Which is the Best Daily Fantasy Site?
I don’t know about you, but all day I listen to sports radio. All I hear every fifteen minutes are ads for FanDuel and how some guy turned a $125 deposit into $120,000. Then I come home and see comercials on ESPN for DraftKings where some guys have made a million dollars playing on DraftKings. Everyday it’s Fanduel this, DraftKings that.
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What’s the Deal and Which One is Better?
It’s kind of like vanilla and chocolate ice cream. Some like one and not the other but some like both of them. They are both ice cream and it comes down to personal preference. Since we are in football season I will stay focused on how both sites run their football operations and compare and contrast the two. If you’re on the fence about joining one and are not sure which one it should be, hopefully this will help you.
Both of them have 9 roster spots but the biggest difference between the two is FD has a kicker while DK has a flex (RB/WR/TE). Again this is where personal preference comes in play because there is a huge debate over the kicker spot. A lot of people don’t like it because it’s very hard to predict who’s going to kick the most field goals.
In Week One, I had Matt Bryant for Atlanta and he kicked a 50+ yard field goal to tie the game, and a 50+ to win it. Scoring ten fantasy points in ten minutes. He ended the day with 18 and I believe that was about three points shy of my QB who threw three touchdowns and over 300 yards. So of coarse I wasn’t complaining that week, but it feels the exact opposite when you lose to someone by two or three points and their kicker out scored yours by 12 points.
The flex spot changes things because you have a better chance of calculating a players outcome.
Scoring
Both sites have the same scoring system but there are two big differences between the two. The First is DraftKings awards you a full point for a reception while FanDuel only awards you half a point. This makes players who catch more passes a lot more valuable on DraftKings. Running backs that catch a lot of the passes out of the backfield will have three to five more points at the end of the game on DraftKings compared to FanDuel. Slot receivers who catch a lot of short passes also get a boost.
The other difference that the two sites have is DK offers bonuses when a player hits a milestone in a game. You get three points if a player gets over 100 yards receiving or rushing and 3 points if a QB passes over 300 yards. These add up big at the end of the day if you get a few of them. Think of it like this, you have two RB’s that rush for 85 and 80 yards, and your opponent has two running backs that rushed for 103 and 105 yards. Instead of being down 16.5 to 20.8 you are down 16.5 to 26.8.
The biggest difference you will notice with DraftKings is that they have games that start at 25 cents and FanDuel starts at a dollar. They both offer games for free but it’s cheaper to make multiple lineups on Draftkings.
On the other hand though, FanDuel has double ups and DraftKings does not. A double up is like a 50/50 but they pay dollar for dollar of your entry. The kicker is there are more people in the game. So it’s top 50 out of 112 instead of 100. But $10 gets you $10 in a double up and $10 only gets you $8 in a 50/50. This is another thing that adds up because if you win two $10 double ups you have $40 in your account. If you win two $10 50/50’s you have $36.
Player Pricing
The sharpest site in the industry was DraftStreet when it came to pricing the players. Since DraftKings bought out DraftStreet you can tell the DS team is working on the prices. Draft Kings has sharper pricing making it harder to fit in the stud players. You need to know the NFL a little better to find value players in order to fit the studs into your lineup. Fan Duel is a little more flexible and it isn’t as hard which makes the games a little more fun to watch because you have better players. But so do our opponents.
FanDuel has more users than DraftKings but they are extremely close. When it comes to DFS it’s great having two major sites to play on because they both will try to win our business by offering better and more exciting contests. When one of them does something major, it doesn’t take long for the other to out do it.
