Latest / The Favorites Sports Betting Podcast / Stuckey and Chad talk how to bet conference tournaments

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Stuckey and Chad talk how to bet conference tournaments · The Favorites Sports Betting Podcast

0:08
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Favorites, the podcast from the Action Network.
0:13
Speaker 1: I'm Chad Millman. Listen. We are in full on college
0:18
Speaker 1: basketball mode. We have the conference tournaments happening this week.
0:23
Speaker 1: We have the incentil A tournament happening in about ten days.
0:29
Speaker 1: I'd love to tell you that Scooch is going to
0:31
Speaker 1: be on the podcast, but he's not because while we
0:33
Speaker 1: had a brief reunion last week, uh, he is traveling
0:36
Speaker 1: again this week and can I join. I happen to
0:40
Speaker 1: think if we could do any better than Scooch, it
0:44
Speaker 1: would be with better um bum bum bum bum bum stucky.
0:53
Speaker 1: So I'm just I'm just a default choice, the backup plan. Well,
0:56
Speaker 1: the plan was have you both, and then it makes
0:59
Speaker 1: me feel a little bit Scooch bailed. You were going
1:01
Speaker 1: to be sort of to bring the depth and insight,
1:05
Speaker 1: and Scooch was going to bring the chuckles. Okay, well
1:09
Speaker 1: maybe I'll try to bring a few chuckles in there.
1:11
Speaker 1: You don't sound like you're committed to that idea now,
1:13
Speaker 1: you just sound like, well, let me let me warm
1:15
Speaker 1: up a little bit. Dude. You've been working since like
1:19
Speaker 1: two o'clock this morning. You've already done. I'll take that
1:21
Speaker 1: bet on ESPM plus. I know you're putting together some
1:24
Speaker 1: college basketball tournament uh conference previews right now, like you're
1:29
Speaker 1: doing a podcast. How much warmer do you have to be?
1:32
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm pretty warm. I just mean for the
1:35
Speaker 1: flow of this. I mean I've also recorded about I
1:37
Speaker 1: think nine podcast episodes in the last two nights, so
1:40
Speaker 1: that's true. Uh yeah, it's been a crazy week, but
1:44
Speaker 1: it's it's March. There's zero complaints of mine. This is
1:47
Speaker 1: a good time to remind people. This is a good
1:49
Speaker 1: time to remind people that, like, honestly, guy, one of
1:51
Speaker 1: my favorite podcasts is the Action Network Colleges podcast that
1:55
Speaker 1: you are doing with Michael Mike Randall and Eli Herskovich
1:58
Speaker 1: and uh College Wilson And I loved this, and I
2:02
Speaker 1: tweeted this out the other day when I was listening
2:04
Speaker 1: to it, I think on Friday or Saturday, Like, you
2:07
Speaker 1: opened the podcast, and you're getting so good at hosting
2:09
Speaker 1: these podcasts, but you opened the podcast with the four
2:13
Speaker 1: of you, All four of you are on the Jacksonville
2:17
Speaker 1: State U T. Martin game. And if people remember the
2:21
Speaker 1: last time you're on the podcast a couple of weeks ago,
2:23
Speaker 1: I like, randomly chose Jacksonville State from the Ken Palm rankings.
2:27
Speaker 1: They were a hundred and nine, and I'm like, give
2:30
Speaker 1: me something about Jacksonville State, and you had the entire
2:33
Speaker 1: lineup broken down and sort of their chances to make
2:38
Speaker 1: the tournament and why you like them, And in that game,
2:41
Speaker 1: I think you bet jack State. Now we actually we
2:45
Speaker 1: we all had Tennessee Martin plus ten, but we had
2:48
Speaker 1: Jacksonville State to win the conference tournament. And I'm sort
2:52
Speaker 1: of disappointed that you brought it up. So I'm trying
2:54
Speaker 1: to move on from that. They got absolutely robbed, robbed
2:58
Speaker 1: against Murray State, who beat them by two. There was
3:01
Speaker 1: made up, flagrant technicals. I mean there's people, I mean,
3:04
Speaker 1: unbiased people were complaining about it on Twitter. That's how
3:07
Speaker 1: I always know if the reps are bad, um, because
3:10
Speaker 1: it's easy to have a lens where you're like this,
3:12
Speaker 1: this call screwed me. But I saw, you know, from
3:15
Speaker 1: your old world, Stanford Stephen van Pelt were tweeting like
3:19
Speaker 1: this is just hard to change the whole game. Um,
3:22
Speaker 1: So I was I was mixed. I really thought Jacksonville
3:24
Speaker 1: State had a shot and I wanted to see them
3:26
Speaker 1: in the tournament. But it was not meant to be.
3:29
Speaker 1: Do you feel like, um, there are more people in
3:32
Speaker 1: the market on teams like Jacksonville State than there ever
3:34
Speaker 1: have been. Yeah, I mean it's and it's only gonna
3:38
Speaker 1: get it's only growing. Um. So just I mean what,
3:43
Speaker 1: there's a data revolution in college basketball and it's creating
3:49
Speaker 1: more efficient lines than we've ever seen, especially with totals. Um,
3:54
Speaker 1: and it's only going to get more efficient over time.
