We're Goin' Streaking!

Sports teams, leagues and media companies are always trying to walk the thin line that distinguishes online sports fantasy games from sports gambling.  The NCAA, for example, knows that encouraging fans to fill out March Madness brackets (and offering prizes to the winners) will encourage them to watch more games.  The NFL loves that fans are obsessed with fantasy football; while the league would rather people play on its own NFL.com site, even playing through ESPN or CBS Sportsline indirectly helps professional football.  Sports media companies, as opposed to sports leagues, aren't looking to promote any one sport or sporting event, but instead are working to encourage people to consume more sports in general.  It's here that ESPN.com's "Streak for the Cash" is such an addictive and brilliant concept.

While "Streak for the Cash" isn't new, I'll briefly explain it for those of you who aren't aware of how this simplistic game works.  Every day, ESPN posts a number of bets that you can select, from "Who will win the game between X and Y?" to "How many strikeouts will Player Z record in tonight's game?"  The choices range from money line to prop bets and everything in between, and span every conceivable sport, league and country.  The goal is to build the longest streak of correct selections in any given month, with the month's longest streak winning a $50,000 prize and another few grand worth of bragging rights.  One wrong pick, however, knocks you back down to zero and you're forced to start over again.

For a $50,000 per month investment on ESPN's part, it seems like "Streak for the Cash" is generating a lot of interest in random sports - in particular, random sports than ESPN is trying to promote.  Let's use myself as a case study of a typical sports fan and ESPN consumer: Within the past two weeks I've "bet" on international club soccer, the soccer Under 20 World Cup, the WNBA and, most recently, PGA golf in addition to a lot of MLB baseball.  Not only am I playing the online game, but I'm also trying to follow my bets - and thus, some obscure sports - on TV or elsewhere online.  Today, for example, I bet on Tiger Woods shooting 71 or worse during the second round of the PGA Championship and have spent most of the afternoon tuned in to TNT for the live broadcast and tracking the scoreboard on PGA.com.  Without ESPN's "Streak for the Cash" game, would I be glued to the TV this afternoon?  Highly unlikely.

Hopefully a 71+ from Tiger Woods will get me to seven straight wins.

For someone who never bets on sports for money, I've become strangely addicted to this simple ESPN fantasy game.  I love how it rewards you for a wide range of sports knowledge; knowing a little something about club soccer or WNBA hoops might help make the difference between an impressive 11-game streak and two respectible 5-game streaks with a loss in between (for reference, since I started playing at the beginning of August, the best I've done is six straight, but I'm hoping that another collapse by Tiger gets me to seven - the game is harder than it seems at first blush).  If you like meaningless competition and testing the breadth of your sports knowledge, try your hand at "Streak for the Cash."  And if you win next month's prize, I'd say that $5,000 would be a fair and reasonable referral fee.