Avoiding Games in the Big Apple

For those of you wondering where I had gone, my wife's grandfather passed away at the end of last month in California (age 96, and playing golf twice a week up to a few months ago so not too bad a life), which meant some last minute travel and unfortunately missing the Champions League Final. 

Rather inconveniently, his funeral was scheduled for an hour before kick-off. Very poor timing, but by all accounts, the game was terrible, so perhaps I didn't miss too much.

The timing may have been intentional as, like most older Americans, he was not a football fan. His one and only live football match was the 1994 World Cup Final in Los Angeles for which his dual Grammy Award winning son snagged a couple of tickets, and it amused me to hear him describe that afternoon as "probably the most boring of his life." 

Each to their own I guess. Being of rich Italian ancestry, I can't say it was the happiest afternoon of my life, but it certainly wan't boring! 

I am however, a little concerned that my wife may be a closet Liverpool or Tottenham fan, as ultimately she claimed to be too ill to attend the funeral in person herself, and sent me off on my own!

For those following, here are the May updates for some of the MLB systems I've mentioned, starting with the perennially successful T-Bone System (left).

 

The basic version had a 19-7 record, and an ROI to level stakes of 19.8%, or 16.6% if using the American standard of betting the line to win one point.

The month included a 13 game winning run and over two weeks without a loss, so a profit on the month is hardly surprising.

For the season to date, the record is 39-19 with the level stakes ROI at 7.8% or 5.6% for American staking.

The Overs method I generously shared last month also had a profitable May, with a record of 26-19-2, and an ROI of 12.2%.

For those backing hot favourites, losses from the rare losing start to the season were recovered in May, and results for the Money Line are below:

Some of you may be familiar with the concept of 'public teams', something to be aware of when betting on US sports. I read an article back in 2009 which included this nugget:

The Yankees continue to be THE public team in Major League Baseball betting. And much like Notre Dame in college football, the Dallas Cowboys in pro football, or Duke in college basketball, I've found that it's easier to, for the most part, just stay away from betting on or against these teams. However, after tracking New York again this spring it's time to call a spade a spade. And it's time to start betting against the Yankees blind.

To say it mildly, it wasn't the best of predictions, as the spade turned out to be a diamond, and the New York Yankees went on to win the World Series that year. 

If you had blindly backed them in every game, including post-season, you would have had an ROI of 6.4%, but the comment did make an interesting point about 'popular' teams, which is one to consider when looking to improve a basic system.

When the public bets on a name, rather then a number, there's an opportunity.  

For the five plus seasons above (2014-2019), backing the New York Yankees at home when hot favourites, would have lost you 15.60 points. 

This may not sound a lot out of a system that is up 208.38 points overall, but eliminating losing propositions can make a big difference to that all important ROI. 

Unsurprisingly, the numbers suggest that the market especially overreacts when the game follows a Yankees win over the same opponent. Recency bias anyone?  

And in case you were wondering, New York's other team, the Mets, are the absolute worst team to back as hot favourites at home over this period, costing another 17.95 points.