Thunder Rolls

I've been a little distracted after all the excitement of May. My father-in-law is struggling with his health right now, after a knee replacement surgery that has not gone well. It needs to be re-done but first an an ongoing unidentified bacterial infection needs to resolved. 

My wife and I are now in California providing moral support, although the latter falls mostly on her.  I do have a 50th school reunion to attend in July so I will be leaving her for a while next week while I climb up Helvellyn - weather permitting - for the first time since 1973 before meeting up with at least one of the two friends I did that climb with. 

With my enthusiasm through the roof after the club's first major trophy, I've also been spending literally dozens of hours updating my Crystal Palace spreadsheet which has grown somewhat from my original goal. 

It now includes every single team lineup for the professional club dating back to the 1905-06 Southern League Second Division and through to the end of last season, which is exactly 5,201 matches and 61,953 player entries, not to mention the 7,252 goal scorers, and I've added two new categories to accommodate the Community Shield and Europa League games.

It's all very exciting and I am putting my retirement to good use, but once again, sports investing has remained a secondary activity, and I still need to update the 'official' results for the 2024-25 football systems.

In the NBA Finals, it's a Game 7 tonight - Oklahoma City Thunder versus Indiana Pacers.

Neither team has ever won the NBA Finals, although the franchise now in Oklahoma City did win one as the Seattle SuperSonics back in 1979.

The last Finals Game 7 was in 2016, and this was a rare win for the Road (Away) team which has won just 4 of 19 and just once in the seven games since since 1978.

Game 7s in the Final are a lot rarer now than they used to be. 

In the 1950s there were five. In the 1960s there were four.  In the 1970s three, the 1980s two, and just one each in the 1990s and the noughties. 

Looking at 'recent' spreads (i.e. those this century), in the most recent Game 7 (2016) the Cleveland Cavaliers were 5-point underdogs against the Golden State Warriors, and they won the game by four points.

In the 2013 Finals, the Miami Heat were 6-point favorites against the San Antonio Spurs and covered winning by seven points.

In 2010 the Los Angeles Lakers were 7-point favorites against the Boston Celtics  and won by four, while in 2005 Finals the Spurs won by seven as 5.5-point favorites against the Detroit Pistons. 

The spread is currently 7 and with the Thunder seemingly taking it very easy in Game 6 - they lost by 17 after being down by 31 at one point - I'm expecting them to repeat their Game 7 performance of the Conference Semifinals this year when they easily defeated (by 32 points) the Denver Nuggets in another home Game 7. 

May 2025 - A Month to Remember

I took the liberty of titling my last post 'Memorable May' and while it would have been memorable even with different outcomes, the month turned out to be one of the best of my life, and that is written with no exaggeration.

My son's wedding went off without a hitch at the Gorse Hill Hotel in Woking, and he and his bride are currently honeymooning in our ancestral homeland of Italy, and of course after supporting Crystal Palace for 58 years, they finally won a major trophy, and I am now prepared to concede that the Zenith Data Systems Cup was not really that major.

The stag weekend was in Cardiff - some drinking, darts, and rugby (Bristol v Bath) were all activities I could keep up with the younger ones at, the bubble football, not so much. At 68, trying to stand up without using your arms while enclosed in a giant plastic bubble isn't too easy but I survived and wasn't one of the two casualties of the weekend who were unable to process their alcohol the normal way. My son (also not one of the casualties) spent Saturday walking around Cardiff and watching rugby dressed as Woody from Toy Story, a look he carried off quite well I must say.

I then spent a few days in North Devon, walking to the top of the Little and Great Hangman hills near Combe Martin and staying by the harbour in Ilfracombe. The low point was finding out that Ye Olde Globe in Berrynarbor (established in 1675) is now closed after 350 years.

I also took my wife to the New Forest for a few days. She'd never been before, and I'd actually not been for many years, and it's really rather nice there.

Back to the FA Cup Final and my son and his daughter were both at Covent Garden and later the game with me, and with the latter having seen her first match in September, I fear the bar has been set a little high for her future years of support.

Both the wedding and the FA Cup Final were days I shall never forget. I was at the 1990 Final and Replay, as well as the 2016 Final and having been close to winning on both occasions, and playing one of the top clubs, it was with hope rather than expectation that I went to the Final. 

It was only when the clock showed 30 seconds left of stoppage time and Palace had a goal kick that I allowed myself to believe that we were actually going to win the FA Cup.

Tears were shed I am not ashamed to say. Whatever happens in the future, this will be the only time Palace will win their first major trophy and it meant everything. Even just writing this makes me emotional.

A thank you to Peter, Hikbuzz and Weirimdi for taking the time to comment on my last post or send me a message.

Hikbuzz wrote in early May:

Take it easy Cassini and have a great May

and after the FA Cup win followed up with:

Congrats on the FA Cup win, must have been so great to witness this first hand. I hope to emulate this myself as I am going to Munich on the 31st to support PSG in our quest for what would be our first Champions League win!

Much appreciated, and I am sure he enjoyed his first Champions League win, which was a little more comfortable than Palace's!

Given how good PSG have looked this season, I'm not sure 17th placed Tottenham Hotspur will be too excited about playing the Super Cup match next season.

Peter wrote:

Congrats to Crystal Palace and great to see your long term loyalty rewarded.
I'm sure you're still enjoying it. Not exactly the result we Sacred Manuscript subscribers were hoping for but ... oh well!

While I am still enjoying it, it is true that major finals often offer value for the Draw, but none of UEFA's tournaments hit this season, and only the Community Shield for the English matches. Oh well indeed... 

Did someone mention the Community Shield? Liverpool v Crystal Palace in August, the latter club with a chance to add a second major trophy to their collection... 

With the football season now over, I'll be working on the updates for the Sacred Manuscript. 

Peter identified a possible conflict with the recommendations for the Europa League Final (did I mention that Palace will be competing in this tournament neat season?) and the Europa Conference League Final and I'll make sure I clear this up. Thank you Peter for your input.

