What's in a Name?

One thing on Fan Duel I'm not crazy about is the inability to cap the number of similar opponents in your challenges, as you can on Draft Kings.  Every time I throw out a handful of Head to Head Challenges, one or two guys come in a suck all of them up. And I get pissed off because I want the variance.  I figure I'll win some, lose some, and hopefully come out ahead for the night, if I get all separate opponents.

However, I've swept all the guys (or gals) who have taken up multiple challenge slots (it's only 10-0, but it's a noticeable trend).  So it's hard to stay mad, but it makes me think about the psychology of the game.

You should choose your on-screen moniker wisely.

There are a lot of folks lurking around, trying to find games they think they can win.  And if you have the sort of name that triggers warm and fuzzy feelings, you're going to get a lot of less experienced folks taking up your challenges.  I chose it thinking I wanted the least threatening concept I could think of.  When someone sees this particular name, they can't help, but think "I can beat that guy, right?"  Who in the world would be scared of Fluffy_Bunnies?

Anyway, here are some strategies for picking monikers based on psychology I've noticed:

• Play on peoples prejudices

Think about what kind of people someone might think might not know much about sports and emulate that.  What stereotype comes to mind?  Women.  Choose a name that makes people think you are a girl.  I wasted a fair about of cash playing someone early on on DraftKings attacking monikers Lisabrokenatesheart and CouponQueen because I assumed they were girls.  Whether or not they were, they both were pretty decent at this game of ours.  So I might suggest that you throw "Mrs" in front of your name or maybe reference a Taylor Swift song in your handle.

• Try to be Non-Descript

A lot of people have stumbled across this blog because of my spotlighting top players like Peter Jennings (CSURam88) and Max DaLury.  Another person I spotlighted is David Epstein, who uses the moniker BW5126.  No one remembers him.  That's the beauty of it.  This guy has won hundreds of thousands of dollars, and if you saw a challenge from that that name you would, play him, probably lose, and forget that you lost to him.  Even MaxDalury is really basic (he said it wasn't even his real name, but I have my doubts about this claim).

• Use Misdirection

One of the things people look for are people playing the wrong sport.  If I had a choice in a baseball game, I would choose to play the guy with a moniker from another sport.  A person would surely pick a MJordan23 or a ShotgunSteve over a RedSoxnation, figuring the baseball guy knows baseball, while the others are playing their secondary or tertiary sports.   

• Don't be combative

Don't choose name that make me want to play you.  Ok, me playing you isn't that awful, but don't you think the big dogs would want to play Bankrollme or Yougonnalose down a notch.  It's the opposite of being nondescript, you are actually asking for trouble.