MLB take on the current 2020 season

Can you imagine the headline that might come if there is no MLB season? It might read like this “Millionaire players and billionaire owners disagree on how to share the money so there will not be a season in 2020”. The truth is always in the middle and the tone is of less value than the substance. No one is at fault here. Each side has validity to their stance. However, it is still about how to split up the money amongst already rich people.

It should also be put in the right context. The context surrounding this matter. The players are coming across very poorly in many cases. They are emotional and do not speak with an audience in mind thus they are sounding like sheltered prima donnas. The basis that they are risking their lives is simply wrong. The basis that they will not play unless they get theirs is just a poor statement as it comes off to the public as crying over money when they make so much anyway. Context is that MLB was headed for a great run of seasons, but they have had issues recently that have soured the public audience. Going back to the strike which happened in August 1994 and carried over until April of 1995, baseball has been working extremely hard to regain popularity. We have seen the Montreal Expos shutter, MLB ran the Washing Nationals at first, there were the huge issues with PEDs, and we just are coming off the Houston Astro cheating scandal. Even with all of that, MLB was positioned well. The older players are now gone, and the youth in the game is extremely talented. The money in the game which just two years ago was causing a rift with the players, saw Bryce Harper and Manny Machado sign $300 million dollar contracts and Mike Trout over $400 million. MLB was headed in the right direction. Starts like Ronald Acuna, Juan Soto, Gleyber Torres, Francisco Lindor, and Matt Chapman are at the forefront of leading the way. All the momentum though could be incinerated rather quickly if this now public negotiation does not end well.

Although the players have already agreed to a percentage basis payout for this season, the relevance to the situation has changed. The opening of the states, which is another topic maybe for anther time and the social distancing rules have created an environment where fans and the revenue they bring, will not be included at least in the beginning. None of this is the fault of either side. However, to make an agreement between the two sides, common ground must be found. MLB has gone out of its way to provide the players with a safety protocol so they will feel there is little to no risk of playing. I do not believe there will be issues there. The players will not be saying that they are risking their lives anymore. This was just the wrong thing to say whether they believed it or not. The risks are way to low for them to have this stance, so safety should become a dead issue. All that is left is the money.

MLB has set a schedule and parameters around limiting travel and costs. It is a for-profit business and should try to make as much as they can. MLB offers to split the revenue 50-50 with players is assumed to be another hit in the pocketbook for the players. They agreed to a percentage of games played payout earlier as the spring training was being canceled, thus if there is an 82 game season, they would receive 50% of their contract value. MLB has never shown its books, so we really don’t know what 50% looks like. The players are in the mindset that they will not make the prorated amount and MLB seems to be suggesting that as well. It means they would have another pay cut to absorb. This is the hurdle we may not get past. It likely depends on just how serious anyone wants to play the game and make anything at all. As stated in the opening, it is hard to imagine that a season will be canceled because the revenue can’t be shared. At some point, they need to see into the future and what the reaction to a canceled season for those reasons imply.

The Astros were getting beaten up every at-bat and everywhere they went during spring training by the public who could not stand what they did. Imagine all 30 teams having to go through an ordeal similar. No there would not be that much hatred for every single team as was shown the Astros, but have seen the public comments? They are in no way ready to support a canceled season. Much like the rest of the real world, teams are having financial difficulty. You have seen retail stores, small businesses, and restaurants close permanently due to the shutdown. I am not thinking MLB would permanently close, but things would change dramatically. What if those big contracts were to go away forever? It is a possibility that the sport would not get the buy-in from the public that it had hence the revenue would not be as strong going forward. MLB has already condensed the minor league teams and systems. Would they go even further in this area to eliminate costs? How much would they have to charge to you to attend a game yet still pay the payers? The 2021 season would be so hard to get ramped up with revenues that the 2020 season is imperative to get ironed out. Let alone the near future of the game past 2021. There is a balance that must be found. This is a business that is presented as a game. Make no mistake, people want to make their money. Also, make no mistake; this could awry quickly with large damaging aftershocks that may hurt the existence of the sport. We talk about major sports to include football, baseball, basketball, and hockey. What if it were reduced to only three? It could happen if the groups of people involved today are not extremely careful. I think both sides need to rethink the future before they act on the today and the right answers would be easier to obtain.

Touts Tipsters Pick Services are one of the major sins a bettor can make!