3:58
Speaker 1: Explain to me what you mean by a revolution. I
4:01
Speaker 1: mean there's just having access to something, you know, the
4:05
Speaker 1: general public for you know, a really small fee, having
4:08
Speaker 1: access to something like ken Pop, having access to the
4:13
Speaker 1: Action network and the info that we give out. I mean,
4:15
Speaker 1: these are things that the general public used to not
4:20
Speaker 1: even pay attention to. It was, Oh, Duke is playing
4:23
Speaker 1: this team, and okay, I'm betting Duke. They're really good
4:27
Speaker 1: and have NBA players. Well, now people are you know,
4:30
Speaker 1: starting to understand efficiencies. Uh, and you know, certain strengths
4:35
Speaker 1: and weaknesses of certain teams. And you know, I hear
4:37
Speaker 1: I hear people that have bet their whole lives that
4:41
Speaker 1: never would say, you know, I think the line is
4:43
Speaker 1: going to be this or this line is too high
4:46
Speaker 1: because of this that it's just a new lexicon out
4:49
Speaker 1: of them that I never heard them talk like that,
4:52
Speaker 1: And uh, I think it's a good thing that we
4:55
Speaker 1: have more informed, more informed betting public. It's what we're
4:59
Speaker 1: ultimately try thing to do at the Action Network. But
5:02
Speaker 1: on the flip side, it makes I think, a more
5:04
Speaker 1: efficient market and it's you know, it becomes a little
5:07
Speaker 1: more difficult to back contract, so it's not like the
5:10
Speaker 1: early two thousands when you could have a total that
5:13
Speaker 1: would come out in November and it would move sometimes
5:18
Speaker 1: if a certain team had a new coaching change and
5:20
Speaker 1: they were going to run instead of grind it like
5:22
Speaker 1: they did the year before. But all of that information
5:26
Speaker 1: is now out there and it's just such a more
5:27
Speaker 1: efficient market. In college basketball. By the way, you can
5:31
Speaker 1: get everything stuck he's talking about if you download the
5:34
Speaker 1: Action Network Gap. It's free. It's so interesting that you
5:37
Speaker 1: talk about this data revolution, because it feels like it's
5:40
Speaker 1: been happening for about ten years, and it feels like
5:43
Speaker 1: it started with Ken Palm, Like everybody getting into Ken
5:48
Speaker 1: Palm and understanding the value of Ken Palm and applying
5:52
Speaker 1: so many different metrics, especially efficiency metrics and sort of
5:57
Speaker 1: offensive rating metrics and points per possession metrics that had
6:01
Speaker 1: never been thought of in college basketball. Yeah, I mean
6:06
Speaker 1: a perfect example is you'll have these teams that are
6:10
Speaker 1: really underperforming, or you know, on the flip side, they're overperforming,
6:16
Speaker 1: they're getting a little lucky. And in the past, you
6:19
Speaker 1: know those teams. You know, say a team was underperforming
6:22
Speaker 1: consistently over the first two months of the season, because
6:26
Speaker 1: they were underperforming, you could generally get value in that
6:30
Speaker 1: team just by starting to back them. But a lot
6:32
Speaker 1: of these underlying metrics are capturing you know, they're true performance,
6:37
Speaker 1: and you can look at I mean, you can look
6:38
Speaker 1: at things like a luck metric, but you can look
6:41
Speaker 1: at some of their underlying adjusted efficiencies and you can
6:45
Speaker 1: and I think the market is understanding how really good
6:49
Speaker 1: or really bad certain teams are, regardless of what they're
6:53
Speaker 1: doing on the court, and how lucky you're unlucky they're
6:55
Speaker 1: they're performing. So you've been gambling in college basketball since
6:59
Speaker 1: you were like six, result and when you first started
7:03
Speaker 1: gambling to now, how much has the idea of this
7:06
Speaker 1: data changed the way you handicap? Well, I mean, I've
7:11
Speaker 1: always been a a person that relies on data. Now
7:18
Speaker 1: and there's a lot more out there that I have
7:20
Speaker 1: access to, which is great. But I've always been a
7:23
Speaker 1: person that, you know, combines kind of art and science.
7:27
Speaker 1: So I'm in college basketball. I love situational angles. I mean,
7:31
Speaker 1: these are college kids that you're betting on. There are
7:35
Speaker 1: letdown spots. There are hangovers and letdowns and sandwiches. Now,
7:40
Speaker 1: it's not just and that's what I always tell people.
7:43
Speaker 1: You know, I could train my little sister to pick
7:46
Speaker 1: these spots out, but it's a little it's a little
7:49
Speaker 1: more complicated, and you have to have a feel for it.
7:51
Speaker 1: You have to watch these teams and then matchups come
7:54
Speaker 1: into play as well, because if a certain matchup is
7:57
Speaker 1: really bad for a team, that could override the spot.
8:00
Speaker 1: But I have always thought of myself as a cover
8:04
Speaker 1: that kind of combines the two worlds of the you know,
8:07
Speaker 1: the math flash science part of it and the art.
8:10
Speaker 1: And I think if you can do that successfully, um
8:13
Speaker 1: combined in those two worlds, I think that's how you
8:15
Speaker 1: can become, you know, the most complete college basketball handicapper.
8:19
Speaker 1: Because situational spots, they do matter in college basketball. I
8:24
Speaker 1: will argue that to the grave. Well, I I agree,
8:27
Speaker 1: actually might be NBA is really interesting, right because NBA
8:32
Speaker 1: you can almost you can you know, for lack of
8:36
Speaker 1: a better term, you can predict the situational spot college
8:39
Speaker 1: basketball situational spots. And you had a great story this
8:41
Speaker 1: past weekend about six situational spots that you were looking at.
8:46
Speaker 1: So now I have two questions for you. Uh, let
8:49
Speaker 1: me do the first one. I want to get the
8:50
Speaker 1: situational spots. I'm gonna I'm gonna make a note of
8:52
Speaker 1: that right now. Um, how would you find data and
8:56
Speaker 1: what data data madage matter to you before sort of
9:00
Speaker 1: the internet democratized everything. Well, I mean I would have
9:04
Speaker 1: to do a lot of the data myself. Um, so
9:07
Speaker 1: it was maintaining and I don't have to do is
9:10
Speaker 1: much work in that regard now because of sites like
9:13
Speaker 1: kem pom. But you know the hardest part would be
9:17
Speaker 1: taking You're taking numbers like you know, number of points,
9:21
Speaker 1: number of possessions, you're getting points per possession on both sides,
9:25
Speaker 1: and then removing garbage time and you I would literally
9:30
Speaker 1: have to go through manually and do that. So what
9:35
Speaker 1: is garbage time in college basketball? Means generally when the
9:38
Speaker 1: starters come out, but people have different parameters with the
9:41
Speaker 1: lead have to be. But back way back in the day,
9:45
Speaker 1: you would have to go through manually and do that.
