October, Tesla and Totals

I'm back. My three and a half hour scheduled surgery last Friday is now a distant memory, although the scars are there as proof, lest I forget. Still a little banged up, but the surgeon was pleased with the outcome, and my habit of visiting the A&E every couple of months should now be behind me.

It wasn't the best timing though. I'll spare you the details, but on the Thursday my old Mum had a fall, and is now in hospital while my even older  Dad, who can't be left alone, has moved into a care home, at least for a month. Not the best way for them to celebrate their 63rd wedding anniversary.

In other words, there's been a lot going on, and likely will be a lot going on over the next few weeks or months, and sports investing hasn't been a top priority. 

Overall, October was at one time looking likely to be a record monthly loss, but an end of month recovery meant the final amount lost was just 3.8%. I should make it clear that this is all investments, only a small percentage of which are sports investments.

Perspective is always good after a disappointing month, and this was only the second down month since February of 2016, if exclude May 2016's 0.01% loss which was basically a push. 

My Tesla tip is looking good, with a new chairwoman replacing the always interesting, but maverick, Elon Musk this week.

In the more exciting world of sports, the NHL system now has an ROI of 7%, the NBA's East in the West is at 10.1% while the NBA Overs at last season's 215.5 entry point has a 62-59-1 record, basically a push. 

As I cautioned in this post last month, the lines have moved higher and it wasn't a bad time for me to be away from the action. 

In the entire 2017 season, the Totals were 230 or more only 31 times. In 2016 30 times, and on five occasions in 2015. You have to go back to April 2010 for the previous time.

Contrast this with 2018 and 35 games so far have the Totals in this range, and the season is less than a month old!

In American Football, the College Road Dogs are now headed to their eighth consecutive, and 14th of the last 15 seasons in, profit: 

In the NFL, the basic Road Dogs are just behind:

With four of the last five EPL Big 6 matches ending as Draws, the basic Big 6 Draw strategy now has an ROI of 65.6% this season.  

Per Blogger, my most popular all-time post is January's Probability, Difference and The EPL Draw and I'll have some more fascinating insights into the EPL Draw in the next few days, as time and recovery permit of course. 

MyBookie Gets It Wrong

The World Series is over for another year, and opposing Clayton Kershaw in play-off games again paid dividends. He pitched seven innings, gave up four runs, including two in the top of the first inning as the Los Angeles Dodgers lost 1-4 to the Boston Red Sox last night.

Two home runs were score by Boston's Steve Pearce, (the World Series MVP) with his Wikipedia entry updated to reflect his performance:

The two NFL selections both won last night, the Seattle Seahawks straight up, while Tampa Bay Buccaneers were getting four points and lost by three. That should, barring any dramatic late line moves, take us to an 'official' 20-14-1 for the season:

In the Premier League, backing the Draw in qualifying Little 14 matches was again profitable this weekend, with Draws in the Southampton v Newcastle United and Leicester City v West Ham United matches.

+3.15 points on the weekend, and an ROI of 14.3% so far on the season.

The Big 6 game tonight between Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City doesn't look likely to be a qualifier, but here are the numbers for all Big 6 games since 2012:

A story in USA today is a little strange:

Think a blue wave is coming in the midterm election that will sweep out Republicans .and usher in a Democratically-controlled Congress?

Don't bet on it, gamblers on at least one online betting site are saying.

The odds on MyBookie favor Republicans maintaining hold of their majority, even as political forecaster Nate Silver says there is an 84.9 percent chance of a Democratic victory.

As of Sunday, the odds of the GOP keeping the House are at -140. That means you would need to bet $140 on the Republicans to win $100 if they stay in the majority. The Democrats are at +110, meaning a $100 bet would win you $110 if the Democrats manage to wrest control of the House.

Indeed this book does have these prices, and they are wrong:

For those unfamiliar with US odds, -140 is 1.71 in decimal, while +110 is 2.1.

Betway currently has these more realistic prices:

Betfair is similar with the Democrats available at 1.59, and the Repuglicans at 2.62.

A huge arb opportunity on the face of it, but you won't be able to bet much with MyBookie whose limits are very low. They also state that:

But if you happen to have an account with them, check it out. My 'bet' is that you'll be restricted to peanuts and this is just for the publicity.  

Los Angeles

A big day in Los Angeles as the city hosts games in all four major sports on the same day, the first time this has ever happened and with an MLS game as an added bonus. 

