Paddys
Lots of random drunkenness today making me long for days of zero responsibility…
Likely nothing doing again in hockey tonight, but one trend that I want to point out that we missed at this point due to sheer ignorance. The NIT has become the home of experimental rules changes in college basketball and they’ve made a substantial one this year, changing the shot clock from 35 seconds to 30. This seems a nominal change, but the totals for NIT games are all up 6-15 points from their openers. People are just laying into books for obscene amounts though the value is now gone and the lines are probably overadjusted at this point to stem the tide.
There should be an expected 8-12 extra possessions a game because of the change, which at a point per possession would account for the line adjustments. Something to keep in mind for future seasons and tournaments at the very least.
The lines for region winners and on Kentucky to win look pretty correct to me, but I’m far from a college hoops expert. Best I can see that’s not a longshot is Villanova at or around 2:1 in the east.
March 16
Took yesterday off and missed what would have been a small losing 1-1 day with Pittsburgh and St. Louis the preferred plays. Four games tonight and the only thing remotely close is Washington -1.5 @ Buffalo. Montreal visits Tampa in what should be an excellent game but an unbettable one. More baseball as we get closer to Opening Day.
Pi Day
2-1 for a solid winning day yesterday of +1.2u. Two plays tonight:
Montreal @ Islanders -115
Calgary @ Colorado -144
March 13
Carolina was a loser yesterday. Three plays tonight:
Ottawa +160 @ Islanders
Dallas +160 @ Washington
Edmonton @ Columbus -1.5 +140
March 12
Back on the wagon here with only a few weeks left to go in the season. I still have action on another Tampa team, the Lightning, to win the division, conference and championship at pretty good odds to keep things interesting as our volume dies down. Single play tonight, Dallas @ Carolina -110. Brave Souls can attempt Arizona at or around +200 but I will not be joining.
March 11
Nothing doing yesterday in NHL and nothing again this evening either on a short schedule. Capitals are a lean and nothing more. Since we have a free day and I teased this earlier in the week, I’d like to briefly move onto baseball. The top play for this season and will be my 10 point confidence pool play is Tampa Over 79.5. Long time readers of this site are aware that odds tend to get over adjusted when teams lose key players as their replacements qualities are often only briefly considered. Such is the case for Tampa who were slightly unlucky last season overall.
Tampa also represents what is far and away the best longshot opportunity for futures and that’s for them to win the AL East at or around +750. If you have Tampa as a mid-to-high 80s win team, as I do, then this payout is way, way off and should be much closer to 2-3:1. Also consider that the AL in general and AL East specifically are very clustered with lots of similar win totals across the league. Consider this bit from Ben Lindbergh:
The AL is a prognosticator’s nightmare. As Phil Birnbaum and Neil Paine have noted, there’s an absolute limit to the accuracy of baseball projections. Even if we were omniscient when it came to team talent levels, we wouldn’t be able to predict luck. And luck has large effects: As Birnbaum wrote, “On average, nine teams per season will be lucky by six wins or more.” So what do we do with a division like the AL East, where the worst team is projected to finish only six games behind the best? Even if those projections were perfect, it wouldn’t be at all unusual for the worst team to beat the best one through better luck alone.
Tampa to win the AL and World Series is around 27 and 55 to 1 respectively, but the division and seasonal plays are where the action should be.
March 10
Detroit got the semi miracle cover for a win last night getting an empty netter up 3-2 late in the 3rd. We will take wins anywhere they present themselves at this point. Three really excellent games on tap in NHL tonight: Rangers-Islanders, Lightning-Canadiens and Bruins-Senators. All three are on the board as near tossups and rightly so. I lean towards the Islanders and potentially Colorado in the late game but will likely take a pass on the evening.
March 9
Yesterdays batch of losers was Twitter only so I spared all regular readers the mild carnage. 1-2 and I am probably done with this iteration of the totals engine for the season. Single play tonight, Edmonton @ Detroit -1.5 -110
NHL plays 3.7
NHL:
PIT +120
NYI at FLA Under 5.5 (no Okposo for NYI)
Hit MIN+Under parlay last night #thankslou
March 7
Getting things posted early again here on a Saturday:
Full plays
Dallas +170
Penguins +125
Half plays
Tampa/Dallas Under 5.5 +115
Arizona +185
