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 –1% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 4,891 published picks, not including pending futures, and an average return on investment, per pick, of +3% across 1,618 completed high and medium-confidence picks (low confidence picks, these days, are in experimental markets for us).
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. FiveThirtyEight’s models are heavily used in making NBA and soccer futures picks. FanGraphs is heavily used in making MLB picks. Our NHL picks are based on Gelo, our own model.
Happy Monday. All four markets today.
On single-game MLB bets: On the season, we’re 27–19, we’re up 5.78 units, we’re up 13% (the average line on our winners has been –109). It’s been a good start to the year, but we’re now on a five-game losing streak, which has definitely gotten in our head. It’s a long season, for better or worse.
For the MLB futures: We began the season with 750 units in our MLB futures 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.
For the NBA future: We began the postseason with 75 units in our NBA futures portfolio, with the intent being to spend one a day over the postseason’s 69 days (if there’s an NBA Finals Game 7). With many payouts coming before the end of the postseason, this will hopefully leave us with at least 25 units on hand at all times should we see an arbitrage opportunity or want to hedge. We’re up 5.27 units so far.
For the NHL future: We began the postseason with 75 units in our NHL futures portfolio, with the intent being to spend one a day over the postseason’s 63 days (if there’s a Stanley Cup Finals Game 7). The idea is the same as the NBA—we’re hoping to always have at least 25 units on hand at all times should we see an arbitrage opportunity or want to hedge. We’re up 1.73 units so far.
Chicago (NL) @ Houston
Framber Valdez has been among the most productive pitchers in baseball this year, and he’s been even better over his recent starts. Tuesday, he struck out twelve Royals without walking anybody. He goes tonight on five days of rest. Jameson Taillon, meanwhile, has been better than his ERA suggests, but only before missing time with injury. Since returning, he’s allowed three home runs in fewer than six innings of work. It’s a new week, but our five-game losing streak is loud, and with a bigger favorite flashing positive value, we’re inclined to look past the fact Ryan Pressly and Bryan Abreu might be a little less than 100% after short outings last night.
Pick: Houston to win –185. Low confidence. (Taillon and Valdez must start.)
World Series
For all the value that was available on the Rangers early in the season, it never made sense for us to get in on them to win the World Series.
Today, it makes sense.
The question for the Rangers is Jacob deGrom, and it’s not a small question. Jacob deGrom’s health is arguably the biggest question in baseball, with FanGraphs currently projecting him to be worth 3.5 more wins above a replacement-level starter despite only being projected to pitch two thirds of the remaining season. Will he pitch the full two thirds? That’s the question, along with whether or not he’ll be available in the playoffs. If he does, that would have him hitting his highest innings total since 2019, and his highest relative innings total since 2020. That isn’t that long ago, but it’s hard to ignore the trend. Even if deGrom comes back healthy around the end of the month, it’s hard to bet on him to stay healthy enough to only miss one more month of the season, and to then be available in some capacity in October.
Still, we’re in on Texas, and for a pretty basic reason: We really trust our FanGraphs-based approach. It’s worked great for us in the past, it’s looking good through a quarter of this year, we don’t see any reason to mess with a thing that works. Sometimes, that means blindly following a guess at Jacob deGrom’s health. We can live with that.
Pick: Texas to win +2200. Medium confidence.
NL Central
There’s a little value on the Brewers in the Central today, and we love that for us. Taking it shores up our worst-case in the division, which shores up our worst-case overall, and we don’t even have to flip any of our other NL Central plays (we’re in on all three of the Cardinals, Cubs, and Pirates) to unprofitable. Give us the Brew Crew.
Pick: Milwaukee to win –150. Medium confidence.
NBA Finals
Our only scenarios where we don’t end the Finals profitable on our NBA portfolio are those where the Celtics play the Lakers. Coincidentally, as fans, those are also our doomsdays. No emotional hedge here, intentional or otherwise.
We like the Celtics’ value in the Finals market right now, which makes this straightforward and not a hedge. We’d like to have more upside on the Nuggets, and we may pivot to that position, but our Lakers liability is so large that it’s scary to lean too far in. We’ll wait on the Nuggets probably losing one of their first two, which I’d imagine would leave them with cheaper odds heading to Los Angeles. For the time being, expect a lot of Celtics plays the next few days if they stay at this price.
Pick: Boston to win +110. Low confidence.
Stanley Cup
We aren’t parsing scenarios as deeply in the hockey markets yet, though maybe we should be. Our approach right now boils down to this: In the Eastern Conference, we are really relying on the Panthers stealing one game in Carolina out of the first two. If they do that, we’ll hedge into a safe position on that side of the bracket. If not, we’ll start panic hedging. In the Western Conference, we think the Knights are undervalued, and since they’re also the favorites, we keep taking them. We think the Kraken are undervalued as well, but we have something on them already to beat the Stars this round, so that’s on the table as a nice little boost tonight. Tomorrow, we’ll look more into scenarios, when we know who’s up against Vegas in the West.
Pick: Vegas to win +230. Low confidence.