Look it is very easy to get caught up in the malarky you see in claims and especially all the tweets on Twitter. It is very easy to know who the frauds are, who the claimers are, and who the entertainers are. Sportsbooks limit the guys who win. I  am sure you have seen the complaints, but if you haven't, this is a known issue in the industry. They want as many losing players as possible. These so-called experts are out there showing their ineffectiveness regularly. The margins are too thin for winning players to pay for picks! a -110 line requires a 52.38% win percentage to break even. If you add the price of the selection, that percentage goes up incrementally. You are paying into a line that you expect to make ROI (return on investment). Let's say you invest $500 for a season and the service gives you 100 plays. Each play then has a cost of $5 which should is not very much. Let's say you wager $200 per game and the service wins 54% of the wagers at -110. They won 54 bets at $100 for $5440 and lost 46 at -110 which equals -%5060. You won $380! The problem is that you paid $500 and netted -$120 for a -24% ROI. In theory, there are some services that will keep you afloat, however, they are far and few between. Most are just marketing to get your money.

You need to avoid this situation. There are options. Be careful who you believe in though. It is not 100% necessary to know the person you are getting your info and knowledge from as some of us in the industry are very sharp yet not a known entity. It is also easy for me to tell you that MANY of the known services or industry experts that are widely seen on tv shows, internet programs, or websites that have many so-called experts are previously FAILED touts! In fact, they have grouped together to "hide" amongst the volume of experts to intertwine their performance, thus seemingly providing winning selections. These same groups also charge an exorbitant fee to participate in their shenanigans! These types of services are entertainers. They are NOT going to provide you with the knowledge and skills that you should be acquiring to become a better bettor!

This where the sweet spot comes into play. I have learned that if you are good something you should never do it for free. Certain skill sets are required to become a winning sports bettor. There are several different ways to play. The key elements are to learn, acquire, refine, and duplicate processes that best suit your interests of betting on the games. Whether you want to learn how to handicap teams, games, and situations or you may want to learn how read the market ups and downs, regardless of choice, EastCoastSportsInvestors (ECSI) has solutions for you.

We have created our own network so we can address via specific channels every major sport. I do my work through data analysis and handicapping teams, players, games, and so forth. I have written models and algorithms that help project the results, but it is about knowing what to do with the information. It is also necessary to understand what data is important what data is not important. Notice I did not talk about trends, systems, and meaningless historical data points. This current, fresh, and state of the art material. Most everything is done via Sabermetrics and advanced football statistics. Jeff uses the methodology of the betting market. Why does the money come in on one side yet the line doesn't move? What does it mean when the line does move? Who is betting on into the lines? Jeff does analysis on the betting market and can answer these questions! The idea is that he can tell you what is going behind the scenes and where value is based on the moves in the line. We are all looking for value. That is what we are going to wager on. 

Please do NOT fall into the trap of listening to the FREE guys either! FREE is not valuable. These are guys that are wanting to have large followers and be a "known" Twitter capper. The bettors that follow these guys are not major players nor are they players that will do anything but look for the free stuff. That is their game. They are getting over on the bettors who pay for plays. Right! FREE is that way for a reason. They are not confident enough nor are they winning enough to have a skill set that is valuable enough that someone else would pay for! Simple as that. You will only learn that they are learning just like you are learning.

Be the smart ones. Be the ones that are NEXT LEVEL. Learn how to do this the right way. Become informed, educated, and sharp in the way you approach your investing. ECSI has the environment for you. Use this address: https://www.eastcoastsportsinvestors.com/plans-pricing-1 and sign up for the Back to Basics plan. It is only $29.99 per month. We will educate you on your journey to becoming the NEXT LEVEL. We will answer your questions. We provide analysis. We provide the wagers we have made. We will lead you down the path. It is all about your thought process and what you should be looking at! We WILL help you!

Totals Projections

Totals Projections for an Individual Game

When making a totals line there are several things, we need to consider most of which are driven by the starting pitcher. We also need input from the bullpen as they will dictate how the game ends. I believe in the statistical approach.

I know that it takes roughly 2.1 hits to score one run, but I will use 2.0 hits as rule here and makes math much simpler. Any starting pitcher stats will show hits allowed so that is an easy number to get or calculate. We do really care about innings because there are times where games started will skewed and cannot give an accurate account of games (for example, SP who previously was a relief guy so he will show large innings but not many games started). We can provide ourselves with relatively accurate games started number to use by taking the innings pitched then divide them by 6. The result will give an estimated number of games started which will be accurate enough for our equations. We are going to use the formula of hits divided by games started so we can get hits per game number for the starting pitcher and we will do a very similar thing for the bullpen. Now we must decide on the influence and or types of game data to use to create this model.

