20/20 Interview with Tom Kislingbury

This week DLF senior writer Tom Kislingbury spent a few minutes with us so you could get to know him better. Enjoy!

Where are you from?

I grew up around Hampton Court in Surrey. In England. You know Henry VIII – the king that had 6 wives and beheaded 2 of them? Hampton Court was his home. 

I live 10 minutes away from Wimbledon [where the tennis tournament happens] and work in central London.

What do you do for your regular job?

I’m a comms planner. So I help brands understand their audience and growth potential better – then work out how their advertising and media can help them achieve their objectives.

It means I work with data a lot, so people don’t notice that I’m often looking at football excel sheets.

What is the worst job you have ever had?

I’ve been lucky enough to not have any really bad ones. I had to feed goats for a bit when I worked on a farm as a teenager. Goats are horrible.

What is the best job you have ever had?

My current one is pretty great. But I was a holiday rep in the south of France in 1998.  During the World Cup in France. That was a pretty great summer.

What do you consider your dream job?

If money were no object, then I’d love to work in a museum or a library. Learning about stuff, basically.

How long have you been in the industry?

I started writing for DLF at the start of 2017. That simultaneously seems like a very short and very long time.

How did you get your break into fantasy football?

I realised I looked at football and thought about it differently to the other NFL and fantasy fans in the UK. So, I started writing stuff just for myself really. I was posting it online, but no one was seeing it. I responded to DLF and miraculously was accepted as a writer on the back of my noodling about on Medium. From there doors just started opening, opportunities appeared and so did an audience of people who appreciated my thoughts.

I’m massively grateful to DLF for taking a chance on an unknown English bloke who wrote about defense.

 What tool do you use the most on DLF?

The ADP comparison tool. My dynasty strategy is about antifragility and depth. So the ADP comparison tool helps me identify situations where a player is falling out of fashion for no good reason. Those are my targets.

What tool do you use the most outside of DLF?

The “snaps by position” tool on Pro Football Focus.  I’m fascinated by how players actually line up and deploy. It’s especially useful in the world of defense because positions are so much more fluid and flexible. The position tool helps me understand exactly how different players are being used.

This is necessary because there’s just not much good information on this. Mainstream media is unreliable and often wrong. And fans tend to have opinions on this without any real backing or consistency. Comparative, detailed data really shows the differences.

Who was the best sleeper you pegged that broke out?

Patrick Mahomes. I fell in love with him while watching Jakeem Grant a year before. That love has never wavered since.

Who was your biggest whiff?

I was not a huge fan of T.J. Watt when he came out of college. It turns out he is spectacularly good, and I was dead wrong.

What is the worst trade you have made?

I traded James Conner away for a 4th round pick before his huge breakout in 2018. I did not see Le’Veon Bell’s refusal to play coming. That one hurt.

Who is your favorite underfollowed Twitter account?

Easy – it’s DLF’s very own @UtahEC

When I grow up I want to know half as much about defense as EC does already. Great guy, great knowledge, great follow.

Who is your favorite NFL team?

The Patriots. The first game I ever saw was the Super Bowl between the Pats and Packers in 1997. I had no clue where Green Bay or New England were.  But I was told New England was around Boston. I’d been there before so I picked them. 

They lost the game and I found out they were a joke of a franchise, had only ever reached two title games, and lost them both convincingly.

Then a few years later when they got good everyone assumed I was just a glory-hunter who picked the best team to follow.

Who is your favorite college football team?

I’m neutral. I have no obvious allegiance and I find college football to be wildly more fun if you just cheer for good football rather than a team.

I get to go to college games and cheer for the home team with no guilty feelings about betraying my allegiance.

Who was your favorite player growing up? 

Well, I found football a bit later in life than most fans. But I was a huge Tedy Bruschi and Rodney Harrison fan when I really started to get obsessed with the sport. I still love them both.

Who is your favorite player of all time?

It’s hard to look past Gronk. He was utterly dominant on the field and did it all with a huge smile on his face. Even if the Patriots were not my favourite team I’d struggle to enjoy watching a player as much as I liked him.

What other hobbies or passions do you have outside of fantasy football?

I’m a brewer and a runner. Mainly a runner so I can indulge myself in being a brewer.  Make a lot of beer. Drink it all. Runoff the excess. Repeat.

With COVID 19 lockdown I’ve run 1,000km this year. And probably drank about 1,000 beers…

What are some of your favorite movies?

Indiana Jones is my go-to top movie franchise. Even the Crystal Skull. Behind that Crank is woefully underappreciated as a slice of silly, frenetic, energetic action. 

Who are some of your favorite bands?

Seafood, Super Furry Animals, Teenage Fanclub, The Stranglers, Bikini Kill, The Distillers, Rancid, Blur, The Lemonheads, ELO, The Clash.