Posted by : moneyline

The Saw asks:

I kind of want a second opinion on these considering how golf has gone for me lately. What are your thoughts on the following (tournament match-ups)?

Kjeldsen -110 (53) over Dougherty (137)
Luke Donald +100 (4) over Angel Cabrera (58) (already put that one in)
Lee Westwood -105 (11) over Els (19)
Karlsson -105 (5) over Goosen (23)
Jeev +100 (17) over Molinari (30)
Darren Clarke +105 (78) over GFC (84)
Gareth Maybin -105 (143) over David Horsey (217)
Randhawa +100 (120) over Martin Lafebar (147)

The numbers in parentheses were added by me and reference his own rankings. It’s worth mentioning that I’ve come to realize that, aside from some general strategic flaws, golf was my biggest leak, and thus my advice is probably worthless and definitely falls on the conservative side.  In order of appearance on the list:

You know I love my Soren’s, but I’m not wild about the Kjeldsen play.  It just looks too easy.  I realize Dougherty showed well in his last start, but other than that, is there any other reason to think he’s super overrated here?  It’s not like he is a past winner of the event or has some crazy course history at Wentworth.  In the end I think this leans too heavily on your numbers.

I love the Donald play, and if I was currently active, I’d play it for my max.  This is an ideal spot to fade golf’s most recent major champion as Cabrera won this event back in 2005.

Westwood over Els is okay I guess, but over the long haul, I don’t think you lose much by passing this as it’s pretty marginal.  Previous reports of Ernie Els’ demise may have been a bit exaggerated.

All systems go with Bobby K over Goosen.  It’s the 2nd best option on the list in my eyes.

Fading Molinari, even with Jeev, is questionable.  Francesco’s been playing over his head of late, no doubt, but he was also pretty underrated coming into the season.  I’m not sure that perception has overtaken reality with him quite yet, and you can definitely debate whether or not Jeev will be the better player going forward.

I understand the logic behind playing Clarke (”better” player at + money), but the question you constantly have to ask yourself is:  Is (Darren Clarke) going to beat (Fernandez-Castano) in this specific situation more than (48.78%) of the time?  At this point in D-Clarke’s career, I’m not convinced the answer is yes.

I’d feel a lot better about Maybin in this spot if he was favored, and unless betting on guys with consecutive a’s in their first name has become a trend since I’ve been away, I don’t think there is much merit in fading Lafeber.  It’s not like your numbers have Randhawa as being tons better.

Ultimately, value is not very easy to come by when dealing with 30 cent lines. I say bomb Luke, fire away with Bobby K, and proceed cautiously with the rest.  Either way, good luck this week.

Posted by : moneyline

Now answer me this:

And yes, there is more than one correct answer.

Posted by : moneyline

For ESPN to acknowledge my strong SFTC performance from last month:

Flip the tee though.  I’m holding out for this gem:

Only 3 streaks of 13+ to go.  Mets and Giants tonight.

Posted by : moneyline

I realize and have taken note of the fact that posts like this are much more interesting if they are done within 6 months of the end of the season in question.

Let me be the first to point out that I have been over-reporting my profits for this particular season by roughly 4.5 units for quite some time now.   An incorrectly graded wager and the double recording of a pair of above average days were the culprits behind this mistake.

Other Nonsense = A dozen or so run line bets, a square future, two playoff series bets, a contraband 2 unit regular season series bet, a Home Run Derby throwaway, and a once in a lifetime gift (let’s hope) from Bud Selig.

I don’t have much to say about these.  The huge Dodgers playoff series bet was well thought out & brilliant, and it won.  The allegedly illegal regular season series bet (A’s over Angels) was poorly thought out & yet still brilliant, and it would have won if Huston Street didn’t completely suck.

The run-line bets did well over a meaningless sample size, but I see them becoming obsolete as they only existed to help minimize daily exposure, and that doesn’t figure to be a concern of mine going forward.

Diff = Sum of the difference between the total and actual final score

If asked to describe my performance on totals in 3 words and an ampersand, I’d go with complete & utter dominance.  An average margin of victory of .9 runs over 109 bets is impressive, but let’s be honest here:  These results say more about the wacky stuff that can happen over a 100 wager sample size than they do about my ability to play baseball totals.  I may have had a solid approach, but a savant I am not.

I was not the least bit surprised to find that I indeed got a bit lucky with the sides.  What did catch me off guard though was the huge discrepancy in performance between my dogs and my chalk.  Before the season started I predicted that my dogs/chalk ratio would be 85/15.  I guess it was good fortune that it ended up being more like 75/25 instead.

I’m not going to read too much into this.  One season’s worth of somewhat random results just does not prove anything one way or the other.   Case in point, I actually made money betting on the Nationals in 2008:

I can’t say it was worth it.  Enduring 51 Nationals games for what amounts to a day at Wrigley for one in profit is a net negative on the whole.  I do love that I managed to go a mere 5-11 backing the world champs.  Flipping Brett Myers.  What’s great about this is that I didn’t have any luck fading the Phillies either:

Flipping Kyle Kendrick.   It is sort of funny that in a season where I made 18.33x playing sides, I lost 16.57x betting against the 3 highest profile franchises in baseball.  At least fading the Angels 68 times paid off.  In the end, I really only have a beef with 11 of the league’s 30 teams:

About flipping time Dusty Baker did something for me.  For a while now I’ve been living under the impression that the 2008 baseball season was one giant party, but that is only partially true:

While I was never trapped in one of the early season craters that I often find, it did take me more than 2 months to get something going.  Oddly enough things took off in bases right around the time this happened.  If you account for outside factors, my life, unlike the graph below, hit its apex at the time of my 25th birthday.

If I was ever going to pitch the idea of a sports wagering hedge fund to a group of potential investors — pause for laughter –, I would want to go into the meeting with a fistful of graphs like the one above. Unfortunately, at this point such seasons are the exception not the rule.

Look. +53.29x with x = 2% of bankroll is a fantastic season by any standard, but in this business, results can be misleading.  The gaudy numbers, aside from the fact that I faded LAA 68 times, aren’t what make me proud of the 2008 baseball season.  What makes me proud is the fact that I formed a reasonable plan and then executed it from Day 1 all the way through to the end of the season.  If I can learn to do this in the face of less attractive results, I’ll be in great shape.

Posted by : moneyline

Day 22

I had Marino as -500 over Beem.  The Saw had him at approximately -115.  The true line may or may not rest somewhere in between those two numbers.

Day 23

The options:

Once upon a time (June of ‘07), long before I was the world’s worst NBA handicapper, I lost 18 straight baseball wagers and decided to take a few months off from gambling.  I still remember that 18th loss well.  Trust me when I say that there is nothing quite like laying chalk with a guy who has lost 10 straight decisions when you have lost 17 straight yourself.

Reyes is favored today too but is the worst of the 3 afternoon possibilities at only -108.  As has been pointed out elsewhere, “Milan to Win By 2 Goals Or More” = Milan -1.5.  Sampdoria was a slam dunk last night when their line sat at +1.5 -143.   They are less appealing at -125 but still a better choice than Kenny P (-115), I think.

Streaking with Marino and Chad Billingsley on the same day has long been a dream of mine, but I see no way around taking the Bulls (-149) this evening.