Regarding my minor skin cancer issue, Weirimdi also commented:

I wish you all the best. As someone who works in cancer research I can tell you that early discovery leads to very good outcome.

I am now required to have a full skin check every six months, which is a very minor inconvenience given the upside of any early discoveries as Weirimdi says. 

Back to Palace for a moment, and one of my long time friends who was a little older than me and a Palace supporter since the early 1960's passed away before the Semi-Final from prostate cancer, so get that 'finger up the botty' as one of my friends puts it, although these days that's not routine procedure. But get it checked anyway! 

Again, thank you for the comment Wierimdi, which is much appreciated.

It'll be a busy month for the Sacred Manuscript.

As I mentioned, the football season is now over following Oldham Athletic's win over Southend United yesterday.

In the USA, the NHL Stanley Cup Finals and the NBA Finals (both best of seven) both begin this week.

On Wednesday the NHL Final opens with the Florida Panthers playing the Edmonton Oilers who are hoping to become the first Canadian team to win the Stanley Cup since 1993 and are favourites to do so.

On Thursday in the NBA, the Finals begin with the Oklahoma City Thunder big favourites to win against the Indiana Pacers.

The WNBA is also is full flow now, as well as MLB of course. 

As I fully anticipated, May was not a good month for my weight. Getting out of my routine with wedding related activities, football matches, catching up with old friends meaning I drank beer on 27 days, and a lot on a few of these, means I am back to where I was at the end of last year. June will be a lot different.

Financially, May wasn't such a great month either. I helped my son out with his wedding bar tab and upgraded his gift from the toaster I was hoping to get away with, and my former employer's stock price continued to decline to the point where none of my options are now in the money. 

Some individual holdings had a good month to help limit the damage - Tesla was up 23%, Boeing was up 13% and Palantir up 11% but with the news that Warren Buffett is retiring as Berkshire Hathaway's CEO at the end of 2025, Berkshire Hathaway's stock price slipped by 5.5%. 

Overall I was down 1.8% on the month, the fourth consecutive losing month which is a first for me and hopefully a last, but probably not. Good luck to you all in June. 

Memorable May

Just a quick update to say that I had to have a minor procedure for some skin cancer which wasn't great news but could have been a lot worse, and that I shall be away from home for the next four weeks with a hectic schedule which now includes a trip to Wembley for the FA Cup Final. Third time lucky I hope, as Crystal Palace have been my club since my first game in April 1967, and to win the FA Cup would be very special. 

I'll be at the Nottingham Forest game tomorrow with my son and one of my granddaughters, before heading to a secret destination for his stag weekend. It's a secret from him, although I know where it will be. A few days in North Devon after that, then the Final, another home game versus Wolves, my son's wedding day and finally a few days in the Kent countryside at my sister's place to unwind from it all. 

May will be a memorable month, and hopefully better than April which was not a good month overall - either financially or health-wise - although the monetary losses were put into perspective by the latter and isolated to my former employer reporting results which the market did not like, and as a result most of my options are now currently out of the money. Hopefully the market has overreacted, but a six figure loss on paper isn't great in retirement. 

My son's wedding gift has been downgraded to a toaster.

By the time I return, the football season will be over, the NBA and NHL seasons will be almost over, and we'll have some MLB data to take a look at so for sports betting updates check back in a month or so. Other life events mean that betting won't be top of my agenda for a while, but good luck to those of you for whom it is. 

Country Roads, Eggs and Baskets

I managed to survive the six-state road trip with my son mentioned in my previous post. After flying into New Orleans, Louisiana and spending a couple of days there we drove to Savannah, Georgia stopping overnight in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Nashville, Tennessee, Asheville, North Carolina, and Charleston, South Carolina. We were able to catch the College Basketball Championship game between Florida and Houston in Nashville shortly before we were hauled up on stage to sing along to, in my case, Take Me Home, Country Roads and for my son, The Gambler. 

All in all a great trip although it was disturbing that I was regularly the oldest patron in the bar, with another highlight being the announcement somewhere that someone was celebrating their 70th birthday which made me feel quite young. The last photo on the final night in Savannah was taken at 2:36am so I kept up pretty well I feel! 

My Fitbit and Oura metrics took a hit, as did my scales and wallet, but all bar my wallet are slowly returning to normal. 

The financial markets were extremely volatile while we were away and it was one of those trips I returned home from with no idea whether I was up or down, but unfortunately I was down. Tesla was bouncing around all over the place, up more than 23% on Wednesday as we drove through the Hurricane Helene damaged roads into Asheville, and my former company also had a good run which helped to offset some of the broader market losses. 

I met with my Financial Advisor on Monday and was pleased to hear that I've not messed up (yet) although he felt I was a little aggressive on growth stocks and should consider moving some money into dividend stocks, which is something I was already doing and have mentioned here before, but maybe I'm not doing it fast enough for his liking. 

Back to College Basketball and with the season over, we can look at how that Sacred Manuscript systems. The Small Favourites had a 52-55 losing record ATS for a small loss, but when limited to the top six conferences, the record was 9-8 but the totals had a losing 7-10 record. 

The Conference Tournament System fared much better with a 71-66 record, and the NCAA Tournament results were even better at 22-12 making it a profitable season overall. 

The NBA Regular Season has also ended, with the Playoffs starting today. With Road Favourites not performing as expected this season, we're looking at a loss overall but the Totals Systems have been profitable, notably the Overs on High Totals which delivered a 123-110-1 record. More to come when the playoffs are over but I think one lesson might well be not to base too many systems on one parameter, even if it has been a profitable one over the years. Something about 'eggs and baskets' which applies to more than just NBA betting.  

Factors of Seventeen

While it may seem counter-intuitive, one side effect of retirement has been a reduction in the amount of time available for blogging. In my 'working' from home days, it was easy to find time between meetings for some research or blogging, but with no such constraints these days I'm spending more of my time out of the house.

However, the blog did mark its 17th anniversary a few days ago, and has recently been selected "as one of the Top 100 Sports Betting Blogs on the web".  

