MLB DFS Strategy: Bankroll Management and Contest Selection

Mark Kieffer gives some tips on how to be a successful and profitable MLB DFS player in the first part of his MLB strategy series.

Hello! My name is Mark Kieffer and I am new to the Rotoballer Community. I would say I am back for the very first time, but I believe Ludacris beat me to the saying. I have a passion for fantasy sports, especially fantasy baseball and MLB DFS. I am excited to share some of the strategies that have helped me become a successful MLB DFS Player!

Before I dive into the strategies, here's a little bit about myself: I have been playing Rotisserie Baseball since 1996 at the wee old age of 12. My uncle bought me a team where he was the "manager." I still remember him calling in my lineups after I would tell him who to call. Yes, there once was a time before the Internet when people had to phone in their lineup changes. The world before the widespread use of the Internet feels very much like a different world. It is fun to look back at how those times were and see how far we have come! Now I play most of my Fantasy Baseball on the Internet against people I sort of know and we now have games such as DFS!

While season-long fantasy baseball has been my whole come-up in this fantasy sports realm, over the years I have grown very passionate about DFS. I have been playing DFS seriously since 2015. While I was a losing player in 2015 and every year prior, I was a winning player in MLB DFS every year since 2015. And I am a lifetime-winning player in MLB DFS.

How did I do it? This article is going to give some insight as to how bankroll management and contest selection allowed me to go from being a losing player to a winning player.

Bankroll Management

Bankroll management may not be the most thrilling topic, but it's one of the most important aspects of playing DFS. One can only play DFS if they have the money to play DFS with...... right?

Your bankroll is simply how much money you are willing to spend on DFS before you retired from DFS permanently. What I mean is this: if you say your bankroll is $1000, that's not necessarily what you have deposited on a site, but rather it is the total amount of money you are willing to go through until you have exhausted all of your money. Personally, if I spent my entire bankroll, I wouldn't be able to play DFS anymore and that would make me sad because playing DFS is one of my favorite things to do.

Once you have our bankroll established, the next question that comes up is "how much should I play?". It's a good question, but it's a complicated question that goes into knowing what type of games you are playing. I myself am a tournament player, that really specializes in Single Entry Tournaments (more on that in the game selection section). I aim to not spend more than 2% of my bankroll on a given slate.

How do I get the 2%?

The old school bankroll management tips would often suggest playing no more than 10% of your Bankroll in a given day and allocating it 80% Cash Games and 20% Tournaments. 10% of 20% is 2%.

Another way I think about it, is I typically play about 100 slates in a given year. 2% of my bankroll would be enough money to play 50 slates. If I go broke over the course of 50 slates then I am meant to go broke: it's simply never happened. Even when I was mostly losing, I would cash in a random tournament. Baseball is such a high variance game, that even a "bad" lineup can make money on a random day if you are lucky.

To use my $1000 example, if I do not spend more than 2% of my bankroll I am playing no more than $20 a day. If you are new to DFS in general or MLB DFS, I would encourage you to be really disciplined about spending a low percentage of your bankroll. If you are not a skilled DFS player, playing 10% of your bankroll a day means you will go broke in about 10 days or so, which is a total buzzkill if you were hoping to enjoy a full season of playing DFS.

After a bankroll and a daily limit of spending has been established, it's important to focus on contest selection.

Contest Selection

Bankroll management is important but contest selection is the secret sauce to predicts success. Contest selection is a personal thing that you have to be honest with yourself about. If you aren't already doing it, I highly recommend tracking your DFS results. Not just daily wins and losses in terms of money, but tracking how much you are winning in the various types of games you are playing (Cash Games, Tournaments, etc).

The short advice is to play only what you are good at and fade the rest. I will use my experience as an example of how I arrived at the idea that I should be focused on Single Entry Tournaments:

In 2015, I cashed in tournaments 25% of the time, however, my return on investment (ROI) was -7%

In 2016, I cashed in tournaments only 20% of the time. Do you think my ROI went up or down? If you guessed "down" I totally understand where you were coming from but you are in fact incorrect. My ROI was 18% in 2016. Why?

