Why favorites are on a roll in NFL '05

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hey scott i cant get on your web page whats up?

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can't get into it either, Peter, definitely down for the moment.

[kdog]

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111-76, incredible. It would've even been hard for dogs to go 111-76 in most stretches over the last 15 years.




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And with the Eagles going down tonight that puts home dogs at 19-38. A blistering 33%. Who'd have ever thought road favorites would be the most profitable subset in an NFL season?

[kevstreet]

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111-76, incredible. It would've even been hard for dogs to go 111-76 in most stretches over the last 15 years.




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And with the Eagles going down tonight that puts home dogs at 19-38. A blistering 33%. Who'd have ever thought road favorites would be the most profitable subset in an NFL season?

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I check the lines every week because I'm in a betting league. We select 8 games a week against the line and each pick is given a designated point value (2 picks worth 4 points, 2 picks worth 3 points, etc) The perfect score is 20. There are 30 players! Traditionally the guys in this league prefer favorites (go figure). This season has been sick! This week alone there were 3 guys with perfect scores of 20 and 4 with 19. I've been telling my buddy for the last 3 weeks that I can't get over how this has been a bettor's year for once. Anyway, this is my first time in this forum and I was looking to see if this was a popular opinion, sure enough I came across this thread.

I no longer bet individual games, let's just say I had to sell my baseball card collection to square up w/ my bookie sometime ago, but in the last 20 years I have never seen it this good for the "favorite" population.

[NoChance]

Some insightful comments in a thread from another forum from someone (like many) who has had a rough go this year.

Linky

Scroll down to Michelangelo's long response for some great comments if you don't care to read the entire thread.

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Some insightful comments in a thread from another forum from someone (like many) who has had a rough go this year.

Linky

Scroll down to Michelangelo's long response for some great comments if you don't care to read the entire thread.

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It's an interesting post with a fine theory but because online and Vegas books use the same numbers, it doesn't explain why Vegas oddsmaskers haven't shifted their lines to stop their hemmoraging as they still deal predominantly to "squares". What needs to be determined isn't a political count of how many people favor what on wagerline but a weighted count of how much money is on either side, the perceived sharp and square sides. This will determine once and for all whether and how online and Vegas books are staying afloat. I'm not sure I buy this unless Vegas and offshore actually use different numbers.

[kevstreet]

"A byproduct of this strategy for him is that he is bankrupting the local books who have many more Joe Publics"

Wow, this is spot on! Thanks for the link.

[VarlosZ]

According to my system, the lines are simply being set too low this year.

Last year, my system (which starts at Week 6) picked 86 Favorites and 88 Underdogs, with a win rate of 58.5%.

This season, the exact same system has picked 82 Favorites and only 52 Underdogs -- just 39%. It's win-rate this season has been 55.7%. Unfortunately for me, the system is doing great on games for which it returns a weak opinion, and just breaking even on other games (a problem it didn't have least year), so my bankroll is just treading water.


Anyway, my point is that this doesn't look like a random fluctuation from my perspective. I have no idea why the lines aren't being set high enough this year, but I don't think it's just a matter of flipping a coin and having it come up tails an unually large number of times.

Edit: FWIW, my system picks 9 favorites and 7 underdogs this week. It's weakest pick is Tennessee -6.5, so that's apparently my lock of the week.

Second Edit: I forgot to mention that the above numbers for last year don't include 9 games from Weeks 16 and 17 in which one team had nothing to play for and was resting its starters.

[mrbaseball]

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Long-overdue correction?

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No.

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Short-term aberration?

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Yes.

That said I still think NFL football is basically unbeatable over the long term. But when the suckers start winning it makes especially painful. I think there are lots of better sports betting opportunities than NFL football will ever offer yet for some reason I will never understand it is the most popular form of sports betting. That's why I only play it for entertainment value and never risk anything I would ever notice on it.

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Long-overdue correction?

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No.

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Short-term aberration?

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Yes.

That said I still think NFL football is basically unbeatable over the long term. But when the suckers start winning it makes especially painful. I think there are lots of better sports betting opportunities than NFL football will ever offer yet for some reason I will never understand it is the most popular form of sports betting. That's why I only play it for entertainment value and never risk anything I would ever notice on it.

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I'm getting my arse handed to me this year but I'm still way up over the last 10 years. Other sports could offer better opps but I haven't put my nose to the grindstone with those like I have the NFL.

[jedinite]

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Unfortunately for me, the system is doing great on games for which it returns a weak opinion

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I'm actually noticing the same thing. My "almost warrant a unit" games are 9-3 over the last three weeks and 3-0 this last week. I know its a small sample size, but I can't look back farther from work. I'm going to pull the data when i get back from Vegas next week and maybe there's some value to be had in the last few weeks adding one-unit plays to some of these plays identified as marginal values.