While I claim on Twitter to be the "Author of the world's number one sports trading blog Green All Over", the assertion is made with "tongue-firmly-in-cheek" and while I should perhaps be disappointed that I only rank at number 34 in this list, in all seriousness it's quite inspiring to be noticed, and with the added bonus that 34 is a Fibonacci number.

The blog is accurately described as:

an independent look at challenges and opportunities in sports and financial investing, with occasional diversions as my mood takes me.

I'm a little concerned that Daily Betting Blog from my old friend Steve makes the list at number 59 despite not having posted since 2021, but who am I to question the criteria used to determine the list? 

As others have noted, it's not easy coming up with content after this long, and while I have no plans to stop blogging, it's clear that as life is changing for me, it's perhaps not the priority it once was. 

Later this week I'm off to New Orleans for a ten day road trip across the United States with my son, a final father / son road trip before he becomes a married man in May, a month that will not be focused on betting but on family and trying to keep up with a younger generation on the stag weekend. My ability to drink and recover is not what it used to be. Actually, the drinking part is fine, but at 68 it's the recovery that now takes so much longer. 

I just now realised that I have been blogging for 25% of my life!

To sports and the 2025 MLB season started for the Chicago Cubs and Los Angeles Dodgers a little earlier than most teams with two games in Tokyo, both won by the Dodgers, but for most teams the season started last Thursday.

The College Basketball season is reaching its conclusion with the NCAA tournament to decide the National Champions down to its last four teams. It's rather more boring than usual with few surprises, and a Final Four of all number one seeds (each of the four regions is seeded).  

Since the tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1985, this has only happened once before, in 2008.

The Sacred Manuscript system for this tournament currently has an impressive 22-12 record ATS, although in the Conference Tournaments, the system was only slightly profitable with a 71-66 record. 

The NBA regular season is also winding down with the playoffs starting in mid-April. Overall it hasn't been the best of seasons with Road Favourites having their worst season since 1998. 

It's better news in the NHL which is also in the final stage of its regular season, with the core system having an official ROI of 4.3%, and the Embarrassed and Rested system up 13.6% - numbers that are easily beatable. The "Tough Guys" system hasn't fared so well, with a 28-29 record so far and an ROI of -8.5%.

February Flops

February wasn't the best of months. Sports betting saw a miniscule 0.7% return, which at least was positive, but overall the month ranked as the 194th best in nominal terms out of the 197 since I started tracking, and the 184th best in percentage terms, which is a more positive way of saying that the month was one of the worst ever. 

Tesla lost 27.6% in the month, and is currently down 33% YTD, while Bitcoin lost 17.6% in February and is down 2.8% YTD. 

I did mention in the January summary that: 

As a new retiree, I'm still getting used to the new world of no salary, but if returns on investments could be like January all the time, I'll be a happy man.

Along with being a retiree comes the experience of having gone through a few roller-coaster rides in my investment career, and I'm well aware that it can be a bumpy road. Tesla will be interesting. The CEO has closely (to put it mildly) aligned himself with the current administration, which is not usually a great idea for a CEO, and leading the DOGE effort can't be anything but a distraction from running Tesla. 

With Tesla importing around 25% of their components including some from China, a tariffs war is not going to be helpful. Then there is the issue of the Elon Musk "brand" hurting demand for Teslas in Europe (a 26% drop in sales in February and likely a bigger drop when March's numbers are released) plus the competition in China and Asia from BYD and Tesla is looking like a sell. 

I reduced my position slightly at $433.63 on 17th January which was a good move, but then I bought the shares back on the 23rd at $411.75 which wasn't a good move, given that I could buy them back today at around $263.  

As I've mentioned before, most of my money is invested in low cost broad index funds with these individual share holdings just me playing with money I can afford to lose, although I'd prefer it didn't come to that. I'm planning to continue holding Tesla for now, given that I'm playing with house money after getting in back in 2017.

In the Premier League last season, backing the draw in Big 6 matches was a profitable strategy with an ROI of 104% from the 30 matches, but so far this season hasn't been as profitable with a loss of 10% after the 22 matches played so far. 

The broader strategy of simply opposing Home teams in Big 6 matches rather than target the unpredictable Draw does continue to be lucrative though, with last season's 24% ROI up slightly to 30% this season. Sunday sees Manchester United play Arsenal. 

Half-Term Report

It's half-term for the arena sports of NHL and NBA in the USA and as promised here is the half-time review of how the systems in the Sacred Manuscript have fared do far. 

The NHL broke-up first and aren't back until the weekend, while the NBA has a shorter break with play resuming tonight (Wednesday) with the regular season ending in less than two months on April 13th. 

In the NHL, the first basic system is off to a great start with an ROI of 10.9%, with the Puck Line bets with an even more impressive 32.2%. 

I've included the Over/Under for these matches because the Under shows a big edge so far this season. Historically, Unders have a slight edge winning at 53.8%, but the increase this season is interesting. 

For the more selective system the results are a little disappointing, but still profitable and the Unders trend here is even stronger: 

In theory, and certainly over the longer term, these more selective bets will have a higher ROI, but the reduced volume means that variance is a factor in the short term, and 15 nets is very much short term. 

For the second system the results are not as good. Long term (i.e. since 2006) the ROI on these are 8.2% and 15.1% but so far this season we are down 22.7% (from 60 selections) and 2.9% for the more selective system although this has only had 13 selections to date.

The third main system is down 11.5% (from 40 selections) with the more selective offshoot up 49%, which sounds more exciting than it is given that there has literally only been a handful of selections so far. Again, Unders at 59.5% are coming in at a higher rate than expected this season.

Moving to the NBA and the results are so far very disappointing. Most of the Spread systems are based on the premise that certain Away teams are often value, but this season the winning percentage (46.4%) is the lowest since records began in 1995.

This basic system currently has an ROI of -9.4% from 334 selections and it's not much comfort that factoring in the previous result for both teams this into a 12.1% ROI since this is just 54 selections. 

