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General Forum
Colin Caster on SSB: review and preview
Posted By: Colin Caster
Date: 1 Sep 01, 11:06 pm
August on Colin Caster's pages:
–> Exactly 100 MLB picks, covering 30/31 days in the month. We saw the rise of the A's, the fall of the Twins, and a wild Cleveland comeback win over Seattle (I had the Indians!)
–> MLB Record:
August: 47-53 against an average line of +114 (normally enough for a marginal profit, but bad weighting on my part lost me -6.76 units out of 139.59 wagered).
Season: For the season I am 141-147, –11.84 units out of 370.51 wagered.
Career: For my MLB posting career I ended August +5.32 units out of 512.11 wagered, a return on investment of +1.04%. A study by Prospect on bj21.com earlier this season, sampling 127 of my picks, suggests that playing my picks against median lines would have resulted in about -.35% less return on investment (total of +0.69% return); aggressive shopping would have yielded 1.26% better return (total of +2.3% return).
–> Although I did not handicap NFL preseason games, football discussionon my pages centered on a series of simulations I performed to recommend picks on college season win totals. (Arising from these sims was my controversial assertion on 8/20 that TCU had a 16% of beating Nebraska outright.) Also, there were two weekends of NCAA football picks.
–> Football Record:
August (including weekend beginning 8/30): 7-6-1, but -0.8 units, thanks to a 1-2 record on double weighted selections (Marshall almost got that backdoor cover for me despite the player suspensions).
Career: 18-14-2 on college football, +1.4 units (+3.4% return) against 11/10 vig, all sides and totals. NFL record is 358-304 (54.1%, +23.6 units, +3.4% return) against 11/10 vig, all sides and totals. Most of the NFL (which dates back to 1991, when I began my modeling) was "documented" in a small circulation publication, nothing like the peer review on bj21.com or ssb.
What to expect in September on Colin Caster's pages:
–> Another full month of baseball, involving roughly the same number of picks and units wagered, leading up to the playoffs, which begin October 2nd. You can expect continued (and heightened) discussion of playoff futures and playoff series wagers. My baseball picks and discussion will continue to appear on my NFL page (when not on the free pages).
–> NFL and college football picks, primarily against sides and totals. More of my attention this season will be paid to timing in the line market. My goal is to improve my efficiency against both the opening and closing lines. I will only make picks against lines that are widely available (which I define operationally as comprising 20% or more of available numbers), but because of my emphasis on timing I will offer an e-mail service that provides subscribers with my picks as soon as I release them.
–> Content: As I have explained in my self-description, my picks derive principally from statistical models designed to identify the very weakest lines. My discussion therefore tends to be rather laconic and stats focused. I have in the past (particularly when I worked for wagering.com) provided brief game summaries surrounding my picks, but this was with the understanding that such was not really explanation of the pick as color commentary. It seems to me that very little of that is required for NFL games, for example, each of which are dissected at great length in many news outlets. However, I will consider providing more of this if subscribers find it useful, especially once baseball season winds down.
I hope you will consider giving my pages a try in September. I am happy to address questions either here or backchannel. Good luck all!
Colin Caster
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