I have had a great deal of success in major league baseball, as I'm about to cap off my 7th straight winning season, and look forward to the post-season, where the success has been equal. It would be a bit disconcerting not faring well in baseball, since I played professionally, and certainly have a vast knowledge of what transpires, emotional, mentally, and physically, but that alone, by far, offers no guarantee of success in handicapping anything, but is a good starting point. Fundamental knowledge is just one aspect of handicapping sports, and I'm going to put some of my countless hours in print here, as I attempt to point you in the right direction, as the post-season is upon us once again, and the fall classic takes center stage for a bit. The American League as I documented in a prvious article, has been the dominant side for quite sometime now. Partially do to the ability of the Yankees and the Red Sox, to be a constant member of the post-season contingent of teams dreaming of donning the ring of the fall classic. Over the past 5 years just 8 temas from the AL have made the post-season, while the winds of change blow frequently in the NL, as the 2006 and 2007 playoffs saw 8 different teams making the playoffs, not a single repeater! This is a look inside the numbers, to extract where the value may lie. Most that have followed my picks, have seen that I post frequent runline plays. This is not a habit of mine, it is called handicapping on the fly. This season was completely different than most, and once I caught on, I went where the value was, and produced over 100 units of profit in the last 3 months. Investigating the runline in the post-season reveals that over the past 5 years in postseason play there has been a total of 159 games played, and 37 decided by 1 run. That is 23.3% of all post-season games. This season through today, their have been 657 games decided by 1 run, out of 2,487 games played, or 26.4% decided by 1 run. It shows some modest value on the -1.5 runline, simply because the mis-matched games aren't nearly as prominent as they are in the regular season, so one would expect that the games decided by 1 run in the post-season, would be higher than the regular season, because the games are all competitive, but such is not the case!! There is also the issue of the standard moneyline wager, and where the market runs inefficient. The best place to look would be the AL, where the underdog has gone 11-8 in home games for +5.35 units over the last 5 years, and the dog on the road has actually won more than half the time at 25-24 for 51%. That has equated to +14 units of profit!! The NL dogs have been -7.39 units over the same period. The next area to investigate to find the soft spot in an efficient market is totals. The area of value is set right in the bullseye, where pitching equality, and hitting equality intersect. The totals of 10+ are driven by a weak pitching matchup, and the totals of 8.5 or below are driven by a good pitchers duel expected. There has been no indication here of anything out of the normal distribution expectation. The games where neither pitching, or hitting is expected to dominate, have been a bonanza, showing a weakness in the market. Since teams generally make the post-season because of pitching, then this is the perfect place to look. There should be a bias shown by unders in these "average" matchups for that very reason, as an average pitcher is likely to be backed by a solid bullpen, and top closer. The results reveal the hypothesis is correct, as post-season games with a posted total of 9 or 9.5 have played 43-21 to the UNDER over the last 5 years. That is 67.2% winners!!!! So we have shown the area of weakness resides in playing AL dogs home or away, and totals of 9 to 9.5 under. Please remember there is more to handicapping a game than a system that has but 64 games in its database, or 49 games in its database, because the statistical validy is without great confidence!!!! So playing these blindly, could lead to disappointing results, but using this as a place to look, if other fundamental handicapping principles agree, will give you a winning edge. If you'd like to find that winning edge, then I'm here to help, and give me a try. Otherwise, best of luck in the MLB post-season!!!! Hope to see you at the payout window, because I'll be there!!!!
 

Mr. East
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