The Totals systems are at least performing decently so far, with the 'Overs on High Totals' system hitting at 55.5% while the 'Alpha Unders' has a losing 28-29 record to date, but in the hunt to be profitable at least. 

College Basketball doesn't have a mid-season break, and selections are few and far between in the earlier part of the season, but so far the three systems are a combined 9-9 with the end-of-season tournaments when we get really busy.

At least my bet on the Superbowl was profitable even if I didn't get the best value by waiting until kick-off. 

Fixes, Breaks, Investments and Oct '23 v Jan '25

As many of you will know, sports betting has been on the rise in the US ever since the 1992 Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act which made it illegal outside of Nevada was overturned in 2018 as a violation of states’ rights.

Since then, individual states have one by one legalized in-person sports betting with the ball set rolling by Delaware just a month after the legal decision, quickly realizing the financial benefits of legal sports betting.

According to Forbes, Americans wagered $119.84 billion on sports in 2023, which represented an annual increase of 27.5%.

Along with this increase in sports betting has come an increase in people associated with sports getting themselves in trouble. Last April, Jontay Porter (age 24) became the first active player to be banned (for life) from the NBA for gambling since 1954.

Just last week it was revealed that Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier is under investigation for allegedly "altering his performance" during a March 2023 game, and today we read that:

"Accounts connected with a gambling ring that is under federal investigation for its participation in two NBA betting cases have been tied to "unusual wagering activity" on at least three men's college basketball programs this season. The three schools -- North Carolina A&T, Mississippi Valley State and Eastern Michigan -- were all reportedly bet against by the gambling ring and flagged by betting integrity monitors at various points this season, according to ESPN.

North Carolina A&T recently suspended three basketball players -- including the top two scorers on the season for "violating team rules" last week -- though it's unclear if the indefinite suspensions are tied to the betting case.

The same accounts linked in the probe were also involved in suspicious betting activity that placed large wagers on prop bets involving former Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter during the 2023-24 season and former Hornets guard Terry Rozier in 2023, ESPN reports.     

In baseball, one of the best - at least in terms of calling balls and strikes correctly - umpires Pat Hoberg has been fired  by MLB for "gambling violations." 

It's disappointing, but not really an unexpected byproduct of the huge increase in interest in betting. It happened here in England when spread betting became popular in the 1990s and elite players such as Matt Le Tissier were tempted into trying to fix things such as the timing of the first throw-in. 

In my opinion, the more players on a team, the higher their compensation, and the higher the profile of the match, the lower the risk is that a bet on something macro such as the final score will be impacted. 

Tennis, golf, snooker, darts etc. and it only takes one individual to make a big difference to the final outcome, and that could be due to illness, mood, motivation rather than betting related.

The end of January means just the one NFL game remaining, the Philadelphia Eagles looking to stop the Kansas City Chiefs (-1) from becoming the first team to win three consecutive Superbowls. 

With the mid-season breaks for the NBA and NHL coming up in a few days, it makes sense to review those seasons so far at that time. 

At the start of the year, I didn't recommend a few stocks, but if you disregarded my suggestion, you wouldn't be complaining too much. I wrote:

These aren't recommendations, but for the record they are AbbVie ($ABBV), Applied Materials ($AMAT), Amazon ($AMZN), Alibaba ($BABA), Bristol-Myers Squibb ($BMY), Salesforce ($CRM), Alphabet ($GOOG), NVIDIA ($NVDA), Palantir ($PLTR), Thermo Fisher Scientific ($TMO), UnitedHealth ($UNH) and VeriSign ($VRSN). For crypto I'm now in on Dogecoin as I mentioned back in November.

My two regrets are not investing more, and adding that last sentence. Dogecoin has not had a good month, but overall these numbers are very good.

Palantir is the standout, and Wayward Lad will be happy about that although maybe not so happy about halving his stake!

Tesla is down on the year, but overall it was a good start to the year. As a new retiree, I'm still getting used to the new world of no salary, but if returns on investments could be like January all the time, I'll be a happy man.

In the same post, I also mentioned my target of dropping a few pounds, and again, this is probably not of interest to anyone but myself. I wrote:

Back to my health / weight, and while some of the gain is from building more muscle and focusing on weight training during the latter part of 2024, I do need to get back on track with my calories. I have two weddings, a school reunion (50th), and a climb up Helvellyn coming up and an expensive (for me) suit purchased when I was 11 1/2 stone (162 lbs) which I need to fit into (for the weddings, not the climb up Helvellyn!).

Fortunately I know how to do it, but it's just rather slow and not the most fun with alcohol a big factor.

While exercise is very beneficial in lots of ways, for losing weight (by which I mean fat) it's far less important than calories ingested which has a correlation to wight loss of about 88%.

Fewer than 2100 calories a day, and the weight falls off. Simple. Another Dry January will get the year kick-started.

Another Dry January did just that. I actually noticed that my starting weight in October 2023 was exactly the same as that for January, and decided to try to match or surpass my habits from that month as it was a 'Sober October', it was also a 31 day month, and I dropped almost 18lbs.

My October 2023 / January 2025 comparison:

The numbers are daily of course, except for the totals lost which were very close, even though with more time on my hands these days, I was a little more active than before.

One other difference is that although the starting weights were identical, my body composition wasn't. 

I've been adding strength training to my routine (my son tells me that as I approach old age, this is a must) so there was less fat to lose this year than 15 months ago, so with less weight (i.e. fat) to lose and more calories burned, the similar results are explained. I also bought a Fitbit a couple of days ago, another of my son's suggestions, so I'll have more metrics to play with moving forward. 

The Rest Is Current

There might be only three games left in the 2024 NFL season, but the NHL and NBA seasons are a little more than halfway through their regular seasons, even if their all-star games are still a couple of weeks away.

I mentioned 'bye' weeks in my previous post and while the NHL and NBA schedules are quite different, there are differences regarding how rested one team is compared to another. It's interesting that of the five NHL systems in the Sacred Manuscript, the three that factor in this parameter are the three that are in profit, whereas the two that don't are currently down for the season.

