That ended up costing me about 300 dollars as Evan and I were playing a winner take all. I don’t know what to say other than it’s peculiar how it played out.

The Dynasty was won by Adam. Great win with a cupcake schedule and then teams putting up 84 and 81 in the playoffs. The Turkeys only scored 101, 127, and 133 during the playoff weeks WITHOUT EVEN SETTING A LINEUP. If I had the same schedule as the Shee, I’d have made the playoffs and scored in the top 3 the final 3 weeks. Just the way the cookie crumbles but where is the justice?

Other than that the new year is coming and these days are weird to me. Nothing is happening at work and I’m not sure what I should be doing.