Tips For New Fantasy Baseball Players
Because Major League Baseball’s season is so extensive, lasting more than 5 months, it may seem like a daunting task to play daily fantasy baseball and make bets based off of a group of players’ performances in a single game. Though it is difficult to determine just how well a given player will do in a single game, there are factors you can take into consideration to make your team selection as strong as it can possibly be.
Two Simple Daily Fantasy Baseball Tips To Win
Pick Pitchers Carefully
Pitchers Are Not a Minor Detail
When picking a team, all 9 or 10 of your players are important, but more often than not it is the pitchers that time and time again record the most fantasy points (Fpts) for their teams. Because pitchers earn points through the number of innings they pitch, number of strikeouts recorded, and whether or not they win, they will often either make or break your team.
When selecting a fantasy baseball team, you will want to pay close attention to the pitcher’s individual stats, but also to the opposing team’s batters and whether or not your pitcher(s) will be throwing in front of a home or away crowd. If you pay attention to these factors and continually draft pitchers who are throwing against weak-hitting teams or in a ballpark that is historically friendlier to the guy on the mound, you will drastically increase your odds of scoring big in a given matchup.
Don’t Overvalue or Undervalue Hitters
One of the most commonly made mistakes by people when drafting daily fantasy baseball teams is that of picking hitters based off their salary alone. While it is true that many of the highest paid names in baseball like Mike Trout and Andrew McCutchen will be able to help your team immensely, drafting only big-name players will see you run out of drafting salary quickly and end up sacrificing skill and Fpts at other positions.
Instead of keying in on only a player’s salary or number of homeruns they hit, you should be looking more closely at the average points they score in a game as well as their performance over the course of the most recent 4 or 5 games.
As is the case with pitchers, it is important to take into consideration where a hitter is playing (home or away), the pitcher he will be matched up against, and the friendliness of the ballpark to hitters. If, for example, a prospective player of yours is playing in the hitter-friendly Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati and is matched up against a particularly weak pitcher, it would be a better decision to take that player in lieu of a more popular player who is matched up against a solid pitcher in a pitcher-friendly ballpark.
Playing Daily Fantasy Baseball
If you adhere to these simple drafting techniques, you will be improving your chances of winning on a daily basis. All too many people remain loyal to only a handful of players, and because the variables able to affect a given player’s performance change with each and every game, so too should the players you draft for your team. There are so many players in the Major Leagues that limiting yourself to only a few will definitely end up working against you and your bankroll in the long run.
- One Day Fantasy Baseball at Fanduel – A guide for new players
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