One basic system has a 24-18 record, but when applying the 'rest' factor improves to 8-1. 

The one system that was a late addition to the manuscript thanks to Thomas is currently negative, but once again, if 'rest' is taken into account, the results turn positive with an 18-19 losing record turning into a 4-1 winning record.

In my haste to add this system to the document, I failed to look at the impact of this additional qualifier, a miss that will be fixed moving forward.

You could actually do far worse this season than simply back teams that are better rested than their opponent which has an ROI of 7.0% and a P/L of 37.51 units from 352 bets. This using Killer Sports' data which can almost always be improved upon when it comes to prices. 

However, unless there is some significant change to the scheduling, this is likely to be a blip in the statistics since no other season in the past comes close. 

In the NBA, which shares a similar schedule with the NHL, better rested teams have a slight advantage this season with a win percentage of 52%, but historically this hasn't been an area where an edge has existed except for some totals systems. Or I've just not found them yet! 

Resting On Their Laurels

I've written before about the market overvaluing rested higher-seeded teams in playoffs, for example the MLB, the National League (the English Football fifth tier, not MLB's National League) and of course the NFL, which completed its Divisional Playoff Round where this 'feature' is present.

The rested teams this season were the Detroit Lions in the NFC and Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC. Both played on Saturday with the Lions favoured by 8.5 points and the Chiefs by 9.5 points playing against the Washington Commanders and the Houston Texans respectively, and neither covered the spread, with the Lions actually losing the game. 

Since the NFL moved to this playoff format in the 2021 season, the favourite is just 2-6 ATS, and eliminated three times from the eight games so far. 

This is a small sample of course, but rested teams have been a feature of the NFL playoffs since 2001 and the numbers since then are 38-46-2 ATS with 26 of the 86 teams eliminated. 

Hopefully some of you remembered this idea and took advantage.  With just two selections a year this is not included in the Sacred Manuscript, but then I do include the National League system which only generates six a season which seems a little inconsistent. 

The College Football season ended last night with favoured Ohio State covering the spread against Notre Dame, but for me, the post season interest was more in how the new 12 team format would play out.

Similar to the NFL, four teams were given byes to the Quarter-Finals and all four lost their matches straight up which looks promising. 

One big difference is that all these games are all played at a neutral venue, and the nature of College Football is that not all four teams on a bye were favourites, (actually none were), but it's something to keep an eye on as the format becomes more established and we get more data.    

NFL 2024 - Year of the Favourite, and Overs

With 19 full years of betting profit and loss totals now complete, here's the annual, or somewhat annual as I think I missed this much anticipated update last year, look at how the actuals compare with the expected in regard to Benford's Law.

With a 99.8% correlation it's pretty close, although as in 2023 still a little untidy at the bottom with the 9 remaining unexpectedly higher than both 7 and 8. I'm probably not going to lose any sleep over it. 

Nor will I lose any sleep over my bet on the Jacksonville Jaguars +3 on Sunday which was settled as a Push after they lost by 3 points in overtime, which in US sports counts. 

The Killer Sports line was +3.5 so it will count as a Win in the 'official' records, although it was the only one of three selections to win so the basic Small Road 'Dogs have a second consecutive losing season finishing with a 24-30 record. 

It's only the fourth losing season since 2004 and the more selective Division version at 19-15 had a winning season and it's now 11 years since this one had a losing record. 

The totals had the reverse record of 15-19 with Overs having its best season in all regular season matches since 2010, and it's third highest success rate in the 26 year history of the Killer Sports database. 

My gut feeling is that the standard of kicking and rule changes may be factors here, but something to look at in the off season.

The non-Divisional Small Road 'Dogs were unable to overcome the season long headwind that resulted in Favourites having their best season since 2005 both Straight Up (SU) at 71.9% and Against The Spread (ATS) at 53.4%. 

Some of the Totals Systems were profitable with the Prime Time System recording a 29-26-1 record, the non-Conference version a 12-7-1 record, and the 'Off-a-Bye Week' systems had a combined 50% record at 8-8 so we were down the vig there.

I'm not sure if it is an issue just for me, but I am no longer able to access the Gimmethedog site so the official CFL numbers aren't available. It's a rather niche market I suspect, so no one really cares, but a little frustrating.

Overall the 2024 American Football season numbers look like this - underwhelming for sure, but it does feel like it could have been a lot worse. 

For perspective, the numbers since the systems began are:

Ten-Baggers

In my previous post I mentioned a bunch of individual stocks that I am now following, in addition to the few I've already mentioned, but it occurred to me on my walk yesterday that I should probably clarify that these are being traded in my 'play' account which comprises less than 10% of my investment portfolio. 

The majority of my money is invested in low-cost index tracking funds, and while it would be nice to beat the market with individual stocks, I'm probably not going to be able to over the long-term.

Last year this account was up 26.5% so I did slightly beat the benchmark S&P 500 index (+23.3%), but only with the help of a late surge from Tesla and a late decline for the S&P 500. 

My financial advisor made clear to me, this (choosing $TSLA, not beating the market) was likely a once in a lifetime event, but I'm not sure about that. 

While Tesla became a ten-bagger in a couple of years, there are several other companies who have met the definition.

"eToro analysed the returns of FTSE 350 companies and S&P 500 firms from 2013 to 2023 to identify ten-bagger stocks i.e. companies which have seen their share price surge by a factor of 10 or more (+1,000%) over 10 years."

Your chances are improved by looking to the US markets with just two UK companies (JD Sports (JD) and Games Workshop (GAW) achieving this, a strike rate of 0.6%.

Over in the US, 21 of the current S&P 500 made +1,000% returns from 2013 to 2023, a 4.2% hit rate. This list includes Tesla and the article concludes with the sensible advice that:

It’s also worth bearing in mind that even if you don’t directly invest in these winning companies, you can still benefit from their success by investing in Exchange Traded Funds tracking the performance of particular stock markets as a whole.

2024 / 2025 - Red December

A Happy and Healthy New Year to all of you reading this post. 

