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 –2.6% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 7,447 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’re relying on Neil Paine’s NBA forecast as the basis for our playoff futures portfolio. We use our own Gelo model as the basis for our NHL playoff futures portfolio.
Active markets today: Major League Baseball moneylines, plus NHL futures. With the NBA futures, we’re planning to wait to see how Game 2 goes. MLB futures are off for the weekend.
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 60–56 so far, down 4.44 units. It’s been a terrible performance, one in which every sign of progress has been met with a swift comedown. That said, we’re 10–1 over the last four days.
NHL futures: We’ve had mixed results on these. In 2022, we lost 25% of our futures portfolio. Last year, we made a 33% return. We began on the first day of the playoffs with a 100-unit portfolio. Right now, we’re mostly placing just one future per day. We’re down 22.20 units so far, but as with the NBA portfolio, we’ll profit if our portfolio’s preferred champion—in this case, the Panthers—wins.
Cleveland @ Miami
Ben Lively’s xERA and FIP aren’t as good as his ERA, but. But they’re still very good, and Roddery Muñoz’s similarly trail a much worse ERA over his small three-start sample. Muñoz is very much a spot starter for a bad team. Lively is serviceable. The Guardians are generally quite competitive, and the Marlins had to use Tanner Scott across innings last night. This is a little pricey for Cleveland on the road, but we like it enough to accept that price.
Pick: Cleveland to win –145. Low confidence. (Lively and Muñoz must start.)
Stanley Cup
The odds continue to move towards the Panthers, but not by nearly enough to make us question continuing to double down. Our portfolio is still grim—it’s effectively a 59.20-unit bet on Florida which would pay 5.05 units—but it’s improved from where it was. A Panthers win tonight would be very good for our cause.
Pick: Florida to win –140. Low confidence.