9:48
Speaker 1: Now there's still a lot of that work that does
9:51
Speaker 1: get done by betters um serious betters of of removing
9:55
Speaker 1: those garbage time stats. There are some sites out there
9:57
Speaker 1: that do it, but everyone does it a little bit different.
10:00
Speaker 1: The same thing applies to football as well. You want
10:03
Speaker 1: to take out you know, those statistics when a team
10:06
Speaker 1: is up twenty one and they're just running the ball
10:09
Speaker 1: with backups at the end, to really get their true performance,
10:13
Speaker 1: but it was just a lot of manual work, and
10:15
Speaker 1: you didn't because you were only I was only a
10:18
Speaker 1: one man operation. I didn't have nowhere near as many
10:23
Speaker 1: UH data and variables as I do have access to today.
10:28
Speaker 1: But then again, it was easier to beck college basketball
10:31
Speaker 1: back then, so you know, it's both sides of the coin.
10:36
Speaker 1: It was easy to douce he didn't need as much data,
10:38
Speaker 1: but now it's becoming more efficient. But the access to
10:41
Speaker 1: data is crazy. When did you see it really become hard?
10:44
Speaker 1: Like what year? Did it all of a sudden, We're like, boy,
10:49
Speaker 1: these advantage I used to have, they're kind of disappearing.
10:53
Speaker 1: I would say probably two thousand tennis is when I
10:59
Speaker 1: started to have those thoughts and it's just it seems
11:03
Speaker 1: like it's just a growing force. Um. But yeah, I
11:07
Speaker 1: mean I would say, you know, maybe about seventy nine
11:11
Speaker 1: years ago, UM is when I first you know, had
11:15
Speaker 1: that aha moment like well well this is everything is changing,
11:19
Speaker 1: um And yeah, you're I think you're right. A lot
11:21
Speaker 1: of it started with ken Balm. You ruined it for everybody. Yeah,
11:28
Speaker 1: I mean there was times I remember when I was
11:30
Speaker 1: betting on college basketball in like high school. I remember
11:35
Speaker 1: all being on the forums and this is early two
11:38
Speaker 1: thousand's when you could just blindly take you know, a
11:44
Speaker 1: random team on a Tuesday night that was minus two,
11:48
Speaker 1: and you know, they would they would move they say
11:51
Speaker 1: they were plus two, they would move to minus one.
11:53
Speaker 1: And you could blindly follow these line moves and reverse
11:56
Speaker 1: line moves in college basketball they would You could have
11:59
Speaker 1: all these people that went tout based on it, um.
12:02
Speaker 1: But there was just a lot of simple things that
12:04
Speaker 1: you do, especially totals. Uh. There was a lot of
12:06
Speaker 1: inefficiencies in the college basket market that don't exist today. Well,
12:10
Speaker 1: certainly I remember, like you're talking about early two thousands,
12:12
Speaker 1: that's when I was out in Vegas writing The Odds,
12:15
Speaker 1: my best selling book about guys who bet on sports
12:17
Speaker 1: for a living, and you know, following Allan Boston, and
12:22
Speaker 1: you know he had it just wasn't that hard to
12:25
Speaker 1: get money down, and like he didn't have to chase
12:28
Speaker 1: numbers very hard. Like he'd see a number, he'd get
12:30
Speaker 1: it really quickly. And he kept everything in a spiral
12:35
Speaker 1: bound notebook on um white, three whole punch lined paper. Um,
12:41
Speaker 1: I'm not sorry, I'm sorry, not spiral bound, a three
12:45
Speaker 1: whole punch notebook like one of those big binders. And
12:47
Speaker 1: he would just like have reams and reams of data
12:50
Speaker 1: from that he carries over from year to year on
12:53
Speaker 1: every single team. Uh, that's how he would make his numbers. Yep. Yeah,
12:58
Speaker 1: I mean I have plenty of notebook myself. Philt up.
13:00
Speaker 1: I still love writing. I mean it's not as efficient,
13:03
Speaker 1: but I still love taking a notebook and I will
13:06
Speaker 1: take all of my conference tournament odds in there. But yeah,
13:09
Speaker 1: I mean I I remember back this is mid to
13:13
Speaker 1: late two thousand's when on Saturday morning, for about an
13:18
Speaker 1: hour or two, I would have conversations with Mr Boston
13:22
Speaker 1: about the college basketball card that day. How did you
13:27
Speaker 1: get in touch with Boston? Uh? Covers dot com forms
13:33
Speaker 1: and a mutual friend of mine on the forums and
13:37
Speaker 1: his and uh, you know, he he said, look, you guys,
13:41
Speaker 1: you guys should talk about college basketball. Someone that followed
13:44
Speaker 1: me religiously, and yeah, we just we started talking college basketball.
13:49
Speaker 1: And you'll you'll see Boston have some rants on Twitter
13:52
Speaker 1: about the college basketball market because one of the things
13:54
Speaker 1: that they they do that I mean that the off
13:58
Speaker 1: shores are doing now is you'll don't take really small
14:03
Speaker 1: action the night, you know, as soon as they put
14:06
Speaker 1: the lines out and then to shape the lines, and
14:10
Speaker 1: you know, people will get frustrated that these you know,
14:13
Speaker 1: some sharper groups will go out and get a number
14:15
Speaker 1: but hit it when the limits are really low and
14:18
Speaker 1: then really sucking the value out for others. But it's
14:21
Speaker 1: if you don't do that, someone else is going to
14:24
Speaker 1: do it. That's the argument. Is there a game? Like
14:27
Speaker 1: I had no idea. You and I have never talked
14:29
Speaker 1: about this. We have never talked about the fact that,
14:32
Speaker 1: like you had a relationship with Alan Boston. Yeah, I
14:35
Speaker 1: mean it was purely like, hey, let's talk about the
14:38
Speaker 1: college basketball card today. Do you like this? Why do
14:41
Speaker 1: you like this? Do you like that? Um, Saturday mornings
14:45
Speaker 1: during the the huge enormous hundred and fifty game slates
14:52
Speaker 1: that can be very overwhelming when your Calvin college basketball.