It wasn't the best of Decembers with both my health and net worth spreadsheets displaying a lot of red and with the goal of being green all over, this was not good. 

For my net worth spreadsheet, December ranked 194th of 194 in real terms, although it was "only" the 190th worst in percentage terms. And yes, while it's sad that I've been tracking this figure since 2008, my son (age 34) already has 12 years of such data! 

The post US election rally has evaporated. Although some of my individual stocks are still ahead, overall the broader indices in the US are now lower and as I have mentioned many times, this is where most of my money is invested. 

Retirement gets real in the new year as I shall be dipping into retirement funds to pay for my not-so-lavish lifestyle now that the severance has been used up, and withdrawing during a downturn isn't ideal. 

Reversing the mindset from one of accumulation during my working years to decumulation in retirement almost overnight isn't easy. I've had a nice transition period thanks to the severance, but it's time to adjust. 

I'm removing the 'target' sections which have served me well during my earning years, but which now serve little purpose as I am, for the most part, now at the mercy of the markets.

Perspective is always important and while December has been terrible, July and November were the best and third best months all-time respectively, so it's not been a terrible year overall. 

All these years have had the benefit of a salary, and while that became less of a factor in recent years, with market gyrations having the biggest impact, there was a comfort factor in having that steady income. 

The S&P 500 ended up 23.3% for the year, with the FTSE 100 up 5.7% and my 'play account' for individual stocks was up 26.5%, in large part thanks to gains for Bitcoin (+121%), $TSLA (+63%), and (perhaps rather surprisingly) NatWest ($NWG +81%).  

Other market beaters were Walmart ($WMT +72%), Chipotle ($CMG +32%), and Berkshire Hathaway ($BRKB +27%) but of course there were losers - notably Target (-5%), Boeing (-31%), and Pfeizer (-11%). 

And as I wrote in August 2022, acting on investment tips from your daughter's boyfriend isn't the best of ideas. Despite almost doubling in 2024, I am still down 87% on this "investment" in $MNMD. 

Looking ahead to 2025, which is the only year I will see that is a square number, and there are a few other stocks and crypto I am buying into with some cash I freed up after selling some of my Tesla position.

These aren't recommendations, but for the record they are AbbVie ($ABBV), Applied Materials ($AMAT), Amazon ($AMZN), Alibaba ($BABA), Bristol-Myers Squibb ($BMY), Salesforce ($CRM), Alphabet ($GOOG), NVIDIA ($NVDA), Palantir ($PLTR), Thermo Fisher Scientific ($TMO), UnitedHealth ($UNH) and VeriSign ($VRSN). For crypto I'm now in on Dogecoin as I mentioned back in November. 

Apologies if this isn't of interest to you. I am fully aware that most of the above post is of interest to one person, i.e. me, as it's nice to have a record of where I was with my thoughts at the start of each year. I do like to read the thoughts of others, and Ian at Pension Builder is always worth a read even if his updates are few and far between! Interesting to see that we have - or had - a couple of stocks in common, Lloyds Bank and Palantir although Ian has sold out his position in the former. 

I also agree with his comment here although 1/12th seems on the low side! :

As a result of Trump winning the US presidency - I'm no fan of his by-the-way - I've invested a 12th of my portfolio value into the S&P 500 via iShares. I've no idea which way the US stock market will go, but (if it goes up substantially) I don't want to miss out.

On to sports, and with just one week of the NFL season remaining and a 23-28 record, it's almost certain that the basic Small Road 'Dogs System will see its second consecutive losing season after being profitable in 15 of the previous 17 seasons. With a 17-11 record for the Divisional bets, we're close to breaking even on these overall, but more on this when the regular season wraps up.

The College Football season has finished with the newly expanded playoffs currently in progress, and for these the basic Small Road 'Dogs System had a 76-71 record, with the FBS games 76-67.  

Back to my health / weight, and while some of the gain is from building more muscle and focusing on weight training during the latter part of 2024, I do need to get back on track with my calories. I have two weddings, a school reunion (50th), and a climb up Helvellyn coming up and an expensive (for me) suit purchased when I was 11 1/2 stone (162 lbs) which I need to fit into (for the weddings, not the climb up Helvellyn!). 

Fortunately I know how to do it, but it's just rather slow and not the most fun with alcohol a big factor. 

While exercise is very beneficial in lots of ways, for losing weight (by which I mean fat) it's far less important than calories ingested which has a correlation to wight loss of about 88%. 

Fewer than 2100 calories a day, and the weight falls off. Simple. Another Dry January will get the year kick-started.

Expert Fee

As mentioned in my previous post, my granddaughter and I attended the Crystal Palace v Arsenal match last Saturday and we now have in common that our first Palace defeats in person were both 1:5 losses at home to Arsenal, mine being way back in November 1969.

At age 7, it's fair to say that she didn't seem to find this coincidence quite as interesting as I did, and was more interested in getting to BOXPARK Croydon for a healthy post match meal of chips and milkshakes but in a further disappointment for the evening, Croydon appeared to be undergoing a milkshake shortage.

Aside from those challenges, my trip was good and while betting activity took a back seat to family matters, I did see the news that after 16 years Betfair have decided to get rid of the Premium Charge and replace it with a new 'Expert Fee' starting next month.

Per the Racing Post, this fee:

"will focus on gross profit over a rolling 52-week period, rather than lifetime profitability, with a flexible rate of commission rather than a fixed level.

Exchange users with a 52-week gross profit of less than £25,000 will not pay the new fee, with rates of 20 per cent for those winning between £25,000-£100,000 and a top rate of 40 per cent for players winning more than £100,000 in the measured timeframe. Users can go up and down the fee structure depending on their level of success."

Whether or not this change will reverse the challenges with liquidity remains to be seen, with the Racing Post article stating:

The incoming change in the fee structure comes at a time when liquidity levels – the amount of money being bet on events – have been falling. Data from the exchange shows the average traded in win markets on British horseracing has fallen every year since 2016, with a sharp fall between 2019-2022.

