Weekend Reflection
The intent of this article is to focus on lessons learned from this past weekend’s UFC contests. By going back and analyzing past performances, the research will enhance our practices in building MME Lineups. The goal of the research is to provide readers with an understanding of projections, optimizers and coach’s notes in order to help win tournaments.
Why Reflect?
To explain the “Why” behind this, we will have to go back to 8 year old Geno. I was 15 lbs. overweight, and could not read. Easy target!!! I still remember my stomach dropping when I would get my name called to read, because I knew the jokes would start immediately as I worked to stutter out the words in the text. Luckily, before he left this world, my dad used those moments as an opportunity to teach me about resilience.
The Best Lesson
I remember getting into my dad’s work truck crying. His response, “What’s wrong son?”. I said, “I am just a fat idiot dad, and everyone makes fun of me”. He looked at me with a smirk and said, “we are about to use this to make you succeed. No one will ever tell you who you are!”. So, from that day forward, I spent every recess and PE class in the library learning how to read and my dad would periodically take a break from work to come in an read with me. By the end of that year, I was one of the best readers in my class and on the A/B honor roll! Unfortunately, we lost dad the next year, but wow, how blessed am I to have learned that one before he left us?!
The Connection
You see, my dad would not allow me to settle with a negative experience being what it was. He was going to make sure I learned how to be resilient and turn my failures into successes through hard work. Likewise, we will do the same with our UFC DFS MME tournaments! Instead of only looking back at wins, we will look back at both wins and losses in order to continue to evolve our game. Sometimes, we can make all of the right plays, but things may still not go our way. Instead of turning into “fish” and flopping all around because of our pity party, we will analyze, reflect and learn! Also, instead of high fiving everyone, we will look at our wins with a critical eye in order to repeat our success consistently. Let’s get to work!!!
UFC 3 for 3
UFC ended up being a fiscal loss in that I won back about half the money spent on MME. However, nothing is a total loss if we learn something from it. Right?! Therefore, we will breakdown the 3 fights that provided us with lessons to be learned for the slates to come.
Reflecting on the Slate Approach
The majority of the fighters were required to have a minimum of a 57 pt projection. However, I utilized the ceiling projection in order to identify 4 low owned punts at sub 57 pt projection. The approach in itself held up to be solid in that although I missed some important plays, there were still some well placed lineups in the Mini-Max this past weekend.
Tweaking the Approach
Moving forward, the 4 low owned punts below 57 pts will be brought down to 2 plays and 2 more 57 plus point projected players will be added to the pool in place of the 2 punts in an attempt to create a pool that is more tight with strong plays.
150 Lineups
For the purpose of this study, the cheat Sheet is used in order to execute the following steps:
- Fade 1 of Marley’s Fades
- Fade 1 of Geek’s Fades
- Fade 1 of EricF’s Fades
- Circle back to continue to fade until pool is 18-20
- No Lock
- 5% Randomization
- 150 lineups
- 1 unique
- Use a 10% rule for going over and under on fight ownership using the Max Cap in the DS
- Fade enough players to get pool down to 18-20
Fight Reviews
McCann (8400) V. Carolina (7800)
This fight tempting in that Carolina’s skill and work on the feet can lead her to a decision victory. Also, she has 2 finishes in her 8 wins, so finishing within the distance is in the realm of possibilities for her. However, if the fight goes to the ground, the advantage goes to “Meatball” McCann as she should be able to dictate the fight as long as it stays on the ground. McCann looked impressive in her last decision win against Kim and brought a lot of energy to the crowd. Given the fight location, I give McCann the edge.
McCann Personal Ownership: 18%
This one hurts me, because all I spoke about throughout the week was the narrative of McCann fighting in Liverpool. However, I went with the numbers instead of my gut, and this time it did not pay off. I decided to go underweight on her as her ceiling projection did not check out nor did her projection for her price according to the proprietary blend used in order to create a baseline projection number to build a player pool from. Likewise, I faded Carolina, which was a good fade!
Next Steps
What I learned from this fight is to ask more questions and dive deeper into the research if I am getting a gut feeling about the fight. For example, at a closer look, McCann averaged a score of 94.32 DK points over her last 4 wins. In this situation again, the hope is to dive deeper into the gut feeling and find some data and research that supports that gut feeling. It is always easy to play Monday Morning QB, however this situation will arise again with similar fighters and I plan to be on the right side of its ownership.
Hooker (8200) Vs. Allen (8000)
Hooker cutting weight makes this fight more interesting, but Hooker is the better fighter. Therefore, this fight will be Hooker or pass for DFS purposes as Allen does not appear to have a high chance of scoring well even in a win. Allen’s last 3 wins average out to a score of 68 fantasy points. Hooker scored 107.7 at $8700 in his last win. This makes hooker an appealing play as he proves to show a high ceiling through his finishing ability, but he may be best kept at field ownership in 150.
Allen Personal Ownership: 0%
Allen Personal Ownership: 43%
This fight I faded Allen and looking back on this one, I immediately see where I did not honor my own math that goes into building lineups, which helps limit making plays based on “How I feel”. Allen had a projection of 60ftpts for the fight at 8K, this aligned with the standard deviation formula in that the price is mid ranged and his projection met the minimum requirements by 3 ftpts. For this to make sense, we have to go back to something I was fortunate to learn from @burns. He told me, “the more you rely on the math, the less it is about how you feel, and the better your player pools will be”.
AHA!
For this one, I know what happened, I listened to expert takes and got away from my math. Every expert I heard was talking about how Hooker was the play, and he was a great play! However, I would have won more money if I stuck to the math and added 25% (Field Match) Allen based off of his projection. Again, Monday Morning Quarterback, but this is another great lesson!
Pimblett (9400) V. Vargas (6800)
This one is interesting in that Paddy “The Baddy” is a significant favorite, however a case can be made for the dog in this fight. At a closer look, both fighters have the same professional records if you exclude Vargas’s illegal knee(17-3). other 2 being by decision. While on the other side, Pimblett has already been submitted earlier in his career (Ray: Heel Hook 08.31.19). If you look at ownership leverage and cap space, it would be very nice to be on the right side of an upset here. Pimblett has home field advantage in that the fight is in Liverpool.
Pimblett Personal Ownership: 38%
Vargas Personal Ownership: 18%
Finally, the Pimblett fight is a great one to end on! Furthermore, personal feelings did not cloud judgement during the building progress, as I wanted to fade Paddy, but instead matched the field on his ownership. His projection and matchup were too strong to full fade him. Therefore, his ownership was matched in order to play the projection and not fade the fighter (Feelings don’t matter!).
AHA!
The AHA here is that if I would have practiced the same approach I had with Paddy, and relied on the math, I am a trip to the Boar’s Head Inn for the Honey Moon I still owe her! Don’t worry babe, I will be taking one of these down very soon!
Playing Smart
I still invested in Vargas at 10% above the field in order to be there in the case he upset Pimblett because it is a matter of time until that happens. However, the match making was in his favor, and he did what he was supposed to do against a less competent opponent. Again, sometimes things align for the fighter you don’t like, and that is why math is critical! Math told us to play him and we listened!! (Projected 94 W/ ceiling of 106). Regardless of “feelings” the projections and math that relies in those projections all pointed in the direction of playing Paddy. Glad we listened!
Future Research
We will continue to investigate UFC MME tournament approaches in an effort to get some helmets at the top! Specifically, I plan to begin taking a critical look at 20 entries to replicate the recent success had with NBA MME.
Thanks for sticking with me!
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Come talk to me! I am in the discord 24/7 and value connecting with people.
Twitter: @geno_casas
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