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 –0.5% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 5,363 published picks, not including pending futures, and an average return on investment, per pick, of +3.1% across 1,754 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. 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.
We’ve got today’s MLB futures, and we’ve got a little NFL. Here’s the context on each.
MLB futures: We began the season with 750 units in our MLB futures portfolio. This is circular, because we use FanGraphs probabilities to guide our picks, but if we use FanGraphs probabilities and include today’s plays, our mean expected return on those 750 units is 102.76 units, or 13.7%.
Single-game NFL bets: On the season, we’re 5–11–5; we’re down 6.67 units; and we’re down 32%. We’ve been getting smoked, but we did win yesterday, making our wins equal to our pushes for the first time since…possibly all season, actually.
World Series (Hedge)
One last World Series hedge before the NLCS kicks off. This brings our upside in the hypothetical Phillies/Rangers matchup to an equal magnitude with our downside. We have a lot more work to do, but our worst case (Phillies vs. Rangers) is now an environment where we’re thinking we can hedge to zero if we want that, while our best case (Diamondbacks vs. Astros) is still one with over 450 units of upside (that’s what we get right now if the D-Backs win it all).
Pick: Philadelphia to win +195. Medium confidence. x12
Dallas @ LA Chargers
The Chargers offense has been hard to stop, and it’ll have more weapons healthy this week after the bye. The Cowboys defense has mostly been so good, though, and the Cowboys offense has mostly struggled. The thought here is there are two paths to the under tonight: The Cowboys defense keeping the Chargers in check or the Cowboys offense stumbling. We’ll take that combination.
Pick: Under 50.5 (–110). Low confidence.