Affordability checks have been put forward as one reason for the drop in liquidity, with bigger layers on the exchange not prepared to disclose financial information to continue betting and leaving the site.

Speaking in August, professional gambler Neil Channing said: "If you're a professional layer on there [Betfair] you need a big balance as there will be volatility and swings. So if you're restricted in what you can deposit it makes it very hard to operate. It's a barrier to entry and it's hard for me to be a big layer on the exchange."

The impact on individuals will vary of course. £25,000 a year works out at about £69 a day while £100,000 is about £275 a day.

I have never exceeded this latter amount with a rolling 52-week high of £177.57 set on November 6th, 2009, which was a long time ago when the majority of my sports investing was on Betfair and almost all was in the form of in-play trading. 

Circumstances change in life though, and with the Premium Charge implementation a big reason why in-play liquidity in my favourite sports dried up, my strategy changed to bet-and-forget as I wrote about back in 2019:

I still don't have many friends, but I do have other betting options these days. Yes, Betfair may be taking 50% of profits, but this penalty only kicks in after reaching a lifetime limit, and complaining about paying a higher rate of tax as your income increases isn't something that is morally defensible. Payer a higher tax rate is generally a good problem to have.

My complaints about the Premium Charge were about how it was implemented. The goal posts were moved, but I don't set the rules and no amount of crying or whining will move them back.

The 2008 implementation of a 20% tax was reasonable, but in late June of 2011, the second, and more punitive, phase was introduced when I was already about 90.4% of the way to the lifetime limit. It didn't seem fair to include previous winnings in the lifetime total, but there are some things in life we control, and for those we don't control, we adapt.

In my case, this meant that the time spent trading in-play could no longer be justified, so I moved to a bet-and-forget approach. Winning 50p for a few minutes 'work' is one thing; winning 50p after several hours is quite another.

As it happens, liquidity on the in-play markets I followed took a dive around the same time anyway, so in a way, the Premium Charge did me a favour. I made lemonade with the lemons I was given, as the saying goes.

With just a couple of trading days to go in the financial markets, and anything can happen, it does look as though 2024 will be one of the better years with the US's S&P 500 index currently up about 24% on the year. It's also been a strong year for some of the individual stocks I've mentioned over the years with Bitcoin up 115%, NatWest up 80%, Tesla up 75%, and Walmart up 74%. 

If my former employer's stock price had performed anywhere close to these numbers I'd be ecstatic, but they are currently down almost 4% with the most recent options granted earlier this year out of the money. Plenty of time before these expire though.

Unfortunately another number that has gone up this year is the one on my scales. With my son's wedding less than 150 days away, Dry January may need to be extended next year! 

Service Announcement and American Football Updates

It's not been the best of seasons for the NFL's Small Road 'Dog System, but after a Week 14 that went 4-1 the system has at least clawed its way back to a 22-22 record. The Divisional version of this system is now at 16-8 for the season, but the totals systems are underperforming slightly so the final few weeks of the season will determine whether we end up in the red or the green.

College Football has been a similar story with the Road 'Dogs systems having a 75-67 record, but the totals have the exact opposite. 

In other news, I shall be travelling for the next couple of weeks. A short trip to North Devon with one of my sisters to pay pre-Christmas respects to our parents this week followed by a few days in the Surrey and Kent area before taking one of my granddaughters (age 7) to the Crystal Palace v Arsenal game on the 21st. 

Normal blogging services will resume around Christmas so in the event that I don't get around to it before the holiday, a Merry Christmas to everyone who reads this. 

Bots and HFA in the NFL

Beeblebrox, possibly not his real name, had an explanation for my observation that recently bets placed between the available back and lay money are often being matched instantaneously:

That will be a bot matching your bet. It's very simple to create bots that get notified about every change in a market and then they decide what action to take.

This makes sense, although why this is something I've only noticed recently is still a mystery, since bots have been around for a long time. It could be a timing issue with these bets being placed closer to the event start time than usual, as apparently it's nothing new as Subscriber Rob let me know:

Regarding your latest blog post on bets getting matched on Betfair at
‘Invisible odds’

This has definitely been happening for quite some time and occurs on other sports not just NFL although I do notice it more on American sports.

And a subsequent email today pointed out that it:

Happened again last night. I put in 1.76 for the Islanders and it got matched immediately despite the market being 1.75 / 1.77. They lost!

It's not been the best of runs lately for the NHL Systems, but the ROI is at 9.1% for the season which is in line with their records since 2005.

Two more likely selections tomorrow night.

Subscriber Larry sent me an interesting article on the value of Home Field Advantage in the NFL, a value which is constantly evolving and needs to be looked at on a team by team basis. The article concludes with a table showing the highest as 6.3 points (Detroit Lions) and the lowest as -1.5 (Washington Commanders).

Five of the eight 'North' teams feature in the top 10 which is likely due to their familiarity with the weather, while only two 'West' teams feature in the top half, one of which is Denver with the 'mile-high' location the likely major factor.

Little Boys

My old Mum (RIP) used to tell me that "little boys who ask, don't get" to which, when I was a little older, I would respond "but if I don't ask, I still won't get as no one will know what I want". 

The importance of getting the best price when investing can't be understated and when using Betfair's platform, those extra pips will add up over time. 

I've noticed recently that not all available money is necessarily displayed. It's always been the case that amounts less than the minimum bet won't be displayed, but this seems to have changed.

For example the Indianapolis Colts were a selection today and there was a gap between the prices available to Back and Lay which were 2.0 and 2.04 respectively.

When there is no gap, I typically put in a bid at the higher price, but when a gap exists will often fill it, which is what happened today.  Immediately, my back at 2.02 was matched: 

Of course it is possible that someone just happened to put in a lay at that price for the same amount at the exact same time, but this doesn't seem likely, and it's not the first time I have noticed this recently. 

Happenstance, coincidence, enemy action, as James Bond was told and to the idea that it could all just be a coincidence, as Jim Gordon said "You're a detective now, son. You're not allowed to believe in coincidence anymore."