It will be easier for me to show in a graph, so the following picture is my graphs for each pitcher. I use the last 30 days, L5 starts vs Opp., L3 years vs Opp. (vs OPP), Day if applicable, and home/away splits.

The example shows Mile Mikolas and Dallas Keuchel. The figures on the far right show the calculations that produce the run expected total for each pitcher. Miles Mikolas is expected to allow 3.2 runs and Dallas Keuchel 2.7 runs in this example. The data in the column on the left is the hits divided by 2 (using or data methodology from above) then added and averaged for a total. The second column is the innings pitched divided by 6 which produces our games started data. We divide the runs expected by the games started to get runs per game result. Keep in mind this is only half of the equation because the bullpen too will have allowed runs. It is a much simpler process. We are not singling out on players; we are using their collective data as a group. We will look at their last 14 days of work getting the number of games played in that span. We will then simply look at how many hits they have allowed. We will divide the hist by 2, then that total by the number of games they have played in the last 14 days. It will also give a total runs expected from the bullpen.

We will use the string pitcher expected runs, then add the bullpen expected runs to get total runs expected to allow for each team. We then add them together to get a total runs expected. There is also one other data point we must consider which is BB. BB on can create more opportunities for offenses to score runs but usually, they produce big innings of run-scoring as well. Looking at the data, I have learned that if we can project double-digit BBs between both teams, we need to add 2.5 runs to our projected total. When games get that many BBs in them, the scoring does go up, we can get an the edge here if we can predict it.

Using the same process as before, we already have the games started number, we need to total the BB categories then divide by the number of categories. In the case of the example, Mikolas has 4 categories and Keuchel only 3. Mikolas has 35 BB divided by 4 categories returns a value of 8.75 We then take that total our games started figure. IN Mikolas case we get 8.75 divided by 7.10 returning 1.23 BB per game. Keuchel has 24BBs divided by 3 categories for a value of 8.00. We divide that by 5.17 and returns a value of 1.55. Add them together and we get 2.78 BBs from the starters.  In the example, neither pitcher will have a high walk rate. Neither bullpen increases the numbers to double-digit BB expectations, so in this example, we are adding no additional runs.

The example will show that Mikolas should be expected to allow 3.2 runs and their bullpen 2.06 for a total of 5.26 runs allowed. Keuchel should be expected to allow 2.7 runs and their bullpen 1.54 for a total of 4.2 runs allowed. We have now an expectation that we should see 9.46 runs or our line of 9.5.

The actual line in this game was 7.5. The result was STL 7 and ATL 6.  

101 Making your own line

MLB Handicapping 101

Step #1 Make your own line

It is IMPERATIVE to make your own line when handicapping sports. It is even more so in MLB because the differentiator is usually how to evaluate pitchers, not teams. There are many sports where all that is necessary is team evaluation where a spread is involved. MLB is different. The team part is relative to the other sports but knowing the pitchers is crucial.

I would like to say I have the very best approach but it is not mine at all. I stole and refined it. I use a 3-step method 1^st published by Joe Peta in the book Trading Bases. It is a financial world calculation to get the team evaluations, then a starting pitcher evaluation, and finally a home team edge. Joe was originally a financial trader on Wall St. He was hit by a car and spent a summer away, thus focusing his energy and thoughts on baseball. Let’s get into his model so you can make your own lines that are what I consider the “True” line. A true line is where there is no other influence. A sportsbook will make their line with influence on where they want you to wager or protect where they do not want wagers.  A true line is the most accurate of the teams and players and often will expose the line of the sportsbook. I will share an example from the MLB 2019 playoffs shortly.

We need a team evaluation to get the basis for our line. Based on my own research over the years, it is best to use the Sabermetric predictions and not the actual results. Over the course of the season, these will mirror each other, but especially the first half of the season, you will see some variance in team strength between these predicted results and the sportsbook. Don’t fear that. We want that variance as that will soon be one of our edges over the sportsbook! Team evaluation is based on FanGraphs Projected Standings winning percentage for each team. For the example I am going to provide, STL @ ATL 10/3 2019 Mikolas vs Keuchel, we need the winning percentage of each team. STL was .537 and STL was .556. Based on these winning percentages, we can formulate each team winning probability. That requires a formula.

                Formula for STL winning probability: (STL*(1-ATL)/((STL*(1-ATL)+(ATL(*1-STL)

                Formula for ATL winning probability: (ATL*(1-STL)/((STL*(1-ATL)+(ATL(*1-STL)

The result will look like this. STL win probability is 48.08% and ATL is 51.92%. We will adjust these later. The line for this game was ATL Keuchel -143 and a total of 7.5. Using an Odds converter, we can convert the win probability of 51.92% to a money line. In this case, it comes out to ATL -108. Right off the start, you can see where there is some value. We will adjust ATL up later due to their home field later.

