Salaries, sleepers for League of Legends $200k DFS contest featuring LPL, LCK teams

The world of esports is offering some DFS and betting action while most professional sports leagues are otherwise shut down. The virtual nature of it provides an opportunity for people in the midst of social distancing to still engage their competitive juices. Tournaments often happen in person, but the nature of the games provides for social distancing with relative ease.

DraftKings is offering daily fantasy sports contests around League of Legends games, and on April 9th, they’re featuring a $200,000 prize pool for a contest involving players from leagues in Korea and China. Lineups are due by 2 a.m. ET. First place takes home $50,000, second takes home $20,000, and third takes home $10,000. The top 15 finishers can earn prize money.

This League of Legends DFS contest involves a roster of six players and a team unit fitting under a $50,000 salary cap. You select a captain that is priced higher than normal, but gets you 1.5 times the point total. Then, you fill out a six-player roster that includes the following positions (broken down in detail at DraftKings Playbook):

• Top Laner
• Jungler
• Mid Laner
• Attack Damage (AD) Carry
• Support
• Team

Scoring for players consists of kills (+3 points), assists (+2 points), deaths (-1 point), creep score (+0.02 points), and 10+ K/A Bonus (+2 pts for 10 kills or 10 assists in a single game). The team scoring includes turrets (+1), Dragons (+2), Barons (+3), First Blood (+2), a Win (+2), and a bonus for a win in under 30 minutes (+2). All points earn 1.5x if in the Captain slot.

ESPN offers a simple paragraph summation of players to pick:

The playing field, or map, is always the same every game. There are three major distinct pathways: the top, mid and bottom lanes. The triangular areas in between the paths are called the “jungle.” Based off this, there are five main positions in the game: Top Laner, Jungler, Mid Laner, Bot Laner (or AD Carry) and Support (a role that supports the bottom lane, so that lane usually has two champions in it). The champions in the game are mainly categorized by these roles, all with unique abilities. Some are bruisers that deal a lot of damage with their fists or weapons, some have a lot of armor and health to protect them, some use magic and special powers — there are tons of possibilities. The complexity of the game is matching these powers and combining them with other champions’ powers to create incredible teamfight scenarios (like plays in traditional sports).

Below is a full rundown of pricing for tonight’s contest.

Strategy to consider

If you’re new to esports, and particularly esports DFS, there are some broad strategy options to consider. With League of Legends, the losing team in a given matchup can easily find themselves with limited production when all is said and done. Look through matchups and consider teams facing decidedly inferior opponents. You can view standings here.

A good example for this contest would be EDward Gaming (EDG) vs. LNG Esports (LNG). EDG is 7-4 while LNG is 4-8. Upsets are possible, but there’s a sizable disparity there — particularly when you add in that EDG has won three straight while LNG has lost six straight. You can slide down the list at most any position to find some value, including Aodi ($6,600) at TOP or Meiko ($5,200) as a SUP option. And consider EDG as a value option for the TEAM slot at $5,400.

Another strategy to consider is teams on a hot streak vs. teams on a losing streak. LoL is updated fairly regularly, and it can take even a good team some time to get on track with the changes. That can offer some value from even a poor team.

For this contest, a good example of deep value would be Griffin (GRF) vs. Afreeca Freecs (AF). GRF is sitting in last place but is on a two-game win streak, while AF is sinking like a rock, sitting at 6-9 with a six-game losing streak. Viper offers some sleeper value both as a Captain ($10,500) and as your ADC ($7,000).