DFS & MMA: Everything You Need to Know
When a sports fan imagines fantasy leagues and DFS, they likely imagine football—either American football or soccer. Both are the most popular ways that diehard fans can apply their knowledge of individual players and teams in a competitive setting.
What began as a way for fans to create added content around their favorite sport throughout the season has since evolved in terms of structure and availability. For the last twenty years, DFS, or daily fantasy sports, has slowly become a more popular and speedy variation of the classic format for season-long fantasy teams.
For the most part, fans who enjoy fantasy sports betting online tend to stick to popular staples like football, as mentioned above. However, as the popularity of DFS grows, its quick and simple format has become popular for sports of all stripes. But not many MMA fans understand the ins and outs of the industry as it applies to mixed martial arts.
Fortunately, the format is quite simple and, compared to other sports that include massive rosters, easy to learn. Even better, because there’s less interest in MMA DFS, there are more opportunities available.
Ready to dive into all things MMA DFS? Keep reading for helpful insight into how the competitions work.
Points System & Rosters
Keep in mind that every DFS provider will have a slightly different format when it comes to MMA rules—and most competitions will be UFC-specific given the availability of coverage on the group.
Users will need to build a roster with five fighters, who will each accrue points based on which moves they can executive, how many takedowns and sweeps they notch, as well as their win count. The earlier a win happens, the more points a team is rewarded higher than a victory by decision.
A DFS provider will also build out various competitions that focus on head-to-head battles or tournaments with huge entry fields. Once again, keep in mind that MMA DFS is a relatively new undertaking, so there’s plenty of variation from each provider and rules are subject to change as per user interest.
Drafting Dos & Don’ts
As with any fantasy sport competition, the most important aspect for success is knowing how to draft. For MMS DFS, the most important element to consider when looking for fighters is understanding how the points system works. As mentioned above, most contests award points for early takedowns, which means users should be looking for fighters who end their bouts quickly.
To piggyback on this, it also serves to look for fighters that will bring in more points for various moves during a fight. Even if they don’t win the round, they may have tallied more points than their opponent based on how fantasy points work. In other words, draft based on how a DFS provider allocates points. For the most part, this means opting for offensive players.
Starting Out
A great way to start out with MMA DFS is to stick to smaller head-to-head contests in order to get acquainted with the fantasy platform, its points system, and various fighter stats. After gaining some experience and insight, then entering a larger tournament with a greater number of competitors and a bigger prize pool.
For the most part, MMA DFS is considered ‘softer’ because there are far fewer fighters to keep track of versus other popular fantasy sports like football, and there are also fewer DFS MMA players. The latter aspect makes it easier to notch winnings, as there’s a smaller pool of competition.
However, the limited number of fighters to draft can also pose unique challenges for fantasy MMA players, as it becomes easy to over-analyze players and stats with a limited number of options. For this reason, some DFS MMA players choose to stick with certain fighters rather than shop around in each new competition.
