Draft.com is a daily fantasy sports site that breaks away from current trends by doing away with the salary cap model in favor of a more traditional snake-draft style picking system. Rather than working with a virtual salary and drafting a team based on player costs, you and your opponents take turns picking players for your teams.
Pros
Easier competition than the big DFS sitesSnake style drafts are unique among DFS sitesUnique contest formats such as NFL “Best Ball” gamesCons
Most contests are small with modest prize poolsOnly covers the major US sports leaguesCustomer support only reachable via e-mailIn this way, DRAFT resembles traditional season-long leagues that were popular before the advent of modern daily fantasy sites. However, DRAFT still retains the daily fantasy element by allowing you to build new teams each week. The end result is a fantasy platform that takes the best from season-long fantasy games and daily fantasy games and wraps them all into one product.
Quick Info:
- New Player Bonus: Free $3 entry with your first deposit
- Promo Code: N/A
- Headquarters: New York City
- Sports Covered: NFL, MLB, Golf, NBA and NHL
- Contest Buyins: $1 to $1,000
- Deposit Options: PayPal, credit card and debit card
- Restricted States: Alabama, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Nevada and Washington
DRAFT.com Company Background
DRAFT was originally developed as a mobile-only game with an emphasis on convenience for players. The emphasis today remains on keeping things simple and easy for mobile users, but DRAFT now has a website interface that makes it available whether you’re on the go or sitting at home in front of the desktop.
We first became aware of DRAFT back when it was launched as a mobile-only offering under the name PlayDraft.com. We didn’t hear much from the people at DRAFT for several years afterwards, but then the company hit our radar again in 2017 when it was announced that international gaming giant Paddy Power Betfair had acquired PlayDraft. It was around this time that the company also moved from the original PlayDraft.com domain to DRAFT.com.
DRAFT CEO Jeremy Levine reported at the time that the acquisition of DRAFT by Paddy Power Betfair allowed the company to increase its marketing spend by as much as 100x compared to the previous year. What was once a relatively small player in the DFS game was given a chance to become a serious contender in the compeititive DFS industry.
As it stands, DRAFT remains a smaller daily fantasy site with most contests involving 2-10 players. A few of the larger contests do attract several hundred players while the largest season-long head-to-head tournament available at the time of this writing had room for 2048 entrants, but overall DRAFT is much smaller than the likes of FanDuel and DraftKings with their biggest contests involving hundreds of thousands of entries.
DRAFT Contest Types
The majority of the contests hosted at DRAFT use a snake-style system in which you and your opponents take turns drafting players for your teams. Once a player has been picked, that player is removed from the pool and no one else may select that same player.
The first pick advantage is alternated between each contestsant across each round. If you pick firt in the first round of a head-to-head contest, for example, your opponent will get to pick first in the second round.
You also have the option to create a queue of preferred players and rank others according to your own preferences. This is a useful option because it protects you in case something prevents you from making a pick within the 30-second time limit for each drafting round.
If you are away from the computer or phone and the contest begins, DRAFT will use your queue to make picks for you. If you don’t have a queue, DRAFT will look for your own rankings and try to pick the player you have ranked the highest for that position. If you do not have a queue and have not ranked any players, the system will auto-draft the player with the highest projected point total for that position.
Not all contests follow this exact format, but that’s the basic idea behind DRAFT. Here’s how each of the contest types is organized and played at Draft.com.
DRAFT Deposits And Withdrawals
You can fund your DRAFT account with PayPal, credit card and debit card. The credit and debit card options send you to the PayPal website as well, but you do not need a PayPal account – you can just check out as a guest.
Withdrawals are processed back via PayPal, credit/debit card and check. Speeds vary, but PayPal withdrawals generally take up to 48 hours, withdrawals back to a credit or debit card take about 3-5 days while checks in the mail take about 7-10 days.
Draft.com Contest Scoring Rules
The following scoring rules show how your lineup earns points based on the play of each player on your lineup. Overall, the rules at DRAFT are similar to the rules used at other fantasy sites. If you have experience anywhere else, none of this will look too foreign.
Expert Opinion: Is Draft.com Legit?
DRAFT offers a unique experience for fantasy players and is financially stable due to the backing of one of the largest gaming companies on the planet (Paddy Power Betfair). These facts alone make it worth checking out – especially if you’re starting to get a little burned out on all those salary cap games hosted by the competition.
DRAFT is also worth a look for players new to DFS because it is not full to the brim with sharks. Unlike the other major fantasy sports sites, DRAFT does not allow multiple entries into a single tournament.
When you play in contests here, you play against individual players, one lineup at a time. If you compare this to other major fantasy sites where expert players buy into individual contests hundreds of times with dozens of different lineups, you can see why DRAFT might be preferable for new and casual DFS players.
A simple and intuitive interface whether you’re mobile or on the desktop also helps to make this site friendly to the inexperienced and experienced alike. Once you sign up for an account and visit the lobby, you won’t have any problems finding contests and drafting teams.
The one knock against DRAFT.com is it remains a relatively small DFS site. You’re not going to find the million-dollar guarantees here like at DraftKings or FanDuel. This is a site where you play in smaller contests with smaller prize pools, but with a much better chance to actually win real money.