The Dodgers need to win three consecutive games, including two on the road, to win the World Series after blowing a 4-0 lead last night. Another small profit though, and a much shorter game. 

Our old friend Clayton Kershaw is back for this one, and once again the Los Angeles Dodgers are favourites. 

A reminder though that as we saw last night, and on Friday night, once the starters are out of the game, the pre-game odds should go out of the window. 

That the market often seems reluctant to do this offers great trading opportunities for those who have up to 440 minutes of their lives to spare. An hourly rate of Friday night's £11.10 might not sound too exciting, but small wins adds up over time, and it's a better return than from watching TV. And most games don't go for seven hours, and the World Series is only seven games.

Anyone following the College Small Road 'Dogs this weekend will be very happy with a 14-5 record from the 19 selections, taking this system to 61-46-2 for the season and another double digit ROI possible this season which would be four seasons in five.

Opening lines suggest a quieter Week 10 next weekend, with just two possible qualifiers currently.

it's a quiet weekend in the NFL with just two selections today, and we have one selection in the NBA's Eastern 'Dogs System:

World Series Marathon : Eighteen Innings and Seven Hours

In the NBA it looks like it was another night for Unders going 4-2-1, although two were by half a point and the 'official' line I use for my records may yet be updated.
The Bulls @ Hornets game was not one of the Unders but the initial lay of the Los Angeles Dodgers at 1.57 was fruitful in the World Series. 

With the Dodgers trailing 1-2 in the 13th inning, and the Red Sox trading at 1.1, locking in a small profit seemed prudent.

By time both time (7:20) and number of innings (18), this game was the longest in World Series history beating the 14 innings and 5 hours 41 minutes of the 2005 Game 3 between the Chicago White Sox and the Houston Astros, the first World Series game ever played in the state of Texas. Not a lot of people know that.

The Los Angeles' Super Sports Equinox is now a certainty on Sunday.  

The College Football Small Road 'Dogs are on track for a record number of selections this season, with bumper weeks like Week Two with 14 selections (8-6) and Week 7's 15 selections (10-5). 

I'm not sure why this should be, but Week 9 is looking like another big week with 18 games currently on the radar.

Two were played on Thursday, both winners for us, and a third (Louisiana Tech Bulldogs) won last night and were another winner, so 3-0 ahead already which is a good position to be in going into Saturday.

The above table gives a little more detail on these selections. 14-18 is actually the last five seasons including this one, while the other columns are the system with additional filters applied. So for example, the fourth filter wasn't profitable in earlier seasons, but over the last five seasons it is performing strongly. 

Stings, Dodgers and Neanderthal's Blog

My Unsustainable post regarding the NBA received some attention:

24-0 was the record through Tuesday, but the last couple of nights have seen the Totals go higher, and the expected increase in wins for Unders.

28-18 is the season's results for Overs currently, using the 215.5 or greater line as the entry point. The lines for tonight's six matches are all above 223 points, with the Chicago Bulls v Charlotte Hornets game looking value to sting Overs backers at 225.5.

I hadn't seen Neanderthal's blog until today, but it has now been added to my blog roll. That an earlier post there contained this comment:

I found this strategy in one of the greatest blogs on the Earth (about betting and not only) - the blog of "Cassini" - Green All Over.

had absolutely nothing to do with this decision. 

Game Three of the World Series tonight, and the Los Angeles Dodgers are favourites for the first time this series. At 0-2 down in a best of seven series, they need a win. 

The Boston Red Sox have won seven of their last eight games with Rick Porcello as a starter, while the Dodgers have lost two of the last three behind Buehler Walker. At around 1.64, I'm opposing the Dodgers in this one.

Unsustainable

Doubtless, many of you are profiting hugely right now from my NBA Overs posts, and it's hard to go wrong right now with them. 

At last season's entry point, this season we are hitting at an unsustainable 72.7% with a 24-9 record.  

No fewer than ten teams have gone Overs in every game so far.

A word of caution is that the bookmakers are on to us. The line was 220 or higher in 32% of matches over the first five days of the season, but since then they have made the line at, or above, this number in 85% of matches.

Although I predicted an increase in the average number of points per game, and the number of possessions per game, I didn't expect the increase on last season that there has been so far in both categories. 

