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 –2.5% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 7,511 published picks, not including pending futures; and an average return on investment, per pick, of +2.2% across 2,268 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 use our own Gelo model as the basis for our NHL playoff futures portfolio.
Active markets today: Major League Baseball moneylines and futures. We’re rolling with the Panthers in the NHL futures portfolio, even if that situation is very low-upside (the portfolio will profit by 5.05 units with a Panthers win) and very high-downside (the portfolio will lose 59.20 units with a Panthers loss). Obviously, we wish he’d hedged when they went up 3–0, but even that would have left us breaking even in either scenario. Our real issue was falling as far behind as we fell. We might get away with it, but we made our bed.
Single-day MLB bets: Last year, we finished the season up about 8%, betting strictly moneylines. We’ve tried a similar approach this year. We’re 77–73 so far, down 8.47 units. It seems we did not, in fact, find something that worked. We keep trying, though. For better or worse.
MLB futures: We have a great history with these, though the last two years we’ve only made small profits. In both 2019 and 2021, I believe we recorded better than a 50% ROI. In 2020, we lost about 25% of our portfolio. We began this season with 750 units in our portfolio, with the intent being to spend 500 of those over the regular season and keep 250 in reserve for the postseason and/or hedging & arbitrage opportunities. We place two medium-confidence bets most weekdays until sometime in September when the scenarios become more specific.
Miami @ Kansas City
Can Cole Ragans play stopper? Probably, although the Royals’ fade might be too big for a turnaround, making any win more a respite than fuel for a turnaround. Still, hitting against Roddery Muñoz is a good balm for an offense. We’ll take Kansas City as one of the safer plays tonight.
Pick: Kansas City to win –238. Low confidence. (Muñoz and Ragans must start.)
Texas @ Milwaukee
Another safer play is the Brewers, who’ve been one of baseball’s most consistent teams on the year. As we wrote yesterday, the Rangers’ little win streak is bound to end soon. Most likely, it’s tonight against the ever-competent Freddy Peralta.
Pick: Milwaukee to win –173. Low confidence. (Lorenzen and Peralta must start.)
Washington @ San Diego
Matt Waldron’s been good, and while Patrick Corbin’s kept himself out of disaster territory, he’s usually only hanging on by a thread. With or without Fernando Tatís Jr., the Padres should put enough on the board tonight.
Pick: San Diego to win –197. Low confidence. (Corbin and Waldron must start.)
NL Central
These odds are probably a little less valuable than they appear to our method, because FanGraphs’s Depth Charts model doesn’t have any concern over Nolan Arenado’s forearm injury, but given it’s his glove forearm and they don’t have him on the IL yet, we’re not deeming that a sufficient red flag. This gets the Cards back to a break-even scenario for us in the NL Central race.
Pick: St. Louis to win +450. Medium confidence.
World Series
This one, meanwhile, flips the Astros to a profitable World Series scenario, and we like the value. The Rangers continue to be overvalued, as the reigning champs. The Mariners are promising to add bats at the deadline, but what kind of bats will be available to add? The Astros are a long way from out of it in the AL West, and they’re even closer in the Wild Card picture. They’re a bit of a mess, but their upside is too big to pass up.
Pick: Houston to win +2600. Medium confidence.
