Daily Fantasy Site Reviews
Our goal is to give you, the gambler, plenty of pertinent information on the gambling genre. This means any legislation that may be in the works, tips and tricks on how to actually win when gambling, and plenty of reviews of your favorite casinos. Recently, by popular demand, we have extended our reach to fantasy sports. With millions upon millions of players in the US alone, fantasy sports is a genre that's growing perhaps faster than any previous, including Texas Hold'em and the poker boom of the early 2000s. Online fantasy sports are mighty popular today, which means an explosion of new sites cropping up all over the 'net. Where we come in to serve fantasy gamblers is in the review process.
We will look over these sites, measure them up against our list of criteria for what makes a good site, and pass our verdict on to you. Now, we do hope that you heed our recommendations and decide to play fantasy sports on the sites we deem the best, but you have the ultimate final say here.
How We Vet Legal Fantasy Sites in the US
At Legal Betting Online, we have a set formula we use when judging which fantasy sites are the best in the business. We look at a long list of criteria, and a site must match up. For instance, if we have ten categories we want to look at, and a site only hits on 8 of them, but 2 of their categories are poor, then they won't earn our recommendation as a quality site. It is that simple; we don't give sites the benefit of the doubt just because they may be popular or may be big money makers. We hold fantasy sports sites to a certain set of standards, and here are a few of the many ways by which we judge a site.
What We Cover In Our Fantasy Reviews
When we review a fantasy site, we go digging for the real information. Unlike a lot of reviews you will find online, which are just paid advertisements for a company, we are in no way interested in being kind to a fantasy site. We don't feel one way or another about it; we're simply looking to be honest and impartial. If that comes across as kind, it's because a site has earned it. Likewise, if it comes across as harsh, it's because a site has earned it. We allow only the information of the site to paint our reviews, and to that end there are a certain set of areas we cover.
Some of the things we cover about a fantasy site will include:
- The site's fantasy sports offered; e.g. football, baseball, hockey, basketball, etc
- The site's various leagues offered, from small dollar leagues to the huge million-dollar tournaments
- The site's sign-up procedure; e.g. we will tell you if there are any hiccups you can expect
- The site's bonus structures and what you will have to do before a bonus actually clears
- The site's overall security, i.e. how well the fantasy site is able to protect its base
- The site's banking options, as in the types of methods you can use to deposit and withdrawal cash
- The site's reputation, as in how popular the site is with its particular base, in its genre
We hope that by covering all of these areas in honest, impartial reviews, you will have the information necessary to make the right choice as a gambler.
Reasons to Do Your Homework Before Signing Up with a Site
1: Make sure you have a clear vision on what it takes to win. In other words, you can work to map out a fantasy strategy to use, including how much money to risk, what sport to play, which players to try for, etc. Mapping these things out in advance gives you a much better chance to actually win when playing.
2: You also want to make sure you understand the bonus structure of a site and whether or not you will get that "free money" put into your account. Read up on the regulations and see what people are saying about those televised bonuses.
3: You want to stay abreast of the goings-on in fantasy because you don't want to be the last one to know about a big scandal or something. Just make sure you research a site and make sure that they haven't recently started doing shoddy business with anyone.
4: You definitely need to know what you're walking into. You want to know about the culture of a site, the options of a site, etc, before you put your money in. Having the proverbial lay of the land just puts you in a much better position to succeed.
The Rapid Growth Of Fantasy Sports Over The Past Year
It might be a little difficult to wrap your head around, but fantasy sports actually aren't anything new. The idea of fantasy leagues has been around for decades. Originally, this genre was known as rotisserie leagues, or a roto league, and they primarily dealt with a sport like baseball. It wasn't until fantasy hooked up with the NFL that it really got its start in the mainstream as a big-time sport.
Even still, fantasy was a slow-growth industry, to put it mildly. Around a decade ago, when fantasy football first started breaking out, the guys on ESPN laughed about it. It wasn't considered a sport. You didn't have the big sites like FanDuel and DraftKings. A guy like Matthew Berry was considered a nerd, a stat-happy basement dweller who did not know real sports. However, the genre started picking up steam. The average American fan realized that he or she could create a league, draft the players, set the roster, and basically be the owner, GM and coach all in one. Fantasy started really spreading around, from television shows like FX's The League to Matthew Berry hosting his own ESPN show on prime time television.
Over the past couple of years, fantasy has hit an all-time high. You can bet on the NFL, CFB, NBA, MLB, NHL, NASCAR, the PGA, Esports, and much more. Fantasy sports is also 100% legal in the USA, considered a game based on skill, so people are flocking to these sites in large numbers. Lastly, these big-name sites are paying out millions of dollars a year to fantasy owners who know their stuff, so people are following the money. The industry is experiencing rapid growth, and by this time next year you should expect another two dozen fantasy websites to pop up offering you daily fantasy leagues and big money.
Quick Ways to Learn a Lot about Fantasy Sports
1: Play for Free
Did you know you can play fantasy for free? Just like you would play poker for play money, or try out "fake money" blackjack or roulette, you can play fantasy sports for free to get the hang of things. Learn how to draft, how the points system works, and what you're dealing with in every sport. Brush up on your skills for free before you deposit money.
2: Check Out Social Media
A site like YouTube is absolutely packed with videos of people giving you walk-throughs of their fantasy experience. You can find videos for every sport, every league, and every site. If you want to know something specific about a league or a site, watch your peers as they navigate the terrain. This information is invaluable.
3: Watch the TV
As we mentioned above, fantasy is huge now and has its own hour-long shows on networks like ESPN. If you need insider information about fantasy, watch ESPN or the NFL Network and see what the experts in the genre say. There's no guarantee that you will win this way, but you will learn how to play and what to look for by going this route.
The Future of Fantasy Sports
Although around for decades, the modernized version of daily fantasy leagues are only in their infancy. The future of the sport all depends on government keeping it registered as a game of skill. If this label holds, you can expect dozens, if not hundreds, of competing fantasy sites in the near future. You can expect a lot more contests, more lucrative bonuses, cooler mobile apps, and much more. And when you need to know about a fantasy site and what to look for, we're here at Legal Betting Online to walk you through it all.