Even the slowest team in the league, the San Antonio Spurs (at 98.0), are averaging more possessions per game than last season's average and are one of the teams going Over in every game so far. Stand by for a correction. 

The NHL System is back on track after it's Equinox loss, although another system where the early ROI is unsustainable.

A clean sweep on Sunday took the NFL Small Road 'Dogs system into profit for the season:

with the Divisional games adding another winner:

The College version dropped back slightly with only 6 winners from 13 selections this past weekend:

90 games in eight weeks is a lot higher than usual, but if you are being selective and playing only Conference games, then your ROI is a healthier 10.3% from a more manageable 62 matches :

Another Kershaw Collapse in Game One of the World Series, although not a surprise as Kershaw started as an underdog for the first time since July 2012, a run of 199 games as favourite.

After their second win last night, the Boston Red Sox have the Los Angeles Dodgers where they want them, i.e. needing to win four games out of five. They play in Los Angeles on Friday and Saturday, and if the Dodgers can win one of those, the Los Angeles Sports Equinox will occur. 

Finally, a big thank you to the reader who made a generous donation to the Cassini Retirement Fund which, after the month I'm having in the financial markets, is much needed, writing:

No problems mate! I think if someone’s found an edge they’ve done a lot of research and deserve reward.

I think if someone's given me a reward, they deserve a few more details - hopefully the information shared will be profitable. 

NHL Early Favourites

At the start of last season, I read that NHL favourites are undervalued, "especially early in the season". 

Such pronouncements should always be verified before being acted upon of course, and even if you are happy with a strategy, markets change and they can often be improved upon. 2005 was also a long time ago.

Going into last season, my NHL strategy going back to the 2013 season (2012 was shortened due to a lockout) had a record of:

Backing all favourites over the same four seasons had a negative ROI of -0.6% and in addition would have required placing 5,183 bets, not a practical number for most of us. Looking at all favourites since the 2005 season and I came up with an ROI of -1.8%.

The 153.93 units was also meaningless since not everyone calculates returns based on a level one point stake.

As for the 'early in the season' part of the assertion, while 'early' is a relative term and could mean anything from the first week to the All-Star break, the results from backing October favourites were promising, an ROI of 6.8% from 619 bets, or five a day.

Not an improvement on my own system, but one to watch perhaps. In the event, October 2017 saw losses of 7%, and this month is currently down 10.52 points with a third of the month to go.

All favourites in 2017 had a losing ROI of 0.3%, while my record since 2016 is:

This season's one loss was on Sports Equinox Thursday - clearly the pressure of such a rare occasion was too much. Selection number six play tonight.

The same web site suggested that a subset of favourites, specifically "rested favourites on the road" were also undervalued.

True or false?, I hear you ask.

Again looking at the four seasons 2013-2016 I found that while backing all road favourites had a positive return of 3.5%, playing only rested teams increased this to 8.3%.

Again, not an improvement on my own system, but in 2017 this rested road subset continued to be profitable (6.8%) although so far is a losing bet this season.

2018 World Series Set

The Los Angeles Dodgers won Game 7 of the NLCS last night in Milwaukee 5-1 to reach their second consecutive World Series. The 'official' closing line I use in my records will have the Dodgers as favourites (-112 / 1.893), but I was looking on Betfair shortly before first pitch and the Dodgers were as high as 2.08 before shortening again.

The World series starts on Tuesday and MLB, the TV companies, and anyone not living in, or from, the city Milwaukee, will be pleased at a Boston Red Sox v Los Angeles Dodgers series.

The Red Sox have won six consecutive games as underdogs to get here, but are early favourites to win the series, although the 6.5% margin below can be easily beaten. 

The Red Sox have home-field advantage and cruised to the finals, winning a franchise record 108 regular season games, while the Dodgers need a tie-breaker to win their Division. 

The Red Sox won their play-off series easily too - 3-1 versus the New York Yankees and 4-1 against the Houston Astros, while the Dodgers needed seven games to win the NLCS. 

Over the course of the season, backing the Red Sox when underdogs would have returned 8.98 points from 33 matches, most of that total from road games. 

Despite what the official MLB Twitter account says, this is actually the second World Series between these two teams as they played each other in 1916 when the Dodgers were playing in Brooklyn and known as the Robins. Not many of us will be using those statistics in informing our betting decisions. 

The teams haven't met since August 2016.