08 / AI product
The Daily Stack AI.
The problem
Daily fantasy sports players spend hours building lineups in spreadsheets. They pull stats, compare matchups and second-guess every pick, and the work repeats each slate. The people doing it range from casual players who want a quick lineup to serious ones who want an edge, and both lose the same evening to the same grind.
The product had to take that grind away without turning into a black box. Players decide in a short window before game time, often on a phone, often after a late injury report. Anything slow or confusing would send them back to the spreadsheet. As founding designer I had no existing brand, system or screens, so every choice was mine to make and to defend.
What I designed
I worked as the founding designer, so the brand, the app, the design system and the marketing site all came from one set of decisions.
- 01
Watching the spreadsheet routine
I started by mapping what players actually did before a slate: check injuries, compare matchups, build a lineup, rebuild it after news. Each step was a place the app could save time or lose trust. That map set the order of the app, with news first, then building, then generating.
- 02
Brand identity
I wanted the brand to feel quick and a little futuristic without losing clarity. A bold, angular wordmark sits on near-black with a saturated indigo accent, so buttons and active states are easy to find in poor light. The same look carries from the app to the marketing site.
Marketing site. - 03
Feed and Make a Stack
The home screen is a feed, with a bot posting player news such as injury status changes, each with a Play this Stack button. A plus button opens Make a Stack, Make a Post or Ask AI. In Make a Stack, players pick anchor players, add a title and commentary, and save it to share.
Feed, Make a Stack, and save. - 04
Generating lineups
Generation needed to feel fast and trustworthy. I asked one question, how many lineups, with four large options. A full-screen timer then shows lineups analyzed while it runs. Results land in tabs, one per lineup, with lock controls and a Download CSV button for players who take them elsewhere.
Generating lineups. - 05
Components and access options
I built a small design system for the app: form fields, buttons in several sizes, typography rules and a library of cards. The cards cover stacks, news posts and the two ways to play, a free roll and a pay-as-you-go option, so choosing one reads as an ordinary part of the app.
The design system sheet. - 06
The marketing site
Last, I laid out the landing page in light and dark versions at desktop and mobile widths. The page leads with the AI tools headline and store buttons, then shows the product in short sections on no spreadsheets and Social Stacks, followed by a customer section. I reused the app's components so the two could not drift apart.
Landing page layouts, light and dark.
The solution
The Daily Stack is a mobile app where AI builds the lineups. A feed surfaces player news and critical injury updates as they happen. Players make a Stack around the players they trust, share it as a Social Stack, or ask the AI to generate lineups in one pass. Free-roll and pay-as-you-go options sit alongside. It is built for NBA, NFL and MLS.
The key idea was to design for the minutes before game time. The design system puts speed and clarity first: large tap targets, one question per screen and a bright accent against a dark ground. Intelligence appears as results and a clear timer, not as technical settings, so the AI feels like a shortcut and not a hurdle.
What I delivered
- Brand identity and wordmark
- Mobile app interaction design for feed, stacks and lineups
- Design system with form elements, buttons and card library
- Free-roll and pay-as-you-go access cards
- Marketing site in light and dark, desktop and mobile
- Player news feed and Social Stacks sharing flow
Value added
For people using it
Players skip the spreadsheet. They get lineups generated for them, see injury news as it breaks and can share strategy with other players, all from one phone screen before the slate locks.
For the business
The app is live for NBA, NFL and MLS with a clear brand and a way in for every kind of player, from free roll to pay-as-you-go, which gives the product more than one route to its first users.
For the team
One person owning brand, app and site kept decisions consistent. The component library meant new features could be assembled from existing parts instead of drawn from scratch each time.
The result
The app is live for NBA, NFL and MLS, and it processes 3,891+ lineup combinations in under 35 seconds. I designed the full experience, from the brand identity through the mobile interactions.
Results
- 3,891+lineup combinations processed
- <35sto process them
- 3leagues covered: NBA, NFL and MLS
What I took from it
Putting the speed claim on screen as a visible timer made the product's main promise something players could see. I would look for the equivalent moment on the next AI product and design it first.