Editor’s Note: Since November 2018, Joe has been publishing picks here and back at All Things NIT, our former site. Overall, the results have been mixed, with an average return on investment, per pick, of +0.1% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 5,578 published picks, not including pending futures, and an average return on investment, per pick, of +4.1% across 1,950 completed high and medium-confidence picks (low confidence picks, these days, are in experimental markets for us). We are profitable all-time, but only narrowly.
Use these picks at your own risk. Only you are responsible for any money you lose, and you should not bet more than you can afford to lose. If you’re afraid you might have a gambling problem, seek help.
Odds for these come the better option between Bovada and BetOnline. We used to use the Vegas Consensus, but it’s no longer consistently available in an accurate form online. FanGraphs is heavily used in making MLB picks. Movelor is heavily used in making college football picks, with some references to ESPN’s FPI and SP+. FPI is heavily used in making NFL picks, but mostly futures.
Today’s MLB futures and tonight’s football. Here’s the context on each market.
MLB futures: We began the season with 750 units in our MLB futures portfolio. Using FanGraphs probabilities and including today’s plays, our mean expected final return on those 750 units is 142.30 units, or 19.0%.
Single-game college football bets: On the season, we’re 45–41–2. We’re up 0.62 units and up 1%.
World Series (Hedge)
This is the last stage of this pre-World Series hedge.
Where this leaves us, entering the series, is that we net a 371.39-unit profit on our futures in the season if the Diamondbacks win it all, and we net a 64.13-unit loss if the Rangers win it all. Those numbers will change—we have more bets to place—but that’s where our balance is at. If we wanted, tomorrow morning, to hedge ourselves to a position of being guaranteed at least even money, we could do that as long as the Rangers’ odds were at –578 or longer. We won’t do that, and ideally the Diamondbacks will win Game 1 and make themselves a favorite, but that’s the position where we’ve placed ourselves.
Pick: Texas to win –167. Medium confidence. x27
Florida Atlantic @ Charlotte
This is a hard one, but one take on it is that Charlotte playing so many low-scoring games this year might have less to do with their defensive ability and more to do with them playing against some bad offenses. 3.5 is a number where we’re fairly comfortable, because 4 and 6 and 7 all cover it, and you can get all of those even in overtime. We’ll take the Owls, hesitantly.
Pick: Florida Atlantic –3.5 (–105). Low confidence.
