LATEST STORIES FROM VEGAS WATCH
This Week's Links (2/23-2/27)
February 27, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Basketball Prospectus' John Gasaway is chatting at noon today. It won't get nearly as much play, but this is essentially the equivalent of being Pitt at home. Dave Neal absolutely obliterated Nolan Smith. And I think A.J. Price's knee is okay. LeBron is good. More on Michael...
When Acronyms Disagree: PECOTA's Favorite Hitters
February 25, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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I've spent plenty of time talking about the accuracy of PECOTA and CHONE, two of the most reliable publicly available projection systems, on this site. But while they generally come to very similar conclusions, they don't get there the same way. PECOTA relies heavily on a player...
Projecting Bracketology: Week 4
February 23, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Bracketology is kind of a mess this week. It's not Lunardi; they did the mock committee thing and made all sorts of assumptions about conference tournaments. I'm sure that was fun, but it doesn't really fit with what we're trying to do here.? So this week I used Jerry...
Most Ridiculous Line of the Year
February 20, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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We figured it'd be low, but this is just absurd: Pomeroy has the Longhorns by 0.6. Clearly his opinion of the Sooners is completely unrealistic. There's no way they're the 17th best team in the country. More like 20th.
Actual FanHouse Content
February 18, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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As you may have noticed on the sidebar, I've started writing about college hoops, to go along with my baseball stuff, at FanHouse. Most of it is just game recaps and such, but today's post -- on the relative merits of Oklahoma and West Virginia -- is similar to these "...
Projecting Bracketology: Week 3
February 17, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Bracketology is here (hasn't moved), this week's 20,000 simulations are here: I ran this before any of Monday night's games, but that shouldn't make too much of a difference; Pitt sure lived up to its billing of #2 in the country (barely edging out Memphis). UConn&...
Guessing 2009 MLB Wins Over/Unders
February 12, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Neither Bookmaker nor The Greek have been able to tell me when they'll post the actual totals, but it should be in the next week or two. For now -- assisted by reader Rob B., who actually came up with the first draft of these -- I thought I'd throw out some guesses on what...
PECOTA Depth Charts
February 09, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Go. As Clay notes, it's a very rough run, but still interesting. The Mets having a significant edge in the East isn't surprising, but I wouldn't have guessed that the Braves would be right with Philly. The outfield may be awful, but the infield and rotation are pretty impressive...
Taking the Over on PECOTA
February 09, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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As has been discussed at length on this blog, Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA is probably the most advanced MLB projection system available to the public (although CHONE may have something to say about that). It consistently makes calls that go against conventional wisdom, and more...
More Pomeroy Adjustments
February 05, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Continuing with the analysis I used to compare Duke and North Carolina, I ran the same numbers for all the teams in Pomeroy's top 25. The full table is here, and here are some teams at the extremes (negative means overrated by Pomeroy): I wouldn't have expected to see UConn...
Duke or UNC?
February 03, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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ESPN hasn't started beating us over the head with this debate yet (give it a week), so I thought I'd get a head start, if from a slightly different perspective. Pomeroy currently has Duke as 3.3 points better, but I think that's a tough argument to make. Here are the spreads...
Super Bowl XLIII Props Recap
February 02, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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All the odds are listed in this post, in case you missed it. Toward the end of the pregame show, Barack Obama predicted that the "Steelers are going to eek it out in a close one". I know this is high praise to throw at the guy, but he may be the next Brandon Lang. As discussed...
The Cardinals Are Favored On Sunday
January 28, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Not in the actual game, of course. From Pinnacle: How did this happen? I would love to know. Did someone drop a few grand on Arizona? Maybe they've just been getting more action from Cardinals fans? I would imagine this line would change that pretty quickly. I'm sure they&...
This Week's Links (1/19-1/23)
January 23, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Last Saturday was quite a strange day in college hoops. A Clemson student tackled Wake center Chas McFarland. Providence guard Jeff Xavier's brother came onto the court to have a chat with the ref. And Arizona's Jamelle Horne is in his own little world. Congratulations, NJIT...
Interview With MGM Sportsbook Director Jay Rood: Super Bowl Edition
January 21, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Back in September I asked Jay Rood, Race & Sports Book Director of all 12 of the MGM Mirage's Nevada books, a few questions about the 2008 baseball season and upcoming playoffs. Mr. Rood was nice enough to answer a few questions of my once again, this time focusing on Super...
The Contenders
January 21, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Below are my current rankings of the ten teams most likely to cut down the nets in Detroit on April 6. Because of the nature of what I'm trying to gauge, it's heavily weighted toward future performance, although past games do matter since they will affect seeding. In theory...
Dodgers Re-Sign Furcal
January 20, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Dodgers sign Rafael Furcal for three years, $30MM. $12MM 2012 team option becomes guaranteed if he has 600 PAs in 2011. "He also can earn an additional $1 million annually, including the option year, if he remains healthy."* Analsis: Snyder. CHONE projection: 625 PAs, .284...
Early MLB Divisional Odds
January 19, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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2009 World Series odds have been up since October, but Carib has the first "To win division" odds that I've seen: Nothing really jumps out at first glance. It's pretty amusing that the top four teams in the AL Central have the same odds; in my completely biased opinion...
Yankees Sign Teixeira
January 19, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Yankees sign Mark Texieira for eight years, $180MM. Analysis: Law, Cameron, Szymborski, Brinson. CHONE projection: 645 PA, .286/.381/.521, 32HR, 31 RAA/150; worth $20.7MM in 2009 if "good" fielding 1B. What's funny about this is that although it set off a storm of people...
This Week's Links (1/12-1/16)
January 16, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Saturday Line Guess Off: Round 2. Earl Clark dunked on Luke Harangody. "Posterized", you might say. Gasaway's first "Conference Check" of the season. Pomeroy rolls out a new design and some new stats. The leader in fouls drawn per 40 minutes will shock you....
College Hoops Futures Watch, Take 3
January 16, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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I'm going to skip some of the teams in the bottom half of the WSEX list, just because I don't want to waste everybody's time explaining why Michigan isn't going to win it all. Texas WSEX: 3/5 Best odds: 30:1 (The Greek) Record: 12-4 (1-1) Pomeroy rank: 30 It's too...
College Hoops Futures Watch, Take 2
January 15, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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I'm basically going to go through as many of these as I have time for each night until I finish. Continuing down the WSEX list: Oklahoma WSEX: 5/7 Best odds: 30:1 (Carib) Record: 16-1 (2-0) Pomeroy rank: 16 Griffin is awesome, and Warren is no slouch himself, but I think it'...
Angels Sign Fuentes
January 13, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Angels sign Brian Fuentes for two years, $17.5MM, with $9MM 2011 vesting option based on games finished. Analysis: Szymborski, Law, Carruth, Alper. CHONE projection: 62IP, 5HR, 23BB, 63K, 3.48 ERA, 9 RAR. This is rather obviously a better value than the Wood contract (2/20.5), which...
This Week's Links (1/5-1/9)
January 09, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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The Mariners hired Tom Tango as a consultant. Posnanski's HoF ballot.Twinkie Town projects the AL Central. Gasaway's top 25 freshmen. Chris Jaffe predicts the HoF voting. Jay Paris is not good at this voting thing.
Saturday Line Guess Off: Round 1
January 09, 2009 by
Vegas Watch
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Starting today, MoneyLine and myself are going to have a weekly post/feature/competition where we guess the lines to some interesting games on Saturday's college basketball card. It's still a work in progress, and we're going to try to add some more analysis and back-and...
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