Earlier quoted context omitted.
But if your system is to pick high variance players that are also underrepresented on other players rosters how many lineups can there be? I remain skeptical that this is a viable strategy.
To clarify, you don't just pick high variance players. You _must_ pick some people that are high-cost high-reward types. The superstars that will almost always get their lion's share of points. You cannot win a tournament just by picking high variance players, or it would be extremely hard to do so. You also have a salary cap so you can't just pick 5 superstar players. The higher their perceived worth, the higher the…
I agree with all of this and I agree that one could probably construct a +EV strategy this way. I'm just surprised that the strategy could pay off so shortly. I would imagine that you'd get a scenario where you had a 1% chance of winning but a payoff of > 100 to 1. So +EV but still likely to take a while to come to fruition.