It wasn't the huge score for which I'm ultimately aiming, but one of my entries went for 73 points (62 out of 25,557) for $125. All told, I cashed in four of my eight for a total of $177.50. It cost me $40 to play, so it was a net of $137.50. I started the day with $913.10, so my bankroll is now $1050.60.

Maybe it was dumb luck, and after all this work, I'm only up $50.60, but I've found my approach. For some reason, I assumed this is how the sharps play - maybe they fill out their lineups with more rigor - but they must essentially pick a few pitchers, build stacks around them and make the pieces fit, right?

Or maybe not. I got into a Twitter discussion where one of the sharps, Jonathan Bales, argued multi-entry tournaments provide better expected value than single entry ones because the best players' 10th lineups can't possibly be as strong as their first. So by setting multiple lineups, the sharps are necessarily getting diminished expected value for each one, as opposed to single entry where they're all only entering their best.

But that requires a precise hierarchy of lineups, something I don't have. I might like the aesthetics of one more than another, or one might feel better to me because the stacks line up just right and allow me to spend the entire budget. But I'm not always clear on which one is optimal. Moreover, the Matt Shoemaker roster might be more unique than the Clayton Kershaw or Jacob deGrom ones, so even though it projects to score fewer points, it has higher upside should Kershaw and deGrom have average outings, while Shoemaker deals. And the same is true for the odd Cardinals or White Sox stack, when everyone's got the Blue Jays or Rockies at home.

The idea behind my strategy is I don't really know what will happen on a given night, but I'll have a sense of the pitchers I like (usually a couple obvious ones and 1-2 wild cards), and I'll use my imagination with the hitters. Because I'm used to season-long, it's odd to see perennially productive players like Melky Cabrera going for near the minimum price, or Robinson Cano going for only $2600. If the pitching match-up isn't terrible (neither it nor the park need be perfect), I'll try to use players like that in as many places as possible and see if I can stack sensible hitters around them. In Cabrera's case, that means a cheap Jose Abreu is coming along for the ride and maybe 1-2 other White Sox. In Cano's case, usually it's Kyle Seager (though regrettably not tonight.)

The most expensive lineups are hard to stack as are Rockies and teams facing the Rockies, but it's not necessary to have the optimal one anyway. All you need are a few plausible ones paired with a few good pitchers, and maybe the 8 or 10 to 1 horse comes in that night, and you get paid off. For some reason it reminds me of bowling (and I suck at bowling) where you don't want to hit the head pin straight on, but instead be off to the side a little bit.

Anyway, it's easy to philosophize after a decent win, but I'm still not close to making minimum wage doing this yet. My goal is to use these decent scores to stay afloat until I hit a big one.