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 –2% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 7,904 published picks, not including pending futures; and an average return on investment, per pick, of +1% across 2,397 completed high and medium-confidence picks. The low confidence picks are the problem. Most of our picks are in the low confidence category.
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 from 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. We rely heavily on FanGraphs for all our MLB action. We rely heavily on Nate Silver’s presidential election model for our election futures. For college football bets, we primarily use our own model. For NFL bets, we lean on ESPN’s FPI.
Active markets: MLB moneylines, MLB futures, single-game college football. Here’s the context on each:
MLB moneylines: Last year, we finished the season up about 8%. We’re 169–151–4 so far this year, down 14.16 units. It’s been a bad showing, and we are grateful it will soon be over.
MLB futures: In four of the five years we’ve done these, we’ve profited, twice by large margins. We began this season with 750 units in our portfolio. We place two medium confidence bets most weekdays throughout the regular season. Now that division futures have begun paying out, we’re doing it on weekends as well. These are still tracking well—of the expected twelve playoff teams, three would be bad World Series winners for our portfolio, four would be great, and the other five would be in between—but there’s a long way to go.
Single-game college football bets: Our history here is mediocre, and we’re off to a really bad start this season, with an 8–13 record on the young year. We’re down 5.91 units heading into tonight.
Chicago (AL) @ Detroit
We’re sticking with this approach of betting against the perceived hottest team these last two weeks. Is it a good one? It doesn’t seem that way.
Pick: Chicago (AL) to win +159. Low confidence. (Crochet and Hanifee must start.)
World Series
FanGraphs’s Playoff Odds are a little broken right now between the doubleheader Monday and some end-of-season rotation oddities. But, we’ve been seeing good value on these two teams, and we like the situation for both of them heading into this weekend. The Diamondbacks don’t own the tiebreaker over the Mets or the Braves, so they would need to sweep the Padres to clinch without any help, but the Padres are nearly locked into their seeding and home-field situations, while the Mets and Braves both play playoff teams themselves.
Between those two, the Braves have the easier opponent, getting the Royals at home while the Mets go to Milwaukee. Kansas City has a little more to play for than the Brewers, but not a lot, and they might be celebrating a clinch tonight or tomorrow, setting up a hangover game the next day.
One important development here: This is enough on Atlanta that we now prefer them making the playoffs over the Mets making it. The new best case for our futures portfolio is that the Braves get in as the 5-seed or 6-seed with the Diamondbacks in the other spot.
Pick: Atlanta to win +2800. Medium confidence.
Pick: Arizona to win +3300. Medium confidence.
Virginia Tech @ Miami
We’re skeptical of Miami, but this isn’t about that. This is about trusting Movelor after it’s strong week last week and successful night last night.
Pick: Virginia Tech +17.5 (–105). Low confidence.
