Maddux Sports Blog

It is obviously not at all my intention to turn this into a political debate. I just couldn’t help but take a betting lesson from the speculative frenzy around Barack Obama’s running mate this week. As I write this the announcement has not been made, though it seems to have leaked that it will be Evan Bayh (the leak came from a company that was printing Obama-Bayh bumper stickers. Did no one see that coming? Seems a bit inevitable). That’s  not of interest to me. Instead, what caught my eye was the news this morning that Rep. Chet Edwards had made the short list and was one of the few (three or four) potential candidates that had had his background checked.

Why would a Canadian guy care about a congressman from Texas? Well, I’m a bit of a geek. That’s not the point, though. The point is that I had never heard of him. The more I looked around, the more it seemed like no one else had. There was some strong support for him in Texas, Nancy Pelosi likes him a lot, and he has a solid resume, but he was not on the VP radar at all.

The Point? I do have one. Sports books were offering futures on the vice presidential nominees for weeks. The Democratic ones had been taken down in the last couple of days, but I could still find the last prices offered by several different books. Each book had several different potential candidates - from the favorites like Bayh and Joseph Biden to the longest of longshots. On not one list, though, did I find the name Chet Edwards. No one had set a price for this guy. That means that no one had given him a chance. Yet some how he became one of the four finalists. If you had just relied on the futures to shape your opinions you would have never known that this was possible.

I have a habit of using futures to get a sense of a situation. By seeing the odds that bookmakers set for different situations I get a quick sense of about how things should play out. BY watching the price moves of those futures I get a good sense of how the public is reacting and what they are thinking. What I learned from watching this situation today, though, is that the futures should only be used as a rough guide. They can’t replace your own work. Sports books mostly do a pretty solid job of setting prices, but they aren’t perfect, and they have a lot to cover, so sometimes they don’t provide a complete picture. We can allow ourselves to get lazy and trust the odds more than we should. This situation is a good, painless reminder that that’s not always a good idea.

I know I am supposed to be leaving college basketball behind and focus on baseball or the NBA or the NHL or something, but I just can’t let it go quite yet. As I was taking one last look at things before moving on I came across the odds for the 2009 National Championship. Now, there are a lot of ridiculously bad bets out there, but none are any worse than these. They are full of sucker bets. Here are some of the more laughable:

The favorites - There is a three way tie at the top, with UCLA, Duke and North Carolina all at +650. Just think about that for a second. Duke was pretty terrible in the tournament, UCLA is losing Kevin Love and Darren Collison, and North Carolina will likely be without Psycho T and Ty Lawson. In other words, you can invest now on a team with a clear deficiency, and two others that will likely have their hearts ripped out of them, and if you are right then you get less than seven times your money a year from now. Where do I sign up?

Kansas State - The Wildcats are at 30/1. Huh? Michael Beasley is gone, and Bill Walker will quite possibly follow. That means they will start with 90 percent of their offense gone (and I am only partly exaggerating). I’m pretty sure that a team has to make the tournament in order to win it, so I don’t see how this makes any sense at all.

Michigan - My beloved Wolverines are at 100/1. Now my glasses are as rose-colored as they can be regarding my team, but this is absolutely laughable. The team was truly awful last year. John Beilein is only now starting to recruit his players, and he has very little existing talent to build on. As much as I wish it were different, I think that 100/1 more accurately represents their chances of making the tournament, never mind winning it.

Memphis - The should-be-champs are at 12/1. Derrick Rose and Chris Douglas-Roberts are likely gone, Joey Dorsey will graduate, and John Calipari is coveted by the Knicks. You would seriously have to be a moron to make this bet.

Syracuse - This one is bizarre, too. The Orange are at 15/1. Now, Johnny Flynn and Donte Greene are very nice players who will only improve this year (unless Greene stays in the draft - it’s questionable at this point), but the team hasn’t even made the tournament in two years, and none of next year’s recruits are can’t-miss blue chippers. Unless Carmelo Anthony has rediscovered eligibility this just isn’t going to happen.

Texas - The Longhorns are also at 15/1. Unlike everyone else on this list they could actually be decent value. Until the second that D.J. Augustin declares for the draft, that is. If he stays back another year, which seems somewhat unlikely, then this team could be the closest thing to a good bet on the board.

Arizona - The Wildcats underachieved this year, and only some of the problems can be attributed to the bizarre coaching soap opera. That will be remedied next year, but Lute Olson will have to figure out a way to make up for the loss of Jerryd Bayless and Chase Budinger. Olson is a legend, but he’s not good enough to make the 30/1 price attractive.

Florida - Let’s get this straight - the team didn’t make the tournament, the coach told anyone who would listen that he hated his players, and the team is once again going to be young, inexperienced, and full of questions. Does that sound like a team that is worthy of being the fourth choice in the country at 10/1?

UConn - The Huskies are at 15/1. Those odds are too low at the best of times, and will be truly ridiculous if Hasheem Thabeet declares for the draft. A guy that big who blocks shots as well as he does will be very attractive to NBA teams, so the temptation will be high.

Louisville - David Padgett is graduating. So is Juan Palacios. Earl Clark is likely to enter the draft. That’s a lot of holes to fill - too many to justify a 10/1 price.

Texas Tech - Bobby Knight didn’t exactly leave the cupboards full, and the Pat Knight era didn’t exactly get off to a running start. Sure, they are one of the longer prices on the board at 75/1, but does that really even come remotely close to reflecting the chances of a championship? Maybe if you add a couple of zeros.

The Field - You can bet every team not listed at 12/1 odds. Sounds like a bargain. Except that they list 57 teams including virtually every major conference contender and some mid-major contenders like BYU and Gonzaga. Unless you think that this is Stephen Curry’s year, or that Tubby Smith is going to perform a miracle in his second year at Minnesota, this is as bad as a bet can be.