Las Vegas Betting Notes
By Micah Roberts
With the two number one seeds eliminated and only four teams left, the sentimental choice to win the Super Bowl now is the sixth seeded Green Bay Packers led by their rising star, Aaron Rodgers. Of course, fans from the other three teams would disagree, but fans of other teams who have been eliminated can’t help but root for the quarterback who has created his own niche on a team that was so long associated by Brett Favre.
It’s hard not to root for Rodgers just from the aspect of how tough of a situation he was put in three years ago when the whole Favre soap opera started. Rodgers didn’t say much and just played the game, while Favre’s true nature became apparent to all in his final year.
We’ve seen glimpses of greatness out of Rodgers in the past, but nothing like what we saw last week on the stage of the playoffs where he completed 31 of 36 passes for 336 yards and 3 touchdowns in Atlanta. At times, while he was dodging defenders in the pocket and feeling pressure with eyes in the back of his head, scrambling around, I thought I was watching Roger Staubach back there, another quarterback who wore number 12.
The Las Vegas sportsbooks don’t get caught up in sentiment, but rather cold hard facts when creating their lines, yet they too have been greatly swayed by the impressive Packers in their last two games. It was surprising enough when the Packers were a short 1-point underdog at the top seeded Falcons, but this week they are 3½-point favorites on the road at Chicago for the NFC Championship game.
The Packers have been placed as the 8-to-5 favorite (Bet $100 to win $160) to win the Super Bowl at the Las Vegas Hilton Super Book despite a higher seed such as the Steelers (2/1) still active. The Hilton’s Jeff Sherman believes the Packers would be a pick’em against the Steelers and minus-2½ against the Jets, but also said that the line would drastically change by what happens Sunday. Should one game produce a blow out while the other plays a tight one, it will be reflected greatly in the Super Bowl line.
Three’s the Magic Number
The only sportsbook in Las Vegas that doesn’t attach additional money to any of their key numbers is Bert Osborne’s South Point. Rather than move a game from minus-3 flat to minus-3 (-120) like most of the books do today, Osborne goes right to minus-3½ flat. This season, over 18% of all NFL games landed on “3,” but Osborne’s year-over-year analysis proves his strategy more profitable in the end. While most books deflected action last week on the Ravens-Steelers game because of the additional money attached to that line, Osborne kept hopping back and forth with limit bets at plus-3 ½ with the Ravens and minus-3 with Steelers. In the end, the overall action attracted because of the flat lines helped create a profitable weekend, better than most.
This week Osborne has a major dilemma as both games are hovering around “3”. Should one of the favored teams land on “3“, he‘ll get sided and refund several bets while paying out the winning side at plus-3½. Osborne is probably hoping that the games run up more to avoid the key number, but if they don’t, and you’re looking for value, the South Point and the books under their umbrella such as the Cannery, Palms and El Cortez are definitely places to shop.
Bettors Fare Well Last Week
You would think with half of the underdogs winning that the sportsbooks would have done very well, but that wasn’t the case. The local books were able to scrap out a small win, but just about everyone else fared poorly as both the Packers and Jets found plenty of supporters.
Auburn Line Correct?
Auburn’s 3-point win over Oregon in the BCS title game landed just how the bookmakers thought, right? The game opened Auburn minus-3 at most sportsbooks, but dropped considerably to a pick’em at most places by kickoff. Most all of the power ratings had the game as an initial pick’em which has the question begging to ask, where did the “3” come from? No one wants to be out of line in a big game like that, but it appears that there was some early manipulation on the number that set the market, and it wasn‘t necessarily by any book in Las Vegas either.
It’s not unusual to see instances of pre-seeding games by Sharp groups early at a few sports books with hopes of influencing the entire market. All it takes is a few limit plays by respected players at respected books early on to get the ball rolling and then everyone else falls in line. When the Sharp’s desired line is set, they can bet over 20 times the amount initially seeded later at all the other sportsbooks who follow suit.
The final move proved wrong, other than those who pushed with Oregon, but most of the books still lost money on the game. It wasn’t a result of the possible manipulation, but rather because of extended risk from over a month of taking bowl parlays with Auburn or Oregon being the final leg.
NASCAR is close
Tension is building with NASCAR fans because the wait for the 53rd running of the Daytona 500 is too far away. It’s only been two months since the last race was run, but it feels like an eternity. This week, fans and bettors can get a sneak preview to who will be fast in next month’s speed weeks as the Sprint Cup series will be having a three-day test session at Daytona.
During a recent Goodyear tire test, it was found that the new Daytona surface made the cars a little too fast, so they will be experimenting with an even smaller restrictor plate than last season for the testing. However, don’t expect too much to change from last year. Those who were good in the plate races, namely the Childress and Ganassi teams, will be good again this year.
Just about every sportsbook has their Daytona 500 odds up. While the Las Vegas Hilton Super Book leads the way with the lowest theoretic hold percentage in the city, it’s still a good idea to check all the books around town to find value on certain drivers that maybe the Hilton considered more of a favorite. Must stops for finding early value are all of the Mirage properties, Lucky’s and the M Resort and Spa.