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 -5.0% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 3,554 published picks, not including pending futures, and an average return on investment, per pick, of 0.6% across 899 completed high and medium-confidence picks (low confidence picks, these days, are in experimental markets for us). Our ETA to get the overall number back profitable is currently November 5th, the date of a potential World Series Game 7.
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 have a gambling problem, get help.
Lines for these come from the Vegas consensus or the closest approximation available at the time picks are written, unless otherwise noted. For futures bets (in both sports and politics) and motorsports bets, odds are taken from the better option between Bovada and BetOnline as our best approximation of the Vegas consensus, which isn’t currently/accurately available online. FanGraphs is heavily used in making MLB picks. FiveThirtyEight’s SPI is heavily used in making soccer picks. ESPN’s FPI is heavily used in making NFL picks.
Apologies for not getting yesterday’s college football futures up. We won’t have any this week—one of those weeks. If you’re looking for updates on that (and other housekeeping), check out Joe’s Notes. We’re a bit better about updating in there.
We do have MLB futures today, in addition to two picks against the college football spread and some overnight F1. On the MLB side, for unit context: We started the MLB season with 520 units available to bet on our two-bets-a-day, five-days-a-week cadence, plus another 520 available in reserve for hedges. We are deep into both pools at this point, but things continue to look positive.
ALCS (Hedge)
This is a hedge. It’s a 46-unit hedge, and the expected value isn’t very negative, but the expected value is a little negative. What’s going on is that the benefit we got from the Phillies and Padres winning yesterday was outweighed slightly by the hit we took with the Rays and Blue Jays losing, and with a desire to limit some of the risk, this is the cheapest way we can do that. It takes the Astros to a place, for us, where if they win the World Series and we break even everywhere else, we’ll break even overall. That’s a temporary position, but all of these are temporary. It’s a busy month.
Pick: Houston to win +175. Medium confidence. x23
ALCS
Elsewhere in the AL, the Blue Jays and Rays retain extremely high upside for us, while the Mariners’ upside remains more medium. This pushes it higher, and it’s one of the better-value plays available on today’s board. We’ll double up on it.
Pick: Seattle to win +650. Medium confidence.
Pick: Seattle to win +650. Medium confidence.
Utah @ UCLA
UCLA has the wind in its sails, having beaten Washington so emphatically last Friday night. We had doubt about Washington going in, though, and that doubt has now been picked up by UCLA. It’s asking a lot of either of those programs to be at the level these odds imply they’re at. Utah, meanwhile, is in a tough spot in terms of playoff path but is very believably a top-five team in terms of quality. There’s a chance of a statement today.
Pick: Utah -3.5 (-112). Low confidence.
Oregon @ Arizona
Sticking in the Pac-12: What has Arizona done? They beat North Dakota State, which is impressive, but a home win over a program that even the biggest hypers put alongside the edge of the FBS top 25 isn’t much. Beyond that, it’s wins over San Diego State and Colorado, and wreckings by the likes of Mississippi State and Cal. Oregon was overranked last year, and that carried into the beginnings of this year, but by this point it’s largely washed out. They should roll tonight in Tucson.
Pick: Oregon -13.5 (-115). Low confidence.
Formula 1 Japanese Grand Prix
We aren’t betting against Verstappen here.
Pick: Max Verstappen to win -180. Low confidence.
