Play Ball
MLB regular season betting guide for anyone not interpreting for Shohei Ohtani; Sweet Sixteen!
AP Photo
Unfurl the bunting. Pretend it’s baseball weather if you’re outside in a northern clime. Clear that throat, and for the first time this year, proclaim “Beer Man!” like you mean it.
Major League Baseball’s regular season begins today - with betting more of a theme than the league and a certain Dodgers superstar would prefer. And with it, a myriad of futures, pre-game, and in-game opportunities to last 162 games.
Despite recent stumbles with a stocked roster, the Dodgers remain a trendy pick to win a World Series.
The Braves, led by hot MVP candidate Ronald Acuna, Jr. (above)? Same.
Are the young Orioles for real?
Houston, again?
And then there’s the Rangers, one of the most discounted defending champions in recent memory.
“These prices are kind of short,” DraftKings director of race and sportsbook Johnny Avello said of the Dodgers’ early odds. “There was an opportunity to get them when they weren't sure [about Ohtani]. There were rumors that Ohtani was going to Toronto.
“That was the time to really jump on the Dodgers. I think the Dodgers were up to maybe seven or eight to one when those rumors were flying around. So they've been bet all the way down now to +350 to win it all. And there's still some interest in them, but the bettors, they're kind of looking elsewhere. Baltimore (+1100), they like a lot this year. Lately you've seen a little bit of push onto the Cubs (+2800) with their re-signing [of Cody Bellinger] and so they're just trickling around trying to pick off few spots here and there.”
Meanwhile, the defending champion Rangers sit at +1500 and are seventh-favored at DraftKings and most other sportsbooks.
The Rangers cashed the “First-Time Winner” market at +350 last year, reducing the field in that crafty futures bet to just five teams this year:
That market is currently going for +900 “Yes” and -144 “No.”
The Colorado Rockies and Milwaukee Brewers are not likely to help much, but the San Diego Padres, Seattle Mariners, and Tampa Bay Rays are intriguing. Bet separately:
Rockies +50000
Brewers +9000
Padres +5000
Mariners +1900
Rays +3500
World Series favorites from bet365:
Consider the Gaming Today Playbook the modern version of the old-timey scorecard, trustworthy, informative, with no need of a nubby pencil.
MLB Odds:
It’s been a bad week for those trying to explain legal sports betting as a non-corrosive element in professional athletics and a great one for cynicism to fill the void left by feckless leagues.
What did Ohtani know and when did he know it?
Even worse, did the Raptors’ Jontay Porter tank so his under props would hit?
No answers from investigators yet.
Gaming Today is reporting out these stories and we’ll have much more in the coming days.
AP Photo; Brant James illustration
Bet You Can’t
PlayUSA’s Nick Garcia, a South Sider supremo, has put the pricing odds as such (for entertainment purposes only!):
O: $30 -112
U: $30 -108
Sixteen. Sweet
From Tyler Everett:
Following an opening weekend that featured a few notable upsets in the Round of 64 and a chalky Round of 32, the 2024 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament Sweet 16 will tip off on Thursday. All four 1-seeds (Connecticut, North Carolina, Houston, and Purdue) and all four 2-seeds (Iowa State, Arizona, Marquette, and Tennessee) are still alive. In fact, 6-seed Clemson and 11-seed NC State are the field’s only remaining teams that are lower than a 5-seed.
Here is a look at the point spreads for all eight Sweet 16 matchups, starting with Clemson vs. Arizona in the West Region on Thursday night at 7:09 p.m. ET on CBS. Thursday and Friday’s Sweet 16 games are streaming on many channels and services, including Paramount+ and Max. Cable subscribers can watch the games on CBS, TBS, TNT, and truTV.
North Carolina Likes Betting on NCAAs!
We did not see this coming. Wait … yes, we did.
From Thursday through Sunday, security and compliance company GeoComply logged 19.5 million geolocation checks on 743,000 unique active accounts in the state.
That marked a 56% increase in geolocation checks over the previous week (mobile sports betting launched in North Carolina on March 11) and a 39% increase in active accounts.
Since sports betting launched on March 11, GeoComply has handled nearly 50 million geolocation checks for one million unique users.
This might be good news for NASCAR and the PGA Tour, both of which are counting on some home-state love for their in-gaming betting products as they clamber to increase their national profiles.
March Madness Newbies Update:
Wow, the fun didn’t last long in Florida and Kentucky, which, like North Carolina, are amid their first legal opportunity to bet the local teams in the NCAA tournaments.
North Carolina teams comprise 18.75% of the Sweet 16 with no casualties as the Tar Heels, Wolfpack and Blue Devils remain.
Allowing South Carolina to suckle up because part of it is a Charlotte suburb, Climpson ups the figure to a quarter, but the Gamecocks ruined the perfect percentage.
Meanwhile, Florida was a total first-round wipeout with the Gators, Stetson, and FAU gone.
In Kentucky, the Wildcats somehow made another early exit feel stunning, and Western Kentucky and Morehead State caught the same Allegiant flight home.
NCAAW-agering
Television ratings are spiking for the NCAA women’s tournament. Nearly five million watched the refs guide Caitlin Clark and Iowa past West Virginia to keep the gravy training chugging along.
Wagering has chugged corresponding amounts of gravy.
At Caesars, bets on women’s college basketball were up 190% year-over-year, and the total money wagered on it was up 153% year-over-year from the start of the season to Selection Sunday.
Sportradar Deploys AI for Tennis Streams
From Cole Rush:
Sportradar’s augmented streaming solution uses artificial intelligence, machine learning, and computer vision technologies in tandem to create a streamlined overlay that amplifies the viewing experience and improves sports betting information.
Take serve speed as an example. The speed of any given serve is a key talking point for pundits, announcers, and fans alike. Certain tennis players even build their game around the foundation of their gnarly serve speed.
Augmented streaming makes serve speed (and countless other aspects of a match) more prominent. It allows for richer storytelling and higher engagement from viewers. In addition to measuring the speed of a serve, it’s possible to measure the speed of every shot during a rally.
Odds …
… and enders
bet365 announced it would launch a horse racing app in conjunction with platform provider 1/ST, which is owned - like Pimlico Race Course and Santa Anita and Gulfstream parks - by the Stronach Family.
English Premier League teams are the equivalent of chainsmokers sucking down cigs right up to the moment they go on an iron lung. Jersey sponsorships with gambling companies are set to be phased out after the 2025-26 season. In the meantime, teams continue not only to keep, but add new deals. According to The Telegraph, Aston Villa will jettison Chinese gambling outfit BK8 for Greek casino and sports betting brand Betano next year.
By BRANT JAMES, Gaming Today Senior Writer