Let’s not wrap it up nicely: it’s been a terrible few months for the everyday fantasy sports industry.
A series of bans, insider trading controversies, and seemingly cease-fire orders have been a real stimulus to lawmakers and the mainstream media. But last week, the entire industry got a much-needed potion from one of the most famous entrepreneurs of this generation.
And I did it without being baked in the shark tank set. 슬롯머신
Mark Cuban, a well-known billionaire businessman and owner of the Dallas Mavericks, has become an “investor and strategic partner” with Fantasy Labs. Fantasy Labs provides its customer base with proprietary DFS data, tools, and analytics.
Terms were not disclosed, and it won’t stop arrows from flying at DFS giants like DraftKings and FanDuel. However, the news played a significant role in the vibrant industry.
After the company’s announcement last Thursday, Dan Fabrizio, chairman and co-founder of Fantasy Labs, told Casino City from his office north of Boston, “It’s been an exciting few days. Apparently, the industry has seen a lot of negative momentum over the past few months. So we were very excited to say that our company and the industry as a whole are bringing in celebrities like Mark Cuban and believe in the viability of everyday fantasy sports.
“We’re recharged with this news. I think the whole industry is seeing this as a really positive and a sign that everyday fantasy sports are going to last a long time.”
In a statement, Cuban said, “The explosive growth of fantasy sports and participation in new categories of competition, such as e-sports, increase the need for advanced resources, such as the platforms provided by Fantasy Labs. I am excited to work with a company that works to develop an industry that is preparing for huge growth.”
Two years ago, Fabrizio also saw DFS as an industry that was “aiming for huge growth.” The Boston native is the founder of Sports Insights, which started in 1999 and provides sports betting software, picks, real-time odds, and other data.
“We saw everyday fantasy as another way to use all the [sports insights] statistics and data, but instead of using it in the point spread, we could use it to predict individual player performance,” he explained. “I knew we had the technical knowledge to do it, but I needed to partner with someone who had industry knowledge and not an everyday fantasy expert.”
Enter Peter Jennings and Jonathan Bales. Jennings, a former stock trader from Colorado notorious for his success as a DFS pro with a lifetime gross income of more than $20 million, and Bales, an analyst at DraftKings and author of the “Fantasy Sports for the Smart,” have teamed up with Fabrizio to become part of the Fantasy Labs equation. The company officially launched this time last year and blossomed in its role in providing tools to serious DFS players.
“I’m going to compare us to what Bloomberg has to offer the financial industry,” said Fabrizio, 41. “We count everything you need in one place: player news, information on Twitter, injury updates, weather reports, and more. There are also tools that can help you analyze players and build your own model of players. So, instead of spending hours building your own spreadsheet, we put everything at your fingertips.”
Fabrizio said many in the industry laughed at Fantasy Labs’ $60-a-month fee for all its sports packages and provided a lot of free information on its website.
“People thought we were crazy because the industry standard for providing player prediction information was around $10 a month or more than $60 a season,” he said. “We got into the real high end because we wanted it to be seen. We built something that was really cutting-edge and proved that a lot of top-tier players could realize that this product was worth $60 a month.”