Meet Today's Draft Sharks Team

About Draft Sharks

From left to right: Adam Krautwurst, Jared Smola, Anthony Pappano, Lenny Pappano, Matt Schauf, Kevin English.

Draft Sharks Was Born in 1999…

Draft Sharks was born back in the infancy of the internet — 25 years ago. A lot of things have changed in the last two-plus decades. But the personal motivation for creating Draft Sharks remains: To work at a job I loved, with people who were like family… and, of course, to make a living by helping folks win their FF leagues. I’ve been blessed to be able to check all those boxes.

Here are a few facts about the Draft Sharks “family”:

Two of our analysts, Jared Smola and Kevin English, both started out as college summer interns more than a decade ago (2007 and 2009). They both went from interns to full-time, year-round fantasy football analysts at DS.
Matt Schauf, who rounds out our “triplets” of award-winning analysts, has also been a full-time, year-round fantasy football analyst with DS for more than a decade.
“Full-time, year-round” means our commitment to DS is how we each pay the bills.
My sister and father-in-law both head up our customer service.
My son, Anthony, was born a year after I launched Draft Sharks… today he’s our resident Data Scientist.
My nephew, Adam Krautwurst, is our resident “high-stakes” podcaster and content contributor.

Draft Sharks 1999 Desk

The original desk chair from which I launched Draft Sharks in 1999. It still holds an honored place in my garage.

Draft Sharks 1999 Computer

What computers looked like in 1999 (dial up modem not shown)

…And So Was The MVP Draft Board

DS came up with an online draft tool that didn’t exist in 1999: Customizable cheat sheets based on value based drafting. We coined this unique tool the “MVP Draft Board” since it gave users the most valuable player they could pick in every round. (And, yes, the MVP Board is still our most popular drafting tool.) Of course, it has evolved dramatically over the past two decades. Today it’s part of our 2024 Draft War Room.

Draft Sharks was born in 1999, then came my son Anthony in 2000.

Draft Sharks was born in 1999, then came my son Anthony in 2000.

Yeah, We’ve Won Some Awards

The very first award we won came in our rookie season in 1999. Draft Sharks topped 20-plus experts in the 1999 Fantasy Football Pro Forecast Expert Poll. In the 22-year span from that first win, we’ve taken home numerous player rankings/projections accuracy awards — and even boast some big money winners on staff. Here’s a sample:

6 first place wins in FSTA and Fantasy Pros player rankings contests the past decade.
2nd place Fantasy Pros Preseason Rankings in 2020 (out of 186 experts)
All-time DFS leader in Fantasy Pros contests
A $100,000 win on Draft Kings.

Best fantasy football podcast FSTA winner
Multiple best fantasy football writer awards from the FSTA
FFPC Main Event Top-5
Pros vs. Joes 2nd place

We Only Cover Fantasy Football

Most fantasy sites cover multiple sports. That’s not us. Or they’re basically platforms to pimp their fantasy contests, or sports betting. That’s not us either. We’re a small group of fantasy football analysts who give advice about fantasy football — and only fantasy football. That’s why 77% of our subscribers made the playoffs last season.

DS Team

They drink beer, win FF awards, and work in their underwear (not shown here) as stay at home dads. And best of all, they’ve helped thousands of people win their fantasy leagues.

It’s Personal

Don’t you wish you could just send your FF questions to these award-winning analysts and get a personal reply? Well, yeah, you can. Draft Sharks Insiders can email your questions to our guys. Or if you want to get to know us better — please ask your questions on our free Discord server. And, of course, you can hit me at Lenny@draftsharks.com.

Lenny and Anthony Pappano

Anthony is now the Draft Sharks resident Data Scientist, thanks to all the DS Insider members who helped with his college tuition over the past two decades.