It's simple...contest selection.

When I first started playing DFS, I did the thing the most people do: I tried to play everything. I did Head to Heads, I did 50/50s, I played massive multi-entry GPPs, and I played the Single Entry Tournaments along with the 3-Max. I played on Draftkings and I played on Fanduel. I had money spread out so much, it was hard to get a sense of how I was doing. Even between the sites, I would be up a few bucks on one, one day, and then back down again on another day. It was a mess. I also was on some "this DFS thing is going to win be 100k, or $1 million" and when that wasn't happening I was also getting disappointed. I considered quitting DFS.

What I started to do in 2016 is track my results. What I found at the time surprised me because I felt like such a failure. Back in 2015 when I was -7% ROI, I didn't realize that in Single Entry Tournaments on Draftkings I had an ROI of about 20%. I then had looked at my results during 2016 and while I don't remember what it was at the time, my ROI of Single Entry Tournaments on Draftkings was 26%. In 2017, I started to focus more on Single Entry Tournaments on Draftkings and had an ROI of 270%. In 2020, my ROI was 112% on Single Entry Tournaments on Draftkings. Lifetime from 2015 to the start of 2021, my Single Entry Tournament ROI on Draftkings is about 97%.

I was a big-time loser on Fanduel (I enjoy Fanduel's platform and encourage beginners to start there, I don't know why I am not as good over there) and I was a big-time loser in Cash Games. My highest cash rate in Cash Games was 43%, which is good for a -22% ROI.

While I did get better at DFS over the years, I chalk up a lot of my successes to sticking to what I am good at. Do I still play other types of contests? Sure. I have dreams. It would be fun to bink a 5 or 6 figure grand prize on some random day. I have done that before (the 5 figure kind, not the 6 figure kid...... alas), the rush is unbelievable. But instead of chasing those games, I budget for them and have much lower exposure to those types of contests than I did in the past.

If you have a track record, go back through your history and see what you did well in and what you did not do well in. Focus on the areas you did well in and maximize it. In cash games, a 55% cash rate is the break-even point, and a 60% cash rate is about an 8% ROI, a 65% cash rate is a 17% ROI.

In tournaments, the cash rate isn't as important but the ROI is. The goal of tournaments is to win and finish high. You do not have to cash often, but you do have to know how to build pathways to the top.

Be honest with yourself. No one wants to admit they are bad. Most people that play DFS are bad though. If you are an all-time losing player you aren't alone. About 80% of Draftkings users are net losers. If you can find an aspect of DFS you are good at, stick with that game as the bulk of your entries.

I found myself being good at Single Entry Tournaments at the smaller buy-ins of $3-$12 or so. On a given night, I am chasing a few thousand dollars or a few hundred dollars. Is it as exciting as taking down $50,000 or $100,000? No. But it's fun to play DFS and playing the contests that net me money so I can continue to play. I would rather put myself in a position to win the "smaller" prizes more frequently than to go broke cashing the big prize.

If you struggle to figure out where your strengths lie, think to yourself what type of player you are. Are you someone that understands Game Theory, that can withstand not cashing 70-80% of the time? Or are you someone that needs to see the little green icon saying you have cashed 60% or more? What's your level of risk tolerance? What kind of goals do you have with this?

Often the answers to those questions can guide us into figuring out what makes the most sense to play.

Final Thoughts

When you can stick to a budget and stay disciplined within your spending limits, and when you can find the games and the websites you have the most success in, the opportunity to profit appears. I encourage everyone to go through their history and find what their own successes are. You may find something you did not expect.

Make sure you check back next week as this is the first piece in a series of DFS strategy articles that I will be doing here at RotoBaller! Good luck and play smart!