14:56
Speaker 1: I mean, that's I think that's the hardest thing to
14:58
Speaker 1: do is take a look at a Saturday card, go
15:00
Speaker 1: through it all and make sure you don't miss anything,
15:02
Speaker 1: and then try and narrow down what you're going to bet,
15:04
Speaker 1: because there's ultimately going to be things that you regret
15:07
Speaker 1: that you didn't bet, but you have to just be
15:10
Speaker 1: fine with it. Yeah. I remember sitting on couches, like
15:14
Speaker 1: in his house, watching him just try to juggle every
15:18
Speaker 1: single game that's coming on five dimes, ten dimes, twenty times,
15:21
Speaker 1: here's a halftime, you know, like putting money back into play.
15:25
Speaker 1: The amount of flow that was going in and out
15:27
Speaker 1: of his house was insanity. That's crazy. It was super
15:34
Speaker 1: It was super, super fun. All Right. The other thing
15:36
Speaker 1: I want to ask you about you mentioned something really
15:37
Speaker 1: interesting situational spots. You had a great story this past
15:40
Speaker 1: weekend around situational spots. You just talked about how that
15:45
Speaker 1: is um so vital in handicapping college basketball. Your situational
15:52
Speaker 1: spots this past weekend. You accurately predicted I think five
15:56
Speaker 1: of the six. Um, if I'm not mistaken, tell me
16:01
Speaker 1: what you're looking for in a situational spot, and does
16:03
Speaker 1: anything apply to conference or incidably tournament? Now, yeah, I
16:07
Speaker 1: mean they finished up. It was something I did, you know,
16:09
Speaker 1: every once in a while during the weekdays and then
16:11
Speaker 1: always every Saturday. I think they finished up forty five
16:15
Speaker 1: and thirty this year. Um, but they are now pretty
16:20
Speaker 1: much obsolete. It's you know, and maybe every once in
16:23
Speaker 1: a while have I'll have something in the conference tournament
16:27
Speaker 1: where some team you know, lost twice in heartbreaking fashion
16:32
Speaker 1: and really once the rematch or maybe something like Nevada
16:36
Speaker 1: the way if they get a rematch or a third
16:39
Speaker 1: game against Utah State in the Mountain West Final. I mean,
16:43
Speaker 1: this is a Nevada team that wants you toss a
16:45
Speaker 1: bad day. I mean, you had Jordan Caroline punching the
16:47
Speaker 1: fire extinguisher. You know, fans apparently we're saying things, coaches
16:51
Speaker 1: were saying things. They were fired up after that game,
16:54
Speaker 1: so maybe they come out with just a little extra fire.
16:57
Speaker 1: I want to step on their throats. But at the
17:00
Speaker 1: end of the day, these are postseason tournaments, so and
17:03
Speaker 1: you know, especially with the n c A Tournament, everyone
17:07
Speaker 1: is going to give their best effort um, you know,
17:10
Speaker 1: so one of you have to look at things like rest.
17:14
Speaker 1: Uh and you know, teams that are playing four games
17:17
Speaker 1: in four days and they might not have depth, but
17:19
Speaker 1: those are I think more metrics based things than situational spots.
17:24
Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean after a pretty much last weekend
17:28
Speaker 1: last Saturday, it was really the last Hurrah, which was uh,
17:33
Speaker 1: sort of sada because the season flew by. But yeah,
17:35
Speaker 1: situations about don't really have much warrant moving forward. It
17:39
Speaker 1: is amazing how the season flew by. But I also
17:41
Speaker 1: like this is something else the college basketball betters always
17:45
Speaker 1: talk about, like religiously getting best effort, you know, getting
17:52
Speaker 1: max effort, as if anybody could figure out what that's
17:55
Speaker 1: going to be for eight year old kids, do you
17:59
Speaker 1: know what I mean? Like, tell me, explain to me
18:02
Speaker 1: how you know you're gonna get max effort at this
18:04
Speaker 1: point versus another time. Obviously you know it's different in
18:09
Speaker 1: the regular season, but tell me when you're looking for
18:11
Speaker 1: max effort versus when you're not. I mean, you don't
18:15
Speaker 1: know that's the thing when people will always say. My
18:18
Speaker 1: favorite is when people will point to a game where
18:21
Speaker 1: I'm like, I like this situational spot, and then they'll
18:23
Speaker 1: watch it and say, well, look, that's that's that they
18:26
Speaker 1: got beat. Situation spots don't mean anything. It's just like
18:29
Speaker 1: when you're capping games, you're not trying you know, if
18:32
Speaker 1: you're just doing it from a pure numbers perspective, you're
18:34
Speaker 1: not trying to hit what I'm doing with my situational
18:40
Speaker 1: with spots that I want to hit, you know, ideally
18:44
Speaker 1: percent over time. So if I think I have an
18:46
Speaker 1: edge over a long period of time, um, then I'm
18:50
Speaker 1: gonna get it. There's gonna be times when the team
18:52
Speaker 1: doesn't show up and you think they do. But again,
18:55
Speaker 1: it's it's really understanding the schedule, understanding the team is
18:58
Speaker 1: really being in tune with and it's a lot of
19:01
Speaker 1: that comes from watching a lot, but it's there's a
19:04
Speaker 1: there's an intuition part of it. There's it's it's not
19:07
Speaker 1: pure science. It's a lot of it is art. I
19:08
Speaker 1: mean a perfect example was Seaton Hall this past weekend.
19:14
Speaker 1: I love them versus Villanova because I mean the first
19:17
Speaker 1: time those two teams played Villanova was up I think
19:20
Speaker 1: forty five at one miles Pal had three points. I mean,
19:24
Speaker 1: that was absolutely their most embarrassing loss of the season.
19:29
Speaker 1: Now they're at home playing for the Attorney Lives, and
19:32
Speaker 1: you could see from the jump that team came up,
19:35
Speaker 1: fired up on defense and was just there all of
19:39
Speaker 1: their energy. And that's ultimately all I want when I
19:42
Speaker 1: bet these situational spots. But yeah, I mean there's no science.
19:46
Speaker 1: There's no formula to it, which will which will frustrate,
19:49
Speaker 1: which frustrates a lot of you know, pure math based
19:53
Speaker 1: handicappers that that will just say you're talking gibberish. But um, yeah,
19:58
Speaker 1: there's no You have to be really in tune, watch
20:00
Speaker 1: a lot and and then a lot of it's just
20:03
Speaker 1: part art and some people can get it and some
20:05
Speaker 1: people can't. All right, so we're in conference tournaments. Everyone's
20:09
Speaker 1: going to get going this week. Tell me what you're
20:12
Speaker 1: thinking right now? What are you looking at? If you
20:14
Speaker 1: had to prioritize your futures bets for conference tournaments? Ranked
20:19
Speaker 1: them for me, Force ranked them. Well. I mean, so
20:23
Speaker 1: a lot of what what I'll look to do is
20:25
Speaker 1: I'll have a few lottery tickets and you know, I'll
20:31
Speaker 1: take a shot on a team like a Penn State.
20:33
Speaker 1: I don't have too much invested in it, but a
20:35
Speaker 1: Penn State at six one, they're playing as well as
20:39
Speaker 1: anyone in that conference. They're really a top thirty five
20:42
Speaker 1: team in the country and they won't make the tournament.
20:45
Speaker 1: But this team is playing so well and I think
20:48
Speaker 1: that they can make a potential run provide a headge opportunity.
20:51
Speaker 1: Same thing with Syracuse. They're always tough in a tournament
20:54
Speaker 1: setting there eighty to one. They're gonna play Duke after
20:57
Speaker 1: a cupcake first game ions first game back, it might
21:01
Speaker 1: be tough to assimilate them. It might have a little rust,
21:04
Speaker 1: do can't shoot the three, terrible zone offense. So I'll
21:07
Speaker 1: have a couple of lottery picks. But what I really
21:09
Speaker 1: like to look for and my biggest investments, and I
21:12
Speaker 1: have a piece on my favorite conference tournament futures for
21:15
Speaker 1: all the ones, there's eleven that start tomorrow. I like
21:18
Speaker 1: to look for MS priced futures based on the implied outs,
21:22
Speaker 1: and what I mean by that is look at the
21:24
Speaker 1: The Big Twelve is a perfect example. You can find
21:28
Speaker 1: Texas out there at twelve to one to win the
21:31
Speaker 1: Big Twelve. Tournament. They're gonna they play in the quarterfinals
21:36
Speaker 1: against Kansas, and Kansas is out there at about plus
21:39
Speaker 1: three fifty. When those two teams play, it's going to
21:43
Speaker 1: essentially be a coin flip. I mean, the line will
21:46
Speaker 1: probably be Kansas minus one and a half minus two,
21:50
Speaker 1: but Kansas is plus three fifty in Texas is twelve
21:54
Speaker 1: the one that's outrageous. It really should be Kansas six
21:56
Speaker 1: to one, Texas seven one. There's a couple of things
21:58
Speaker 1: driving that Kansas name recognition, you know, their success in
22:02
Speaker 1: the Big Twelve. A lot of people always want to
22:05
Speaker 1: bet Kansas to win the Big Twelve. It just isn't
22:07
Speaker 1: the same team. I mean, they have two regulation wins
22:10
Speaker 1: all season long on the road to One of them
22:14
Speaker 1: was at Oklahoma State, who had a three and a
22:16
Speaker 1: wide open three two tie at the end of the game,
22:19
Speaker 1: and the other one was against against Baylor. That's it.
22:22
Speaker 1: This is not your older brother's Kansas team. And Texas
22:25
Speaker 1: had a huge slide to end the year. They were
22:27
Speaker 1: one in four in their last five. But over those
22:30
Speaker 1: five games, Carlin Woach was Karin Roach excuse me, was suspended.
22:34
Speaker 1: He's back now for the Big Twelve tournament. He's their
22:37
Speaker 1: leading score average about fifteen a game. They have about
22:40
Speaker 1: six other guys at average between eight and ten, but
22:43
Speaker 1: they have no real guy who could take over and
22:46
Speaker 1: shoulder that score that they need. Roach leads their teams
22:49
Speaker 1: and steals. They're a completely different team with roach back.
22:53
Speaker 1: So there is just a ton of value with Texas
22:55
Speaker 1: based on this market assumption that Kansas is going to
22:58
Speaker 1: beat them. But that's basically a win flip game. So
23:01
Speaker 1: Texas is one of my favorite ones at twelve to one. Now,
23:03
Speaker 1: they could go out and get beat by Kansas because
23:05
Speaker 1: it's a coin flip game, but at twelve the one,
23:07
Speaker 1: I'm willing to take a shot on them. That's such
23:09
Speaker 1: a great stat to regulation wins during the regular season
23:15
Speaker 1: on the road all year, and the only other one
23:18
Speaker 1: was at TCU and overtime UM and that Baylor game was,
23:23
Speaker 1: you know, the game after Baylor lost one of their
23:24
Speaker 1: best players in Tristan Clark. But they've just been a
23:27
Speaker 1: horror show on the road away from Martins. They're still
23:29
Speaker 1: tough as nails and Allen Field House, but I mean,
23:33
Speaker 1: just look at some of the splits. I mean, they
23:35
Speaker 1: would beat Kansas State at home easily, but lose that.
23:39
Speaker 1: Kansas State. They beat Texas Tech at home easily and
23:42
Speaker 1: lost by but I don't even know sixty and Lubbock.
23:46
Speaker 1: This team is so young and they're they're just they're
23:50
Speaker 1: away from Allen Field House. They are so vulnerable. I
23:53
Speaker 1: actually think Texas is going to get them in the
23:55
Speaker 1: first round. But it's again, it's just a coin flip.
23:58
Speaker 1: And the difference in the price twelve the one of
24:00
Speaker 1: three to one. It's crazy, all right, So that's one,
24:02
Speaker 1: give me another. I also think the pack twelve offers
24:08
Speaker 1: some value. Uh with Oregon. Oregon, you can find them
24:12
Speaker 1: six seven to one. Thing is they're gonna have to
24:15
Speaker 1: win four games in four days. But their first games
24:19
Speaker 1: against Washington State, who's quit, they're done. It's gonna be
24:22
Speaker 1: an easy win for them. And this is a team
24:24
Speaker 1: that's really coming on at the end of the year.
24:26
Speaker 1: They've dealt with a ton all year long. So they
24:29
Speaker 1: had Bowl Boll who was their big, their seven foot
24:32
Speaker 1: big man who averaged twenty one and nine. He went
24:34
Speaker 1: out for the year in mid December. They had you know,
24:38
Speaker 1: Louis King was out for a while, Wootten was out
24:40
Speaker 1: for a while, so they just had a lot. We're
24:42
Speaker 1: in flux all year long, but now they're finally starting
24:45
Speaker 1: to get an identity play together the end of the
24:49
Speaker 1: year on a three game winning streak, including a win
24:51
Speaker 1: at Washington. And you know, Dan Alman is just a
24:54
Speaker 1: great coach with especially in the tournament setting. He's constantly
24:59
Speaker 1: changing his d senses. They're one of about twenty five
25:02
Speaker 1: teams that will throw in a zone over the time,
25:08
Speaker 1: and they'll throw a lot of minient man and they'll
25:10
Speaker 1: even press a quarter of the time. So they just
25:12
Speaker 1: keep they keep teams off balance, which is tough in
25:15
Speaker 1: a tournament setting. Uh, this team is really coming on.
25:18
Speaker 1: It's just a wide open pack twelve. I think Washington
25:22
Speaker 1: is the most dangerous team in the n c A
25:24
Speaker 1: tournament because of their zone. But these teams have all
25:27
Speaker 1: seen that Washington zone multiple times. Now. That's why I
25:31
Speaker 1: think you're seeing Washington struggle down the line and in
25:34
Speaker 1: a crazy pack twelve. I think Oregon is going to
25:37
Speaker 1: make a run to the final here at least Washington
25:40
Speaker 1: and Marquette, two teams that I was so high on
25:44
Speaker 1: about a month ago. I bought future tickets on both
25:48
Speaker 1: of them. I bought future tickets like in a rush
25:53
Speaker 1: after listening to the first Action Network Colleges podcast of
25:56
Speaker 1: the season with You and Eli and Mike and Colin Wilson. Um,
26:02
Speaker 1: these teams are freaking crater. I think I have another
26:07
Speaker 1: call coming in now. Listen. It's just a podcast. Why
26:11
Speaker 1: don't you get it? The look what I'm saying is
26:17
Speaker 1: is Washington and I've been preaching this. There is zero
26:20
Speaker 1: reason to worry about Washington. Um there. I mean, unless
26:23
Speaker 1: they don't get in the tournament, I don't think it's
26:25
Speaker 1: gonna happen. But they're there. Syracuse West, that's who they are.
26:30
Speaker 1: Their head coach was an assistant for under Bayond for
26:33
Speaker 1: twenty years. He went out there and you know, and
26:37
Speaker 1: he installed the same exact two three zone, and they
26:41
Speaker 1: do it actually more. They're the only team that runs
26:44
Speaker 1: own more than Syracuse this year, and they're actually doing
26:46
Speaker 1: it with more effectiveness. But you'll see at the end
26:49
Speaker 1: of the year during the regular season in the past
26:51
Speaker 1: where Syracuse struggles. I mean, this isn't a team that
26:54
Speaker 1: gets a one seed a two seeds every year. But
26:57
Speaker 1: then they get into the tournament and they're playing these
26:58
Speaker 1: teams that haven't seen that zone with all of its length,
27:02
Speaker 1: which Washington has as well, and teams are lost in
27:06
Speaker 1: these foreign gyms that they're not used to playing in,
27:09
Speaker 1: and so Washington is going to be the same exact
27:11
Speaker 1: thing in Syracuse. Syracuse will be as just as dangerous
27:14
Speaker 1: as they always are in the tournament when they get in,
27:16
Speaker 1: and you know, these teams will be around maybe a
27:19
Speaker 1: seven and eight seed. Uh, And they're just a team
27:22
Speaker 1: you do not want to play because all they do
27:24
Speaker 1: is play that zone. They have one of the best
27:26
Speaker 1: defenders in the nation and table, they're one of the
27:29
Speaker 1: most experienced teams in the nation. They're actually number one
27:33
Speaker 1: in minutes continuity, which is a Ken Palm metric that
27:35
Speaker 1: looks at minutes played last year by all the players
27:39
Speaker 1: on a team compared to this year, and they're over
27:43
Speaker 1: the averages around fifty. So this team's played together a
27:46
Speaker 1: ton that really experienced a lot of seniors, and they
27:48
Speaker 1: have a unique scheme and it's that zone, and that
27:51
Speaker 1: is what you look for in a team that can
27:54
Speaker 1: make a run with a deep future. I mean, even
27:57
Speaker 1: Baylor they made a couple of lead eight run because
28:00
Speaker 1: of their zone, and it's it's just these unique A
28:04
Speaker 1: lot of times its zones that teams aren't used to
28:06
Speaker 1: seeing can trip up anyone in the tournament. Marquette is
28:10
Speaker 1: a different story. Marcus Howard is wearing down their their turnovers,
28:14
Speaker 1: their defense has just been bad. I mean, I'm I'm
28:19
Speaker 1: actually hoping that they get bounced early in the Big
28:21
Speaker 1: East Tournament, get a week off, figure things out. Marcus
28:25
Speaker 1: Howard can still take over game, go for fifty. They're
28:28
Speaker 1: not dead in the water, but there's some worrying signs there.
