ProContest continues its early stage testing of new fantasy sports contests. The latest test is the creation of a totally new fantasy sports game for the upcoming 2013 NFL Draft. Using pari-mutuel wagering principles, contest entrants can predict what positions or college conferences will be selected most during this April's draft.
This totally new game further shows the breakthrough utility of the patented pari-mutuel fantasy sports concept. This game is a free play/no prize game as the intent, as with the other early games, is to check the game logic and play functionality.
The NFL Draft is now a very big television event, with approximately 25 million tuning in to watch. The first three rounds are broadcast live in primetime, with rounds 4 through 7 occurring on Saturday.
For those that will be unable to register on ProContest.com and play, here are the screen shots of the various questions (races) that contestants will input their predictions. You will see that the screens have similar "wagering" data and odds displays to pari-mutuel tote boards at horse and dog tracks. If you're familiar with pari-mutuel race wagering, ProContest's fantasy sports games should be a snap to play.
How the contestants will play the game is that they will select the question (race) and then input the number of bet points (virtual currency - no monetary value) in the yellow-shaded area to reflect their choices. All entries start out with the same amount of virtual currency. A person can enter the contest more than once, but the startingvirtual currency for each entry is the same.
You will see for Question 4, Conference Most Selected Rounds 5-7, that in early play, the SEC is the early favorite at 2 to 1 odds. As more people make their selections, the Current Trend information will update and the odds (Win odds) will change accordingly.
The contestant's intent is to make the correct selections such that they will finish the contest with higher levels of virtual currency to qualify for the various prize tiers. In these early test phases, the games are free play/no prize. Ultimately, pay-to-play fantasy games with top prizes on the order of 50 to 100 times the entry fee are envisioned. So for a game like this, an entry fee might be $5, but the prize levels might be on the order of $250, $50 and $5 for 1st, 2nd and 3rd Prize.
This game concept also allows more prize winners in that it is not just the top three finishers. In these games, the prize levels are actually prize tiers, with the ability to award many prizes within a tier. So, if in a game where 100 people enter, there might be 1 $250 1st Prize, 3 $50 2nd Prizes and 22 $5 3rd Prizes awarded. But if in the same game, let's say actually 450 people enter. In that case, there might be 2 $250 1st Prize, 13 $50 2nd Prizes and 99 $5 3rd Prizes awarded. This is a big advantage over typical fantasy sports games in that many people can win valuable prizes, not just a few. Also, with the high prize to entry fee ratio, even at low entry fee levels, nice prizes can be won. The low entry fee allows contestants to make multiple entries to apply different strategies, such as all longshots, entering early to take advantage of any bonus virtual points, waiting until just before the game starts, etc.
ProContest's new approach could be the big innovation that the fantasy sports industry has been looking for. For those interested, feel free to register at ProContest and try out the NFL Draft game. The NFL Draft begins on April 25th.
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