Sunday, April 28, 2013

2013 NFL Draft Pari-Mutuel Fantasy Sports Game Results

To continue the early testing of the totally new pari-mutuel fantasy sports game website, ProContest.com, a free play game based on the NFL draft was offered.  Crafting a bona fide fantasy sports game around the NFL draft is a completely new concept, never before seen.  This game has great potential with regard to monetizing this huge event that attracts approximately 25 million viewers each year.  This game was alluded to during the reporting of the Week 17 results at the end of last year's regular season in this post.

The four races that constituted the NFL Draft game were:
  1. Position Most Selected Rounds 1-4
  2. Position Most Selected Rounds 5-7
  3. Conference Most Selected Rounds 1-4
  4. Conference Most Selected Rounds 5-7
Here are the results for the various game elements along with their final odds to Win as determined by contest entrants:

Position Most Selected Rounds 1-4
Win    Other/Field / 14:1
Place  Cornerback / 28:1
Show  Defensive End / 4:1
Favorite:  Defensive End at 4:1

Position Most Selected Rounds 5-7
Win    Offensive Line (Any) / 5:1
Place  Running Back (Any) / 7:1
Show  Other/Field / 9:1
Favorite:  Offensive Line (Any) and Wide Receiver at 5:1

Conference Most Selected Rounds 1-4
Win    SEC / 4:1
Place  Other/Field / 11:1
Show  Pac 12 / 23:1
Favorite:  SEC, Big 10 and Big 12 at 4:1

Conference Most Selected Rounds 5-7
Win    Other/Field / 10:1
Place  SEC / 7:1
Show  ACC / 10:1
Favorite:  Big 10 and Big 12 at 5:1

For the early round position race, the favorite Defensive Ends did finish in the money, just a whisker behind the second place finisher Cornerback.  The Cornerback position was a longshot at 28:1 and came in second.  The Other/Field entry was at 14:1 but did come in first by a wide margin.

For the late round position race, the favorite Offensive Line (Any) did win but the other favorite Wide Receiver finished out of the money.  The Runningback position at 7:1 placed and the Other/Field entry at 9:1 showed.  The finish order was fairly closely correlated to the final odds for this race, with the exception of the co-favorite Wide Receiver.

For the early round conference race, the favorite SEC did win and won convincingly.  The Other/Field entry placed just ahead of the Pac 12, which showed.  The Pac 12 was a longshot in this race at 23:1 but came in third and just missed a second place finish.

For the late round conference race, both favorites Big 10 and Big 12 finished out of the money.  The second favorite SEC placed, but the Other/Field entry, at a reasonable 10:1 won.  Rounding out the in the money finishers, the ACC also going off at 10:1 showed.  This might have been reasonably expected as the big conferences should do well in early rounds with minor conferences or Division II or III players potentially being selected late, making the Field/Other entry more attractive.

Overall, the NFL Draft pari-mutuel game performed well with regard to game mechanics.  It definitely is an option to be offered as a pay-to-play prize awarding game in the future.  We're initially thinking of an entry fee in the $5 range, with prize tiers (multiple winners per prize tier that vary based on total number of entries) in the range of $250/$50/$10.  This kind of high prize to entry fee ratio should be more attractive than that offered by those other "daily" fantasy sports sites.  Just think that perhaps next year, you can watch the NFL Draft and have the potential to win cash prizes!

Stay tuned to ProContest's blog for further developments on that, other games/sports, and general ProContest info.

No comments: