When the Board Talks
I read Brad Free’s column on tote board action earlier this week with much interest. The concept of smart money is ridiculous, he argues. Yet, “It is downright stubborn … to ignore unusual betting action without considering the possibility the action is meaningful” (Daily Racing Form — sub. req.). True. But what I’m wondering about, and what Free doesn’t really address, is how do bettors determine if the action is meaningful? The answer, I suspect, lies in the pattern of odds action.
I can think of three races in the past year where I observed truly unusual odds action that ended up pointing to the winner, and in each case, I dithered over whether what I was seeing was significant and whether I should incorporate it into any bets I made (I didn’t, to my regret). But I can also remember races where actual odds differed from the morning line in a way that indicated the “possible existence of factors not previously considered” and ended up pointing to nothing.
The difference lay in how the odds action played out: What was noticeable in the three races I recall with unusual action that was not apparent in the odds action of other races is that in each of those three races, the odds changes were sustained and balanced.
In last year’s MassCap, for example, Offlee Wild had a morning line value of 15-1, which he opened at. With the next flash of the board, his odds plunged to 6-5, and then stabilized at 3-1, which is where they remained until post time. Funny Cide, expected to be the overwhelming favorite at 8-5, drifted up to 2-1 — which might not seem significant, except that the MassCap crowd was made up of many casual fans who intended to bet Funny Cide regardless of any other factors. Neither horses’ odds fluctuated greatly after their new values were set, and the odds of other horses on the board hewed pretty close to the morning line. It was an instance of meaningful action on the tote board. And for anyone paying attention, it was a chance to cash a ticket.