28:31
Speaker 1: What do I do with Murray State. I mean it's
28:36
Speaker 1: I think that's I think you want to wait and see.
28:40
Speaker 1: I don't think you want to buy a future on
28:41
Speaker 1: them now. You want to wait and see what their
28:43
Speaker 1: bracket looks like. But I'm not a buyer in in
28:46
Speaker 1: Mary State. I mean you can look at a lot
28:49
Speaker 1: of these teams historically in college, these mid majors, if
28:52
Speaker 1: you look back at a lot of the teams that
28:55
Speaker 1: made a deep runs, they're not generally driven by one
28:59
Speaker 1: star player. And Mary stayed as a one man band.
29:02
Speaker 1: I mean, it is Morant and that is pretty much it.
29:05
Speaker 1: I mean there have been there have been mid majors
29:07
Speaker 1: with NBA stars that never even make the n C
29:11
Speaker 1: a tournament. Damian Lillard comes to mind, um, but you
29:14
Speaker 1: don't really normally see just a one man team make
29:19
Speaker 1: a deep run from a mid major in the n
29:22
Speaker 1: c A tournament. Pretty easy to team against. They're gonna
29:26
Speaker 1: get killed inside. I mean, if they play a really
29:30
Speaker 1: guard heavy team, Morant can maybe win a couple of games,
29:34
Speaker 1: but I think it's gonna be tough for Mary's State.
29:36
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not a buyer. I'm actually would be
29:39
Speaker 1: more intrigued with Belmont and their motion offense if they
29:43
Speaker 1: get in. I mean, there it's an outside shot for
29:46
Speaker 1: an outlaw at large, but it's just Morant and that's it.
29:49
Speaker 1: I mean, maybe he can go for and and pick
29:55
Speaker 1: up a win or two, but I don't like their
29:56
Speaker 1: chances to make a really deep run as a regular better,
30:00
Speaker 1: as someone who could be described practically as a professional better.
30:05
Speaker 1: I think the most polarizing team in all of college
30:09
Speaker 1: basketball for betters for years decades has been Duke. Where
30:16
Speaker 1: do you stand on Duke as a team to bet on?
30:22
Speaker 1: I personally despise Duke basketball and the reason I do
30:28
Speaker 1: and the reason I carried through and I don't let
30:30
Speaker 1: it affect my handicap and I'll bet them at times,
30:32
Speaker 1: so generally I would think that they tend to be
30:35
Speaker 1: a little overvalued in spots. Their home court is fully
30:40
Speaker 1: captured in the market. But the reason I hate Duke
30:44
Speaker 1: is the reason that I started betting. My dad is
30:47
Speaker 1: a huge, huge Duke fan, and in the nineties, when
30:51
Speaker 1: I was kid seven years old, eight years old, I
30:55
Speaker 1: used to bet them twenty dollars that Duke would lose
31:00
Speaker 1: every game. And it was the greatest betting scheme ever
31:03
Speaker 1: because if Duke one and they would win almost every
31:07
Speaker 1: game but one every year back then, he wouldn't make
31:10
Speaker 1: me pay him twenty or something that was seven year
31:12
Speaker 1: old kids, but if one game that Duke lost, I
31:15
Speaker 1: would get twenty bucks. So I grew up rooting against Duke.
31:20
Speaker 1: I grew up when my dad was at the Duke
31:24
Speaker 1: Kentucky game and he was sitting at him and he
31:28
Speaker 1: was at the spectrum the lightner shot when he went
31:30
Speaker 1: ten to ten, he was under the basket where later
31:32
Speaker 1: Or made it. And I don't really remember this, but
31:36
Speaker 1: my mom I thought I was I think I was eight.
31:39
Speaker 1: My mom says that I cried and then I wouldn't
31:42
Speaker 1: talk to my dad for a week and now I, uh,
31:47
Speaker 1: I am dating and will eventually marry a girl that's
31:50
Speaker 1: and live in Lexington went to Kentucky. He whole family
31:53
Speaker 1: or Kentucky fans. My dad says that the only reason
31:55
Speaker 1: I'm doing this is to still get him back for
31:57
Speaker 1: that shot you're gonna for posh. Yeah, eventually some time
32:03
Speaker 1: later this year. Did she know that? I think so?
32:08
Speaker 1: You think so? Are you know? So? I know so?
32:11
Speaker 1: Because you told her you said, I'm going to propose her.
32:13
Speaker 1: She said, asshole, you better proposed to me before the
32:15
Speaker 1: end of the year. Uh both Now, No, I so
32:20
Speaker 1: I told her that I would. I know that I'm
32:22
Speaker 1: going to be with her. I mean, she's a she's
32:24
Speaker 1: a she's a better too. It was meant to be um.
