Daily fantasy sports pick’em is white-hot and it was only a matter of time before traditional DFS sites got on board. DraftKings Pick6 brings the pick’em phenomenon to one of the daily fantasy OGs, with a little bit of a wrinkle in how the contests work and pay out.
Right now, Unabated is rolling out Pick6 support on our DFS Pick’em Entry Builder. If you’ve used the tool to enter contests at PrizePicks and Underdog
Fantasy, you’ll already be familiar with how it works.
Choose projection sets or upload your own for your chosen sport or sports (Pick6 currently only supports the NBA and NFL).
Once you click “Next” you’ll see a list of players and lines, sorted by the best edge. Just like with PrizePicks and Underdog plays, you can filter by stat categories if you want to zero in on just yardage, or just carries/catches, for example.
One key difference right now is that you won’t see your total edge on an entry as you fill out your card.
That’s because the key difference between Pick6 and other pick’em sites is that Pick6 is played peer-to-peer.
How Do DraftKings Pick6 Payouts Work?
Because it’s played peer-to-peer, payouts in Pick6 get a little complicated compared to PrizePicks and Underdog.
All of what follows happens behind the scenes, so it’s largely academic. But just so you know, here’s how it works.
Instead of submitting one, for example, $10 entry that you play against the house, each $1 you spend on a lineup is its own individual entry.
If you submit a slip with Joe Flacco with more than 260.5 passing yards, Patrick Mahomes with more than 263.5 passing yards and C.J. Stroud with less than 259.5 passing yards for $10, you’ve created 10 separate $1 entries with those picks.
DK says it distributes those individual entries across contests in the following way:
- Contests where you have no entries; then
- Contests where you have no entries of the current lineup being entered, but have entries of other Pick Set(s); then
- Contests where you already have entries of the current Pick Set being entered.
- If the number of contests in (1), (2) or (3) above are equal, your entries will be placed in the contests in which you have the fewest number of total entries, irrespective of Pick Set, followed by the contests with the lowest percentage of seats filled at the time of entry submission.
Got all that? Great.
Per DraftKings, Pick6 contests have a maximum entry limit of 150 entries.This is the crucial part: If the amount for which you want to enter exceeds the number of available contests, your entry fees – and therefore potential payout – may be reduced.
When you’re in the lobby, you’ll see payouts listed as “Estimated Prizing.”
That’s because the total prize pool for each contest gets divvied up among those entries that hit the appropriate number of picks. The example DraftKings uses is that if a five-pick, $10,000 contest distributes 80 percent to the number of five-correct entries and 20 percent to the four-correct entries.
If 320 entries hit five of five, each would win $25. If you had two entries among the 320, you’d win $50 (remember, these are all considered $1 entries).
To determine the “Estimated Prizing” DraftKings looks at the overall success rate for a given contest, and ballparking how many winning entries there will be.
As of this writing, on a six-man entry, the estimated payout is 25-1 on six of six correct and 2-1 for five of six. But the actual amount you win could be less if there aren’t enough players to fill out the contest. Or it could change if the statistics used to determine the “estimated prizing” change.
How Does DraftKings Pick6 Scoring Work?
Scoring in Pick6 works like it does in other DFS pick’em contests. You choose two to six players, and if their in-game stats exceed or fall short of their targets, you’re graded as having made a correct or incorrect pick.
Unlike PrizePicks and Underdog, where you’re able to select whether to play insured or uninsured entries, all Pick6 entries with five or six picks in them will pay a reduced rate for missing one.
In What States Are DraftKings Pick6 Legal?
DraftKings Pick6 is currently only available in:
- Alaska
- California
- Georgia
- Minnesota
- Missouri
- Nebraska
- New Mexico
- North Dakota
- Oklahoma
- South Carolina
- South Dakota
- Tennessee
- Utah
- Wisconsin
- West Virginia
- Washington, D.C.
What Are the Odds of Winning a Pick6?
We’ve taken a deep dive into the math behind Underdog and PrizePicks entries. Because of the peer-to-peer nature of Pick6, it’s going to work out somewhat differently. The final payout is going to be an unknown, which makes it a more complicated endeavor.
But a good place to start would be to use the breakeven percentage method in the article above. You can calculate optimal spots starting with the assumption that the estimated payout will be the actual payout.
We’re working on the math behind Pick6 to find the optimal plays. Check back later for a more complete breakdown.
The important part is that these lines are still going to be beatable if your projections are solid. And because of variations in lines between the various DFS pick’em sites, you’ll be able to line shop. Use your projections to find the contests that offer you the best edge.
