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 –0.8% when weighting by confidence (1 for low, 2 for medium, 3 for high) across 5,031 published picks, not including pending futures, and an average return on investment, per pick, of +3.1% across 1,617 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.
Two markets today.
Single-game MLB bets: On the season, we’re 47–34–1, we’re up 5.86 units, we’re up 7% (the average line on our winners has been –118). April was great, May was bad, June has been good so far.
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. 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 the 750 units based on what we’ve bet so far is 124.42 units, or 12.0%.
New York (NL) @ Houston
An odd thing happening with Houston is that their futures market value is terrible, worst in the league, but their single-game value is often there. I’m not sure exactly what this means, but we do see the Astros pop up a lot when Framber Valdez is starting, which probably indicates the betting public doesn’t understand that this guy is one of the best pitchers alive.
Verlander’s tough, and he bounced back his last time out. We’ll still take the better pitcher backed by a comparable lineup.
Pick: Houston to win –129. Low confidence. (Verlander and Valdez must start.)
World Series
This Cardinals value is very narrow, even at 100-to-1 odds, and that says a lot about where the Cardinals are at considering they remain the best roster on paper in the NL Central. Still, someone has to win that division, and whoever wins it will get home field advantage in the Wild Card Series. That’s not a bad setup. I wouldn’t rule the Cardinals out just yet.
The Cardinals pick prompts us to take another narrow-value play, which is the Padres. If we didn’t take them, they’d be one pick away from dropping into being an unprofitable World Series scenario for us. One of the mandates in our approach to these portfolios is maximizing the number of profitable paths.
Pick: San Diego to win +1800. Medium confidence.
Pick: St. Louis to win +10000. Medium confidence.