32:28
Speaker 1: But now so I have a personal reason. They hate
32:30
Speaker 1: to but I also love them because it's the reason
32:32
Speaker 1: that they got me into betting. But I tend. I
32:35
Speaker 1: mean a lot of the hate also comes from the
32:38
Speaker 1: they They are no longer this team, by the way,
32:40
Speaker 1: but they started the whole flopping revolution, and you know so,
32:45
Speaker 1: I mean people always hate the flops and all the
32:48
Speaker 1: calls that Duke would get on those flops. Now they're
32:51
Speaker 1: just an NBA team, So they're not like that. I mean, now,
32:54
Speaker 1: now the new Duke is like Wisconsin, uh, and you
32:57
Speaker 1: know all of the flops. So but I think that
33:00
Speaker 1: drives it a lot to all of the Cameron crazys,
33:04
Speaker 1: the floor slapping, there's just a lot of things that
33:07
Speaker 1: you know are unlikable for dupe. But I think it's
33:10
Speaker 1: good for college basketball when Duke is really good, which
33:12
Speaker 1: they usually are. Did you buy a ring? Ah? No?
33:17
Speaker 1: Not yet? All right, Well, if you need help with that,
33:19
Speaker 1: let me know. What's that. If you need help with that,
33:22
Speaker 1: let me know. We'll do all right. Stucky, I gotta go.
33:25
Speaker 1: I got a meeting. I can't sit around a podcast
33:27
Speaker 1: with you all day. I can shoot the ship. I
33:29
Speaker 1: could hear about what's going to happen with your engagement.
33:31
Speaker 1: We could talk about college basketball. But you're busy. You're
33:34
Speaker 1: a multimedia superstar. I'm busy, you know, trying to run
33:38
Speaker 1: an operation. Here. When's the next bestseller coming? Listen? Man,
33:44
Speaker 1: I got so much work to do. I can't sit
33:46
Speaker 1: around writing books all day. That's like, you know, it's
33:49
Speaker 1: what you can do when like you've got nothing else
33:53
Speaker 1: to do. It's like a luxury. Oh yeah, the answer
33:57
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be today, five years or I don't know,
34:00
Speaker 1: is there another one coming down the line, or you
34:02
Speaker 1: don't write No, no, no, I'll definitely write another book
34:05
Speaker 1: at some point in my life. But I think if
34:08
Speaker 1: I had stayed at ESPN, I probably writing a book
34:10
Speaker 1: right now. But that was also an indication me like
34:13
Speaker 1: it might be time to leave ESPN. I was starting
34:15
Speaker 1: to have like a lot of the other ideas of
34:17
Speaker 1: what I could think I could be doing. And uh, instead, I,
34:21
Speaker 1: you know, decided to check it all and go work
34:23
Speaker 1: at the Action Network because that seemed like a better
34:26
Speaker 1: idea than trying to write a book. That's how hard
34:28
Speaker 1: it is to write a book. I decided to go
34:30
Speaker 1: somewhere where we could all start a company from scratch.
34:34
Speaker 1: I'm with it. Well, I'm glad that you came on board,
34:38
Speaker 1: and I will see you in Vegas next week. I
34:40
Speaker 1: will see you next week in Vegas. That's right. We
34:41
Speaker 1: gotta tell people we have a big event going on
34:43
Speaker 1: at the Palms in Vegas next week. Free event. Uh.
34:47
Speaker 1: It starts at seven o'clock. I'm gonna be there, Stuck,
34:49
Speaker 1: He's gonna be there. Blackjack is gonna be there. LaDuke
34:51
Speaker 1: is going to be there, Darren Ravel is going to
34:54
Speaker 1: be there. Uh, free event. You do not have to
34:57
Speaker 1: pay to go with the little chalk talk pre tournament
34:59
Speaker 1: chalk talk, watch the play in games. It's gonna be
35:01
Speaker 1: a blast. I totally should have mentioned that in the
35:04
Speaker 1: podcast at some point. Yeah, for anyone listening, I'll be
35:08
Speaker 1: out there whole weekend. I mean if I'm going on
35:10
Speaker 1: there ones that I can't leave during the tournament, so
35:13
Speaker 1: I'll be coming back a lot of work in between
35:16
Speaker 1: two with coming back on Monday. So if anyone is around,
35:22
Speaker 1: just uh for those other days, probably at the Westgate
35:25
Speaker 1: a couple of days, just shout my way. Go to
35:29
Speaker 1: Action Network dot com slash Madness Hyphen Party. Action Network
35:34
Speaker 1: dot com slash Madness hyphen Party, and it's going to
35:39
Speaker 1: be a blast. You get free entry, drink, tickets, a
35:41
Speaker 1: T shirt. Um, go are sef We've already had like
35:44
Speaker 1: three people RSPP for this thing. It turns out we're
35:47
Speaker 1: big in the event space because remember we had the
35:50
Speaker 1: podcast for the favorites and like we had to turn
35:52
Speaker 1: people away. There were so many people we didn't we
35:54
Speaker 1: didn't we underestimated how popular we are. Well, that's a
35:58
Speaker 1: good thing. Yeah, I'm excited for it should be a
36:00
Speaker 1: blast and uh, it's it's just a great time to
36:04
Speaker 1: be in Gas that night before the n A Tournament
36:07
Speaker 1: the first Thursday, which we'll start at nine in the morning. There,
36:12
Speaker 1: it's a great time to be there with all the excitement.
36:14
Speaker 1: It's betting Christmas Eve, beautiful Stuck, I'll see you out there, baby.
36:19
Speaker 1: All right, thanks, thank you too, Stuck. You for the
36:22
Speaker 1: in depth college basketball plus the uh insight, the fact
36:26
Speaker 1: that he's going to get engaged sometime this year. We're
36:28
Speaker 1: really excited about that. We're gonna throw a big party.
36:30
Speaker 1: We're also having that big party in Vegas. This has
36:33
Speaker 1: been the favorites from the Action Network. Download us from
36:37
Speaker 1: Radio dot com, Slash, the Action Network, or wherever you
36:42
Speaker 1: get your podcasts. Until next time, Thank you very much.