Mage won the Kentucky Derby yesterday as a 15-1 underdog. The horse had only run in three races, so these odds were understandable. That said, Dan Wolken points out that Mage’s performance in the Florida Derby should have put betters on notice. And that’s what successful gambling on horse racing is all about!
Now we’ll see just how good Mage can be. Dan calls Mage an “excellent horse.” Can Mage win the Triple Crown? That’s a huge challenge of course, and we’ll learn a lot more in the Preakness:
“If Forte runs, you may see Mage in the 3-1 to 4-1 range,” Avello noted, “and if he doesn’t, you might see him in the neighborhood of 5-2. I mean, who else is out there for him to go against now?
It’s not just about Mage. It’s also about the competition.
The cool thing is we may have a rivalry on our hands, which is always great for horse racing and the Triple Crown.
The good news is that legal sportsbooks can implements tools to uncover inappropriate betting activity. AS this story unfolds, it will be interesting to see how sports teams and leagues can use these tools to ensure that players and coaches aren’t impacting the integrity of the game.
This simple fact remains. The increased prevalence of sports betting raises concerns about the potential for match-fixing, point-shaving, and other forms of corruption that could compromise the integrity of the game. Leagues and teams must establish and enforce stringent regulations to prevent such occurrences and maintain public trust in the fairness of competition. Hopefully, the technology that enables easy betting can also find violations of league and team rules.
Nobody knows how tonight’s picks will work out. But naturally everyone will have opinions.
I’m more interested in overall strategy as opposed to making definitive statements about specific players. Good drafting is about more than player valuation. It’s mostly about probability analysis. The teams that forget that and fall in love with players usually end up making mistakes.
Let’s start with the Texans. This team has a horrible roster, and they have an owner that likes to meddle. They’re also on their third head coach in three years. Basically, the organization is a dumpster fire.
Despite that, the Texans were sitting on a ton of draft capital as a result of last year’s Deshaun Watson trade with the Browns. If they sat back and let the draft come to them, they could load up on talent this year and next.
But these are the Texans, so chaos rules. The owner wanted a quarterback, so they draft C.J. Stroud with the second pick of the draft. Solid pick. Now they could wait till pick #12 and get another very good player.
Tom Brady has announced his retirement from the NFL, and it’s not hyperbole to say that this is the end of an era. Brady is the most successful quarterback in NFL history and is widely recognized as the greatest player to have played the position. Patrick Mahomes may have something to say about that over the next ten years, but for now nobody is coming close to Brady’s accomplishments.
After last year’s retirement fiasco and his subsequent personal issues, Brady handled this one in a clean and subdued manner, with a simple announcement on Instagram that didn’t leak. He handled it with class.
He also avoided any silly Brady vs. Belichick talk following his announcement by having Bill Belichick join him on his podcast, giving both of them the opportunity to gush over the other’s accomplishments, which frankly came off as very authentic.
Belichick was effusive in his praise of Brady, and went into great detail about how Brady saw the field and recognized coverages.
We were treated to a great Super Bowl last night. It featured the two best teams in the NFL fighting it out to the finish, with both quarterbacks delivering impressive performances. The penalty on the last drive was unfortunate because it prevented a final drive from Jalen Hurts and the Eagles to tie or win the game, but the holding call was probably correct. In the end, the Kansas City Chiefs were able to pull out a win over a tough Philadelphia Eagles team that came to play.
Point Spread
Going into the game, the Eagles were a 1.5 point favorite with the over/under at around 50. The game was very close and lived up to the billing of the two best teams in the NFL making it to the game. The Eagles were the sexy pick to cover, and the Patrick Mahomes injury was certainly a factor, but as we pointed out, the Eagles hadn’t faced a very tough schedule. Could their defense hold up against Mahomes if he was relatively healthy?
