Late-Round Perspectives: Al Zeidenfeld

JJ Zachariason (0:00)

Al Zeidenfeld is an ESPN Plus Fantasy Football Contributor and Podcaster, and he's a super successful daily fantasy sports player. He's a YouTuber, a Twitch streamer, a dad, and he's a poker player. He lives the smizz life. These are his late-round perspectives.

Can you just snap your fingers and the background changes? Is that Smith's Life for you?

Al Zeidenfeld (0:32)

I can totally do that.

JJ Zachariason (0:33)

Let's see, snap your fingers, change that background.

Al Zeidenfeld (0:35)

Okay, hold on, let me get, I gotta get to the thing. Here, I could do this, or I could just go like here.

JJ Zachariason (0:41)

Oh, that snap was clutch. What are you, you're like in suburban Wisconsin right now with that house.

Al Zeidenfeld (0:47)

You like that one? I mean, like, look, we could go outside.

JJ Zachariason (0:50)

Oh, wow, now you're in Iceland all of a sudden.

Al Zeidenfeld (0:52)

This is Lake Victoria Falls.

JJ Zachariason (0:58)

Man, that is quite the green screen you got going on there.

Al Zeidenfeld (1:01)

Thank you.

JJ Zachariason (1:03)

Looking good.

Al Zeidenfeld (1:03)

Downtown LA.

JJ Zachariason (1:04)

You know, I was thinking before you hopped on, we're coming up on like our 10-year anniversary of knowing each other.

Al Zeidenfeld (1:11)

Look at the air.

JJ Zachariason (1:12)

Isn't that crazy? Because I think the first time we hung out was in San Francisco in like 2014 at that FSGA, or it was FSWN.

Al Zeidenfeld (1:19)

It was FSWA at the time. So it was that one, and then you were at a boot camp with me and CSU Ram and Davis Maddock and Dan Bock in Atlanta.

JJ Zachariason (1:29)

Let's actually, let's bring up the boot camp thing. So you had this business venture that you did where you would bring DFS slash, I mean, at the time though, DFS was very, very new.

And there was sort of this like blurred line of are you a DFS person? That really didn't exist at the time, I would say. Like it wasn't as meaningful or as big. Now there's people who specifically are DFS touts or are specifically season long touts and that's just the way that it is. But back then it was just, I mean, DFS was more of a free for all than it is now. This is back in, I think 2015 was when we went into that in Atlanta.

But you started boot camp where you would go to different cities and you would have presenters who were experts, if you will, on these specific topics. I remember I did a presentation on quarterbacks in DFS and you would have little events for it and stuff like that. Is there anything that I'm missing?

Al Zeidenfeld (2:22)

No, it's not about boot camp. It was like a seminar that we would do in different cities where you could learn about something and meet people in person. Because that was the thing. Daily fantasy, fantasy football, less so. Because fantasy football leagues are about, typically, your friends and family. Hence, the friends and family leagues. So you have a lot of contact and a lot of people, that's how they keep in touch with their high school friends, their college friends, it's through these leagues that go on for decades.

After they have moved to all different parts, but you get back together for the draft, you talk about trades, you lament over waiver wires, where I beat you, you're my college roommate, and I beat you and your friends and family. Daily fantasy is more isolating than that. So bringing people together, like 50 to 100 people that would attend these seminars, these boot camps, along with four or five other experts that we would put together, and then I would break them into little breakout groups, where we'd compete against each other and build a lineup for that night. It was always built around like an NBA or an MLB game that was going on at night.

And then we'd go with some people who wanted to pay the extra to go be at a, like that night was a Braves game. We'd get a luxury box at the Braves game and go to that. And then it was just a fun way to meet people that wanted to do daily fantasy and be better at their research in daily fantasy and their strategy in daily fantasy.

And it's before streaming was as viable as it is now and.

JJ Zachariason (3:42)

Right, right.

I think that's what's key is like so much has changed since that point in time that now you can hop on a live stream and get that kind of information and people can do these deep dives and strategic dives. Because like we all had, like, I mean, I put together PowerPoint presentation and it was detailed on, you know, different, it was like in-depth. It was like the stuff that I would put in my draft guide these days, right? Like it was, it was a very strategic and specific thing.