It's not really a big deal, but another reminder that it usually pays to not take what someone is happy to offer you, but to ask for more. 

After all, if you don't ask, you won't get. Sorry Mum.

Bluesky

Like many others this week, I have been slowly but surely setting myself up over at BlueSky where you can find me at @green-all-over.bsky.social

I have no immediate plans to leave Twitter, sorry X, and the plan is to use both in parallel for a while and see where it goes. 

The Mike Tyson v Jake Paul fight last night got the weekend off to a winning start, and the NBA's Overs system had three winners from three.

Spoiling the night were the Nashville Predators who lost in the NHL to reduce the ROI for the season to 19.2% after 24 selections. We have another selection in action tonight. 

The NFL this season hasn't been great. Several matches have been selections on more than one market (e.g. spread and totals) and it seems like it's been a story of winning on one and losing on the other, which isn't helpful. 

The Thursday Night game between the Washington Commanders and the Philadelphia Eagles last week was the latest example, and once again it looks like a fairly quiet weekend with just one probable selection for the Small Road 'Dogs System, but we do have two qualifiers for the "Bye Week" system which doesn't generate a lot of selections but has been very solid over the years:

 

Mike Tyson v Jake Paul

The Trump rally in the financial markets cooled off a little this week, although Bitcoin is still hovering around its all-time high. I've started to monitor Dogecoin since Trump's new right-hand man Elon Musk has long been a supporter, and this has more than doubled since the US election to around $0.37. This is still well shy of it's May 2021 all-time high of $0.73.

Tesla remains up 27.6% since the election, but Pfeizer (down 10%) isn't looking so good with the nomination of RFK Jr for Health Secretary this week not ideal.

I'll be watching the Jake Paul v Mike Tyson fight tonight, and have backed the former to win at 1.68. One subscriber asked my opinion, and as much as I would like Mike Tyson to win, I can't see him overcoming his age, but also that he's not boxed in 20 years and quit his last fight. 

Here's what my thoughts were yesterday, for what they are worth, which is probably not a whole lot to be honest:

I did initially think that Tyson is probably where the value would be, and for the same reason as you, that Paul's followers will be backing him in large numbers, but I do have some reservations, specifically:

Age. At 58 and not having boxed (other than an exhibition) for almost 20 years, he's not as fit as Jake Paul ( age 27) will be.

Motivation: Tyson quit in his last fight , saying afterwards "I do not have the guts to be in this sport anymore. I don't want to disrespect the sport that I love. My heart is not into this anymore. I'm sorry for the fans who paid for this. I wish I could have done better." - that's a concern.

Health: The fight was postponed from its original date due to a "health scare" (ulcer issue) for Tyson on a flight. That doesn't sound great.

Finally, his open workout this week raised questions about how ready he is for this fight. I'm not an expert, but the opinion among experts was that Tyson didn't look good: “This guy should not be in there. Mike couldn’t gauge the distance with his trainer on the mitts; he was coming too close; the punches were missing the mitt; they were not hitting accurately enough, and his feet weren’t there either.”

That doesn't sound good. On the plus side for Tyson, he's a natural boxer, and the rules seem to have been set to help him - 14 ounce gloves and two minute rounds.

Overall I have to say I think Paul will win. A 31 year age difference is a lot, and it's not as if Tyson is in the best of health for a 58 year old.

But of course, one punch and all these doubts are irrelevant.

I think many of us who are of a certain age will be hoping that Tyson can find that one punch and put Jake Paul in his place. It's interesting that the 1.68 price from yesterday has now shortened to 1.55 / 1.56 in just a few hours, but in a gimmicky contest like this, whatever happens, it will be obvious in hindsight.

Leopards

In my Silver Linings post, I referenced my "hedge bet" on Harris, and I am pleased to say it has so far paid off rather nicely. I wrote that:

...my bet on Harris was a hedge, and focus on the silver lining of my Bitcoin holding hitting a new all-time high. Hopefully Tesla will also benefit from Elon Musk's role with the Trump campaign, and the US futures look green across the board, especially the Russell 2000 which is comprised of smaller companies who will benefit from Trump's promised tariffs.

The three days since the election have been rather interesting with Tesla up 27.8%, Bitcoin up 10% and the S&P500 up 3.7% and Wednesday was my best single day ever beating the record set on March 24th, 2020 - eight days after my worst day ever - when the markets bounced back in the early days of COVID. 

Tesla closed on Friday at $321.22, still a little shy of it's November 2021 high of $409.97, while Bitcoin did reach a new high and is currently around $77,000. The S&P500 also set a new high going above 6,000 for the first time ever on Friday. 

As a new retiree, the sequence-of-returns risk is always a concern. Because of my severance, I have yet to dip into my retirement funds which is when retirement will get real, so for those funds to be about 10% higher than they were back in April when employment ended is a positive with the negatives unfortunately landing on people a lot less fortunate than myself, many of whom will have voted for Trump. 

'I never thought leopards would eat MY face,' sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party.

If you've been following this blog for a while, you should be aware that I've long advocated for investing in low-cost passive index tracking funds over high-cost actively managed funds, and for the S&P 500 over the FTSE 100. 

While there are still about seven weeks to go in the year, it's looking most probable that the S&P 500 will again be the "winner" - results from the past ten years:

It's week 10 of the NFL today, and for the first time since week 5 of the 2020 season it looks very much like there will be no qualifiers for the Small Road 'Dogs System. With a 14-18 record this season, perhaps that's not a bad thing. 

The College Football cousin had four winning selections from five in week 11 to take the season record to 56-48, and the new College Basketball season has begun, although no selections yet as the early weeks are essentially warm-ups for the conference games which start in January.

The season didn't get off to a great start for the number 11 ranked Auburn Tigers, after two players started fighting on their flight to Houston and the pilots decided to divert.  Not a surprise that the replacement flight didn't include the two combatants Jahki Howard and Ja'Heim Hudson. Auburn won the game, so a new system is born - back the Away team if their flight is interrupted by a brawl.