Now we must properly evaluate the starting pitchers who will have the most impact on the line. This is the most important part of making the line accurate.  The way I do this is based on the WAR the pitcher has contributed to the staff. I total the staff WAR then divide the starting pitcher contribution to it, which then becomes the adjustment we must make to the team winning percentage. I use any pitchers that are projected to have started 5 games. Again, we are using the projected results. The purpose of the projected results is to eliminate human variance. We can get enamored in the “what we have last seen” syndrome and often over or under evaluate a pitcher by his true results. WAR is a statistic that measures a player's contribution to wins so it fits right into this extremely well. In this case, STL has 12.2 WAR and ATL 12.3 WAR. Mikolas has 2.8 WAR and Keuchel 1.2 WAR. We are now going to add or in some cases subtract the value of a starting pitcher to the team winning percentage. That requires another formula.

                Formula for Mikolas: (((2.8*5)-12.2)/162)+.537

                Formula for Keuchel: (((1.2*5)-12.3)/162+.556

The results are a new winning percentage of .548 for STL and .517 for ATL with new winning probabilities of STL 53.11% and ATL 46.89%. Now we are seeing the true value of evaluating pitchers! We now have STL as the favorite!

We now must adjust for home field. That adjust is a formula where the home team gets 2.75% added to their win probability. That is worth nearly 15 on the money line and is an adjustment I have made as Joe Peta’s version was too low.

Now we have completed analysis where ATL is 49.64%-win probability and STL is 50.36%. The true line should be STL -101 and the sportsbook line is ATL -143! We can bet on STL +123 at a tremendous value! The outcome in this game was STL 7 ATL6. Winner!

My spreadsheet does all the math for me and presents it like this:

I do this for every single game. It gives me a direction to look and prepare for. I then do more matchup analysis to either support this line or to find flaws. The more support to it the bigger I will wager.

Sabermetrics vs StatCast

Sabermetrics vs StatCast Metrics

Sabermetrics are sound and true results of specific data that either show results or can be used to predict future results. Data such as wOBA, wRC+, wRAA, and WAR are staples of Sabermetric data. We can use them in prognostication and handicapping games or teams. Data such as FIP, SIERA and xFIP are staples of pitching performance. This data separates players and teams by specific criteria which in turn then handicaps strengths and weaknesses so we can find value to wager on.

StatCast metrics are the results of specific actions. They have measured velocities of balls hit off bats or how many times the barrel of the bat hits the ball. This data is NOT very useful in daily wagering whatsoever. Sabermetrics does have data representing hard-hit rates, medium hit rates and soft hit rates so why does it really matter what the arch of the ball flight was, or how many mph exit velocity was?

The way I see and have heard MLB managers speak of StatCast measures is in terms of process. StatCast has a metric called xwOBA. It is a predictor for weighted on base percentage. The calculation is Quality of contact + K + BB. This data does not pinpoint to trueness worthy of making wagers. It is specific to players, not teams. Looking from the pitcher side, there is data showing previous results against the batters they will face so maybe a predictive value there. MLB managers know of this data and they use it for the process of hitting or pitching. The theory is that if a player is following a good process, his numbers will get better because from batter to batter or pitch to pitch it is sound. It makes sense to me. But it does not indicate anything regarding the quality of the player or team. It does to a degree indicate positive or negative results that should come. How soon?

Sabermetrics can do similar things regarding xFIP. I can see where a pitcher is going to get in trouble and where he is dominant. I can also bet on those edges. I can combine data for pitchers so it flows together, and I can see the process! FIP, + GB%, + BB%, +K%, + O-Swing%, +SwStr%+, hard-hit rate, and BABIP. This data will tell me how he controls the game from the mound, how many runners he should allow, how hitters fair against his pitches, whether the ball takes flight when hit and more! Sabermetrics is specific. When grouped together, you can tell a story and get a reasonable conclusion on how teams and players are going to perform.  I can specifically indicate a team is 11% better offensively using Sabermetrics which is a very clear edge. There is no such thing in StatCast data. Barrels, exit velocity, and xwOBA are all nice things and might have value to the Fantasy world, but there is not much value to this data in sports wagering.

If you are interested in learning how to do this, I have a Discord channel where we discuss this plus, I give out daily selections. It is $29.99 per mo.

The link is https://www.eastcoastsportsinvestors.com/plans-pricing-1

You can follow me on Twitter @Webbie20MLB

Team Wins is real value

Starting pitchers need to be looked at via Team Wins, not personal wins!

