Shawn Siegele explains his contrarian approach for the Underdog playoff tournaments. If you want to maximize your advance rates while building a potentially powerful Super Bowl squad, these reality underdogs could be the way to do it.
Gauntlet and Mitten drafts are now live over at Underdog. The Mitten 1 filled, so we’re on to Mitten 2, which is currently at 40% and filling fast.
In Part 1, I broke down the pros and cons for playing through each of the mostly likely Super Bowl champions and explained how to maximize Philadelphia, Buffalo, and Kansas City teams. Today we’ll take it up a notch and look at teams with a more difficult path to a championship. Counterintuitively, the gunslinger approach builds in a surprising amount of safety.
The Format
Madison Parkhill wrote an excellent strategy piece last week that’ll help get you started in playoff tournaments.
The Gauntlet is a $25 playoff contest that features a $100,000 top prize. The Mitten 2 is a $5 contest with a $50,000 top prize. Both tournaments require contestants to advance through each of the first three rounds and then win the tournament during the Super Bowl.
The playoff contests are six-team, 10-round best-ball drafts that start 1-QB, 1-RB, 2-WR/TE, 1-Flex, and employ Underdog’s half-ppr scoring.
Here is the genius of this contest:
- With those 10 roster spots, you must score enough points with your five Super Bowl starters to win the contest.
- With those 10 roster spots, you must also score enough points with your five Wild Card starters to be the one team in your league that advances to Round 2.
Many teams that emphasize the Chiefs, Bills, and Eagles will be dead before the first postseason kickoff. There is another option.
The Gunslinger Approach to Underdog Playoff Contests
In our third entry in the Underdog playoff series, Colm Kelly and I dive into tactics for winning the Mitten 2.
