Beating Fantasy WSOP ME, semi x-post

[EverettKings]

Over here in the MTT forum some boys started a fantasy WSOP main event contest. You pick your team of 25 runners and whoever's team makes the most money in the WSOP ME wins. Fun times.

If you look at the thread, most of the lists are incredibly similar, with Ivey hitting all but 1, for example. One list had almost entirely unknowns. He laughed about how good his chances are vs the "good" lists of seasoned world class players. The players with "good" lists stood by their players being better and more +EV. No one can argue with the fact that those lists have the best players who have the best chances of making big money. But the unknown list is an overwhelming favorite. What gives?


In order to win pools like this you have to score points where other people don't. Sure, cheer for Ivey, and if he kicks ass then you and 25 of the 26 other people get the same boost. This is the same idea as filling out NCAA bball tourney brackets. Why don't the girls who put all the #1 seeds ever win? They're the most +EV right? Because they share so many picks and never pull away from the field. It's always some guy who locked and picked some 8-seed to the finals where noone else did. You have virtually no chance with a trendy list.

Pretend for a second everyone got to pick one person in this pool. Say 20 pick Ivey, 5 pick Harrington, and 1 guy picks Yun Known. Say the odds are 50% of Ivey doing best, 40% Harrington, and 10% Yun. In ten runs, five times Ivey wins and everyone who bet on him gets 1/20 of the prize pool. So they get 5/20 or 25% of a pool on average over ten runs. Four times Dan the man wins, so those five people get 1/5 of the prize pool 4 times, or 80% of a pool over ten runs. Nice. Alright Yun wins once in ten. The guy who bet on him gets all of the prize pool once in ten, for 100% of a pool over ten runs. So, who's the genius?

Sorry if this has been covered before, but I think it's interesting stuff and couldnt hurt to come up again.

Everett