DFS Tournament Tracking – NFL Week 6

Daily fantasy NFL tournaments provide opportunity for all kinds of players to get into the game. Whether you are a low-stakes grinder, casual player or nosebleed-stakes sharp, the tournament space has a contest for you. But how to select the right ones? 

That’s where DFS Tournament Tracking comes into play. This piece will give all the information you need to know about various tournaments on DraftKings and FanDuel. Here are some of the terms you will need to know to get full value out of this data:

Rake — Percent of entry money paid to the contest providor
First — Percent of prize money to first place
Top 10 — Percent of prize money to the top 10 places
Pays — Percent of entrants finishing in the money
Min cash — How much a minimum cash is worth divided by the entry fee

The tournaments will be put into similar groups so you can easily compare based on your bankroll and play style. 

Mass multi-entry 

High stakes

• The Wildcat is most expensive, but will save users a good bit on rake. Similar can be said for the NFL Blitz if you are looking to get action in on FanDuel.
• The Bomb and Dash get raked pretty heavily.
• All of these contests have very top-heavy prize structures.

Mid stakes

• The Hail Mary and Slant have the clear top prize structures of this group. They both offer 10% to first place, a low relative amount to the top-10, and at least a 2x min cash.
• The Sunday Million requires users to beat over 800,000 other competitors, and is remarkably top-heavy.
• The DraftKings Millionaire is shrinking in overall prize pool. This week it dipped under four million in total prizes.

Low stakes

• The Dive, Hail Mary and Pooch Punt all have very flat prize structures, with the latter two paying out roughly 30% of users.
• The mini-MAX by comparison is more top-heavy and is the only DraftKings tournament in this group due to entry limit rules on each site.

Between 10 and 50 entries

High stakes

• The DeUcEs WiLd contest is new this week, and is honestly not worth playing from my vantage point. Over 40% of the prize pool goes to first, with less than half of that being paid out to the rest of the top-10. It’s an awful prize structure.
• DraftKings offers the two best contests here, both paying out 20% to first with a fairly flat payout up top.

Mid stakes

• These contests are roughly the same. 
• If you can afford to pay up for the Hot Route, it is slightly flatter with less total entries.

Low stakes

• Every contest in this range offers 10% or less to first place.
• The Huddle on FanDuel continues to offer a massive rake discount for inexperienced players.
• The Play-Action is starting to get more top-heavy as the overall prize pool shrinks.

Fewer than 10 entries

High stakes

• The SWEAT has gone back to being single-entry, with just 52 total entries.
• The Game Changer and Luxury Box, on DraftKings and FanDuel respectively, offer massive rake discounts worth taking advantage of.
• Crazy Eights has a catchy name, but the prize structure is just OK compared to other contests.

Mid stakes

• Something I’ve started looking for is 10% or less to first place, with at least two times that to the rest of the top-10. The Cover 2, Goal Line and Sweep meet these criteria,
• There is a wide range in field sizes here. 
• The Touchdown on FanDuel offers a pretty significant min cash boost from other contests, all the way up to 2.31x.

Low stakes

• These are some bigger fields, but the contests almost all have quality prize structures.
• The Blind Side, Onside Kick and Flea Flicker offer the smallest field sizes, with an obvious cut to overall prize pool (and first place prize) as a result.