Cash games: clear the cut line

Cash games pay a flat prize. In a 50/50 the top half of the field gets paid. In a double-up nearly half the field gets paid about double the entry fee. In a head-to-head you face one opponent and the higher score wins. First place and the last paying spot collect the same money.

The number you have to beat

These examples use made-up contests. Run your own on the bankroll page with the numbers from the contest page.

A $10 50/50 that pays $18 has a break-even win rate of 10 / 18 = 55.6%. Half the field wins, so an average player wins 50% of the time. You have to beat that average by 5.6 points, every week, just to get your money back.

A $10 double-up that pays $20 has a break-even of 10 / 20 = 50%, which looks easier until you count the winners. If 45 of every 100 entries get paid, the average player wins 45% and needs 50%, a gap of 5 points.

A head-to-head paying $18 has the same 55.6% break-even as the 50/50. Against an equal opponent you win half the time, collect 0.5 x $18 = $9 per entry on average, and pay $10.

Your sample is smaller than it looks

Running one lineup through ten contests gets you something closer to one result than ten. An NFL regular season gives you 18 weeks, so about 18 results.

The standard error on a win rate near 50% over 18 tries is the square root of 0.25 / 18, or 11.8 points. That is twice the 5.6-point edge you are trying to measure. Shrinking it to 5.6 points takes about 80 independent slates (0.25 / 0.056² = 80). One NFL season cannot tell you whether you are a winning cash player.

Floor beats ceiling

Floor is what a player gives you on an ordinary bad day. Ceiling is what he gives you on his best. In cash you pay for floor, because 30 points above the cut line earn nothing.

Volume is the floor you can see in advance: carries and targets in NFL, minutes in NBA, top-unit ice time in NHL, a high spot in the order in MLB. A receiver who needs one long touchdown to pay off has a low floor at any price.

Scoring changes who has floor. A catch pays 1 on DraftKings and 0.5 on FanDuel, so a running back with six catches for 40 yards scores 10 on DraftKings and 7 on FanDuel before his first carry. On both sites a rushing yard pays 0.1 and a passing yard pays 0.04, so a quarterback's 40 rushing yards are worth 100 passing yards (0.1 / 0.04 = 2.5, and 40 x 2.5 = 100).

The cut line and the chalk

The cut line is the lowest score that gets paid. The field sets it, and it moves every slate.

Chalk means the most popular plays, and DraftKings' own guide calls chalk key to cash lineups. The reason is arithmetic. Say a $4,000 backup steps into a starting job and 70% of the field rosters him. If he scores 20 and you passed, 70% of the field just got 20 points from a $4,000 spot you filled with someone else. If you roster him and he scores 5, most of the field took the same hit, so you lost no ground on them.

In a contest that pays about half the field, the way to lose is to fall behind most of it. Fading a cheap, heavily rostered player is a tournament move.

Building the roster

• Spend nearly the whole cap. Unused salary is floor you didn't buy.
• Run one lineup. By your own projections, your second-best roster is worse than your best.
• Stack only if the stack is also your best floor. Stacks widen the range of outcomes, and cash doesn't pay for the top of that range. Stacking explains why.
• Check news up to lock. A player who doesn't suit up scores zero, and a zero is the fastest way under the line. Late swap and other sport rules are in the sport guide.
• Start from the math. The lineup builder finds the highest projected legal roster under the cap. Read it before you trust it, then ask where the floor is thin.

Pick your spots

Look at who you are playing. FanDuel's terms bar entering beginner contests when you are not a beginner, and New York's 2023 rules require operators to flag "any highly experienced player" in contests. An open head-to-head can put you against someone who plays that contest every week.

If you don't know your edge, assume it is zero. At zero edge the $10 50/50 above returns $9 per entry on average, and the $1 gap is what the hobby costs you.

Facts checked Nov 5, 2026.