Different= Profitable

I am in a fantasy baseball draft tonight. An auction draft. I was just thinking of how to draft my players. If I value players differently from the rest of the league, I have a better chance to win. Here is a demonstration:

The league is on ESPN.  Most managers in the league will be using the ESPN.com predicted player values. Hypothetically:

Player 1: $36
Player 2: $34
Player 3: $30

Now, say I go to the Yahoo! Sports predicted player values instead. Hypothetically:

Player 1: $30
Player 2: $34
Player 3: $36

And then hypothetically, here is the true value of the players:

Player 1: $33
Player 2: $33
Player 3: $33

You can see that both rating systems have the same accuracy; they rate the individual players differently, but as a whole they have the same margin of error. If I use the second rating system, and the rest of the league uses the first system, here's how the auction will turn out:

Player 1: sold for $36 to another manager, worth $33, value captured  = -$3
Player 2: sold for $34 to me or another manager, worth $33, value captured = -$1
Player 3: sold for $31 to me, worth $33, value captured = $2

So by using an alternate but equally accurate rating system, my team will be better than the rest of the league.

This principal applies to investing: By using a methodology that is different from what is popular at the time, as long as the methodology is no less accurate, you will make a profit. By following the crowd's reasoning, you will lose money.