Single-Game Fantasy MLB Contests

After a successful debut of single-game contests at the end of last football season, FanDuel and DraftKings are both rolling out the format for certain MLB games. Both sites were reluctant to get into single-game territory due to legality concerns, but DraftKings got the ball rolling during last year’s NFL postseason and FanDuel quickly followed suit.

The new fantasy baseball contests at both sites feature reduced rosters and require you to pick at least one player from each team. FanDuel and DraftKings diverge from there in the other rules regarding lineups and scoring.

FanDuel Single Game MLB Contests

FanDuel DFS introduced single-game MLB contests his week ahead of the San Francisco Giants vs. LA Dodgers series. At the time of this writing, FanDuel had just nine contests based on this game to choose from with buyins ranging from $1 to $333 and prize pools ranging from $250 to $25,000.

FanDuel’s biggest single game MLB contest at the time of this writing was a $25,000 guaranteed multi entry for $4 and a first place prize of $5,000. So far, FanDuel’s single game contests have been much smaller in size compared to their massive, multi-game GPP tournaments.

Single game MLB rosters at FanDuel consist of the following positions:

• One MVP player who earns 1.5x points
• One infielder
• One outfielder
• 2 UTILS

Here’s how the DraftKings MLB scoring system works taking into account your MVP player’s scoring bonus:

MVP Player	Infielder, Outfielder, UTIL
Single: 4.5 points	Single: 3 points
Double: 9 points	Double: 6 points
Triple: 13.5 points	Triple: 9 points
Walk: 4.5 points	Walk: 3 points
Hit By Pitch: 4.5 points	Hit By Pitch: 4.5 points
Home Run: 18 points	Home Run: 12 points
Run: 4.8 points	Run: 3.2 points
RBI: 5.25 points	RBI: 3.5 points
Stolen Base: 9 points	Stolen Base: 6 points

DraftKings Showdown MLB Contests

DraftKings DFS calls its single-game contests “Showdown” events and these too involve a reduced roster of 6 FLEX players. At the time of this writing, DraftKings had dozens of single-game MLB contests on offer with entry fees ranging from free all the way up to $10,600 and everything in between. Prize pools ranged from a couple bucks for 3-player showdowns on up to $50,000.

In fact, that $50,000 contest was the biggest of the night for this particular Giants-Dodgers slate. The Sunday Night Showdown had a $10 entry fee, guaranteed $50,000 in prizes and offered $10,000 to first place.

As far as the rules go, the only position requirements are that your lineup must include at least one player from each team and you may not have more than 4 hitters from any one team. Beyond that, there are no other position requirements. You can have six pitchers, six hitters or any other combination of players you wish as long as you follow the first two rules.

Here’s the DraftKings single-game MLB scoring system:

Hitters	Pitchers
Single: 3 points	Inning Pitched (SP): 2.25 points
Double: 5 points	Inning Pitched (RP): 3.9 points
Triple: 8 points	Strikeout (SP): 2 points
Home Run: 10 points	Strikeout (RP): 3 points
RBI: 2 points	Win: 4 points
Run: 2 points	ERA: -2 points
Walk: 2 points	Hit Against: -0.6 points
Hit By Pitch: 2 points	Walk Against: -0.6 points
Sacrifice Fly: 1.25 points	Hit Batsman: -0.6 points
Sacrifice Hit: 1.25 points	Hold: 2.5 points
Stolen Base: 5 points	Save: 5 points
	Complete Game: 2.5 points
	Complete Game Shutout: 2.5 points
	No Hitter: 5 points
	10+ Strikeouts: 2 points
	7+ Innings Pitched: 1.25 points

You can check out the new contests at: www.draftkings.com