Wagering
Pricing
Tom LaMarra on simulcasting fees and Churchill’s recent takeout hike:
I’m no math whiz, so correct me if I’m wrong. In the case of Churchill, if its host fee remains the same, a rebate shop and its customers get to keep the extra 3 percentage points when the exacta takeout goes from 19% to 22%.
If you operate a rebate shop or are a large importer of simulcast signals, higher takeout is money. That may explain why racetracks, rebate shops, and [ADWs] don’t complain about 30% trifecta rakes: If they pay the sender 3% for the signal, there’s 27 cents per dollar to play with before taxes.
Matt Hegarty on how those cents might get shared:
If simulcast rates do not go up at the same rate as the takeouts, then some players may not feel the full impact of the hikes. Many account-wagering operations, including Churchill’s mammoth twinspires.com and an offshore site the company bought several years ago, offer rebates to players, and some sites may elect to forgo the additional revenue to increase the rebates to their players on the Churchill signal. Many rebated players, including those who use automated systems employing algorithms to determine their wagers, are highly sensitive to takeout rates.
Odds and Ends
Exacta-mundo on the current state of turf blogging: “… I can’t help but think we’re now truly in a time when there’s no one left to ask the needed questions without feeling like they have something to lose.”
If you’re in Massachusetts, you still stand to lose 5% on winning wagers paying more than $600: An amendment striking the new withholding requirement, which went into effect this spring, didn’t make it into the final version of the supplemental budget bill passed by the state legislature. How many Bay State bettors have been affected? Racing director Jennifer Durenberger told the Massachusetts Gaming Commission in this morning’s meeting that the state’s three simulcasting licensees report a total of 860 instances of state withholding since May, compared to 10 for federal withholding.
Another kind of loss: “… last Saturday at Hollywood was either a celebration or an early funeral.” (For consolation, see the coach.)
Recent Preakness History
Preakness winners 2001-2012, where they finished in the Kentucky Derby, and their Preakness odds / Kentucky Derby winners, where they finished in the Preakness, and their Preakness odds / * = Preakness post-time favorite
About a dozen have been declared as likely starters in the Preakness Stakes, with seven plus Orb coming out of the Kentucky Derby. Looking at the last dozen runnings of the Preakness, one of that group is most likely to beat Derby winner Orb (if he can be beaten). Non-Derby starters have won the Preakness only twice since 2001, both in years of exceptional circumstance.
Kentucky Derby winners have a mixed record over the period listed above, with one DNF, six losses, and five wins. Assuming Orb is the favorite in the Preakness as he was in the Derby, the odds tilt back in his favor with the performance of Derby favorites as Preakness favorites since 2001 — three of the four in that group (Point Given, 1.80 KYD; Smarty Jones, 4.10 KYD; Street Sense, 4.90 KYD; and Big Brown, 2.40 KYD) won the second leg of the Triple Crown. Street Sense finished second to Curlin, the eventual 2007 Horse of the Year. All of which is to say, if you like Illinois Derby winner Departing for the Preakness upset — well, you have to hope Orb’s former Claiborne pasture buddy proves exceptional in more ways than one.
A Bullish Derby Strategy
First, understand the race, then understand chance:
No. 5, Toro has learned the hard way the immutable, unmerciful truth of superfecta betting:
Only good horses reliably finish first or second, and only decent ones usually run third. But any half-wit critter with a post and a pulse can finish fourth.
This is why I rarely play the super, even for a dime.
Gone, Baby, Gone
Ray Paulick interviews a catchphrase:
Did [Go, Baby, Go] make a difference in handle or attendance?
That’s a hard question, Ray. I’d like to think so as U.S. handle increased significantly from 1998 to 2004 when I was living large. There was definitely more racing on national TV and more coordinated national marketing and promotion. But it might have just been good timing. The game had a nice run of almost-Triple Crown winners from ’98-’04 with Real Quiet, Charismatic, War Emblem, Funny Cide and Smarty Jones and the Seabiscuit book and movie definitely helped put us back in front of American public …
“Good timing” is an understatement: 1998-2004 was the rise of the Internet as we now know it. The industry’s various factions simultaneously managed to catch the moment, via ADWs, and squander it.
Hong Kong Handle
In a column about a software glitch, an extraordinary figure:
We can’t wait for commingling to occur and not just because it will give Hong Kong’s finest taxi drivers the chance to dictate who starts favourite in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe and Golden Slipper. The weight of Hong Kong money will leave punters in betting shops around the world scratching their heads and redefine the term market mover. Just for perspective, the accidental HK$30 million was a lot in any language (US$3.8 million) and enough to buy a 30-second commercial during the Super Bowl. But it was also less than 2.5 per cent of the total turnover at Sha Tin yesterday, which reached a solid HK$1.3 billion …
Or about $171 million in American dollars.
For a little perspective: Total handle on the 2012 Kentucky Derby was $133 million, total two-day handle on the 2012 Breeders’ Cup $144 million.
7/11/13 Addendum: Hong Kong handle rises 9%, hits a record high of $93.8 billion ($12.1 billion) in its most recent season, outhandling the US.
Odds and Ends
Dick Jerardi doesn’t care where a single comes in a bet sequence: “The way I look at it, there are two possibilities: I am going to be right or I am going to be wrong. When that is determined is irrelevant.”
Can you be the best ever if you need a rabbit?
Breeders’ Cup Turf Trends: It’s all about the finish.
As much as I’d like to think Excelebration will be the second-favorite to Wise Dan in the Breeders’ Cup Mile (and available at 3-1 or better), raceday betting will probably look more like the current ante-post odds.
Appreciating Frankie Dettori, “global proponent of la dolce vita.”
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Jessica Chapel is an editor and web producer living in Massachusetts. Railbird is a Thoroughbred horse racing blog published since June 2004. More / Contact
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