MLB investing oftentimes is about your team winning the game. In many cases there is no spread as we use the Money Line most often, thus a winning ticket just needs your team to win the game. A starting pitcher's personal won-lost record is 100% meaningless to our goal. The following charts will indicate this. Likewise, if we just use his value in the team starts, we can actually start getting an edge. 

A team win is earned for the starting pitcher in any game for which he started and the team wins. Sure this record does not give us value he produced in terms of quality, but we have other measures for that. This does tell us that he pitched well enough for his team to win the game.  This is exactly what we are trying to accomplish! 

The first chart is the team win pct% win the starter pitches a game. The 2nd chart is his personal won-lost record. There are some very interesting findings and maybe some that are just obvious. The number one pitcher was MIL Brandon Woodruff. I bet you would not have seen that coming! He made 22 starts and his team won 18 of those starts. He personally only won 11 games. The value is knowing that if you bet on him last season, you would have won 81.8% of your wagers! CLE Adam Plutko is ranked 9th! He made 20 starts and his team won 14 of them! Again, another guy who you would have underestimated his value to your bankroll. 

On the other side of that coin are guys like TEX Lance Lynn. He ranked 11th in wins. However, his team won only 1 more game than they lose when he was on the mound. His win total was 16 and his team's win total was 17 while losing 16 times when he started. Another one is SEA Marco Gonzalez who ranked 12th in wins with 16. His team had 17 wins when he started and they also had 17 losses. Below are the charts of the top 35 guys in both teams win % and personal won-lost record. FOr us gamblers,  there is value in certain results we just have to know what to look for!  

The MOST underrated aspect of MLB handicapping is simply OFFENSE!

The MOST underrated aspect of MLB handicapping is simply OFFENSE!

MLB handicappers spend most of their time (and rightfully so) on the games starting pitchers. The starting pitcher quality determines the lines and therefore should get the majority of the work. Baseball today has a larger comparison that goes unnoticed by too many though. When most people, let alone handicappers, can teel you the variance quality of the starting pitchers, very few even look at the offenses. This is a large mistake and a missed opportunity. Just like the pitchers, there is variance in an offense that can be used for handicapping games. 

Let's just say that Team A is playing Team B where both pitchers are #4 starters and there is not much variance in their quality. This will set a line something line Team A -125 because they are the home team. What if I told you that Team B was currently #5 in wRAA, #3 in wOBA and #4 in wRC+? Then I told you team A was ranked 24th in all those categories across the board. Would that matter to you? Based on the topic of this article, the answer to that question is it should matter.

In many cases, there are larger advantages for a team in the offense than there is in the pitching. This can come into play in a game like the one above where the pitching is equal, or it can come into play when considering the value of an underdog against a quality team that is slumping at the plate. It is important to know what to look for though. A team with an HR edge is simply not a situation that really matters. Sabermetrics has well-defined stats for specific things is those stats measure. wRAA (Weighted Runs Above Average) measures the number of runs a player contributes to his team above an average player. Comparing teams, it is the number of runs above an average offense this team is! This is very useful information. wOBA (Weighted On Base Average) gives credit to the batter for each outcome individually not treating a hit or an at-bat as one thing, thus an extra-base hit has more value. It is a better stat than OBP, batting average, or RBI. It is a "catch-all" stat to provide the hitter's comprehensive offensive value. wRC+ (Weighted Runs Created Plus) is very similar to wRAA however it is shown on a scale where 100 is average, thus you will a 104 wRC+. It means that the team creates runs 4% better than an average team does. It is calculated much the same where the individual value of outcomes matters. 

Using these scales and data points, we will get a very clear picture of the offensive edge a team has on its opponent. We can match the offense up to the pitcher's 3 true outcomes strategies. We can quantify run variances based on offensive output, which in turn will allow us to make wagers based on the strength of an offense over the opponent. It works like this. Team A has -2.2 wRAA, 87 wRC+ and .290 wOBA. It means they are 2 runs worse than an average offense, 13% worse than an average offense and .050 (avg is .347) worse in overall offensive value. If Team B has and averages everything, they are minimally 2 runs better with a stretch to 3. If they are above average, they are likely 3-4+ runs better. Now we can make wagers. If the starting pitcher can not affect the scoring probabilities enough, we can easily see where the value is. 

Sure there are more elements to this like ISO, BB% and K% to name some, but the premiss is to illustrate the value of evaluating a team on offense as it oftentimes will be an overlooked aspect of the game where some opportunities have left on the table.