Posted on 11/05/2018 9:03:13 AM PST by C19fan
Before the late-afternoon NFL games even kicked off, the writing was on the wall -- bookmakers from Nevada to New Jersey were taking a bath on a Sunday that will go down as one of the betting public's best.
Nevada industry sources estimated the state's sportsbooks lost in the range of $7 million to $10 million overall on Sunday.
In the early games, the books found themselves holding lopsided betting action on the Minnesota Vikings and Pittsburgh Steelers, two popular picks that easily covered the spread. Their fate was sealed by the Kansas City Chiefs, the most heavily bet favorite on the board Sunday.
Kansas City closed as an eight-point favorite over the Cleveland Browns and won 37-21. Eighty-eight percent of the money wagered on the point spread at William Hill's sportsbooks in Nevada and New Jersey was on Kansas City.
"We were pretty much done at that point," MGM vice president of race and sports Jay Rood said. "Disaster."
(Excerpt) Read more at espn.com ...
Not as big a disaster as if the Golden Knights would have pulled out a Stanley Cup win.
Shoot, even the lowest level mob bookie knows you have to lay off some action if all the money is coming in on one side.
Somebody educate me? I thought they adjust the point spread so that they get approximately half of all bets on each side? I’m surorised to hear the sports books could have had big losses like this.
I thought that if early bets are too lopsided towards one team, they changed he the spread so that it becomes a very attractive bet to bet on the other team?
I’ve never done these bets so maybe misunderstood.
But I also once hesrd someone say, the bookies don’t want to do something as risky as predicting the outcome of an NFL game, that they want to handle the actions n and make their profit in the “vig” and be happy with that.
Seriously? $7 to $10 million?
Not really a big deal given what they profit on most week’s action.
I think the problem is if there is so much action based on the opening line in one direction and the sports books adjust they might find themselves in between where they end up paying the early bettors on one side then the late bettors who bet based on the heavily modified line.
They couldn’t attract Browns money no matter the spread.
Some people think bookmakers are trying to predict the most likely final score of the game. But they are actually trying to pick the exact number that will cause equal dollar betting on either side of the contest, then they pocket the 10% vig.
Somebody is failing hard at predicting that number and adjusting it on the fly.
Do they have software to analyze the bets , so that they would adjust the point spread, so as to avoid this sort of situation?
I have a feeling that somebody, somewhere, is having a tough meeting today, to explain how the house lost so much money on the bets.
The oddsmaker who decided that a team that fired their coach and OC earlier in the week would play the hottest team in football to within 8 points is probably being fitted for cement shoes by the "casino executives" right now.
Apparently, Vegas doesn’t have a genius successor to the great Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal ...
What is NFL? Is that the anti-American group who thinks they have a winner in badmouthing their fans and the country?
Wouldn’t know about any spread outside of butter, margarine, cream cheese or jelly/jam/preserves.
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