From the NBA Playoffs to the NFL Awards Markets to the Olympics: Bet the EDGE Answers Your Questions

Bet the EDGE is seeking your input for the podcast. They are taking your questions and discussing them every Tuesday on the podcast.

Spoiler Alert: They can be about any sport but do not have to be about sports betting or even sports.

Let’s run through a few from this past week’s Q&A session.

NFL and NBA Awards Markets

@GeauxPepper asked: Do y’all think the NBA and NFL higher ups have told writers to cut back on award polling? No Pelissero poll at end of the NFL season. No real midseason NBA polling like how Mark Medina would always publish. Pros and cons as an award bettor?

Jay Croucher (@croucherJD) ran with this one.

“I think in terms of kind of a real-world nongambling perspective, I think people should absolutely declare their votes. Your voting on Awards has ripples into people’s salaries and stuff. I think that you shouldn’t be able to just like get away with something ridiculous like Joe Flacco for Comeback Player of the Year. Strangely, no other examples come to mind…NBC’s own Mike Florio has been big on that, and I agree. In terms of handicapping, and pros and cons for this, in terms of betting these markets, personally, I would prefer that in terms of midseason stuff there was no polling at all. I’d rather be completely in the dark because I think that my strength as a handicapper of these is being able to project what people will vote for. I’m going to be wrong sometimes relative to market, but I’m going to be right more often than I’m wrong and when there are these polls, it’s just like a public cheat sheet and it infects the markets, and it gets everyone closer, gets the market closer to the truth and it makes it easier for books to price these markets and it can erode value.”

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NBA Playoff Pricing

@NFLPinnacleBeat asked: Can you price out an NBA Playoff series between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Phoenix Suns?

Drew Dinsick (@whale_capper) broke it down.

“The market might give us like we saw with Nuggets vs. Suns last year, where there’s an aura that until you’ve done it, until you’ve won the championship, you’re going to get situations where a team with KD on it is treated as the better team because they have the better player, because he has won rings, and you don’t have a guy that has won rings. I think there’s a very real world where if this occurred in say, Round 2 of the playoffs, which is probably where it most likely would happen in like a 1 vs. 4, right? That’s probably where you would see this. I think in that scenario, you would potentially get -120 / +100 in favor of Phoenix. My fare on this is Oklahoma City -180. So, I would have a pretty decent side on Oklahoma City in this…We’re going to be in an interesting world this year in the NBA Playoff series betting markets with teams like Oklahoma City who don’t have pedigree, who don’t have experience, and who are going to be at a discount because of those factors and you’re going to have to make some tough decisions. Do you trust your math and your numbers here or do you go with the vibes and the mysticism and the star power that comes with some of the kind of funkiness of playoff series.”

Betting Olympics Swimming

Later in the episode there was a question for Drew regarding handicapping swimming with an eye on the upcoming Paris Olympics.

“The keys to getting started if you’re going to bet any sport in the Olympics…I think the first thing that you ought to do is find odds from last time. Find pre-event odds and try to figure out how did they come up with these? Why was this swimmer the favorite before the before the meet started? Why was this event kind of a cluster at the top as opposed to having a strong favorite…Go through that exercise of just looking at last time and trying to take a snapshot of what was the market looking like on the eve of the event. Then try to figure out why it was right, why it was wrong…start by figuring out how the market prices and then pay attention to the qualifying which is the true ramp up… news and information that comes out through the qualifying cycle…the news and information across qualifying is huge…When you get to the event itself, there’s a uniqueness about swimming…The idea of performing progressively and getting better as you get to the Finals and being able to swim your fastest race at that Final Stage is an important factor…These are all just some tips. Every sport has unique, weird wrinkles like this and just digging into the rules, digging into the format, and really trying to understand why the market is priced is key.”

Croucher added a final thought on the topic.

“It (Swimming) can be deceptive just looking at times because if you are betting this stuff you need to actually watch the race because market prices will be skewed off of heat times. A lot of the times, one of the presumptive favorites beforehand is just clearly taking the foot off the gas in the last 10 or 15 meters and that has affected their price when it really shouldn’t have…You can find some advantages there I think.”

Every Tuesday, Bet the EDGE is taking your questions. This is your invitation to DM either Jay or Drew on X. Learn specifically what you want to know from two and about two of the best in the space.