Saratoga Morning Line

[TempletonPeck]

Thehoarsehorseplayer Wrote:
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> I also noticed that on each of the first two days
> of the meet (maybe two out of the first three) a
> horse listed at 20-1 won at 20-1. Were these good
> or bad morning lines?

It\'s entirely possible, any maybe even equally likely, that the answer to \"Were these good or bad morning lines?\" Is \"good,\" or \"bad,\" or \"indifferent.\"

[mjellish]

Just wanna throw in my two cents here.

Point 1: The job of the person who makes the morning line is to set the line in accordance of how they think the public will bet the race.  That\'s it.  It has nothing to do, or at least it shouldn\'t, with who they think will win the race.

Point 2: The job of the handicapper is to try to figure out our own line of who will most likely hit the board so we can decide if it offers value enough to bet our money to hopefully cash a ticket.  This is irrespective of whatever the morning line person says.

Points number one and two have nothing to do with each other.  A lot of the discussion points on this thread have been good points, but not relevant to the topic at hand.  It\'s like someone saying the track announcer isn\'t calling the races well and then someone else saying I don\'t care because she is hot and someone else saying I don\'t listen to her anyway and then we argue about whether or not she is hot or should be listened to.

The point was made that the morning line at Saratoga has been when way off.  And that point is dead nuts right IMO, usually blatantly so at least once or twice per day.  The guy isn\'t performing well at his job.  Maybe he\'ll get it, maybe he won\'t.

[BitPlayer]

I\'m not a good enough player to make horizontal bets, except for the occasional double, so the morning line doesn\'t really affect me.  I can look at the actual betting.

What\'s not clear to me from this string, however, is how horizontal players determine \"value\" in races for which they cannot see betting.  Do people really rely on the morning line, or do they have their own sense of who is likely to take money?

[SoCalMan2]

BitPlayer Wrote:
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> I\'m not a good enough player to make horizontal
> bets, except for the occasional double, so the
> morning line doesn\'t really affect me.  I can look
> at the actual betting.
>
> What\'s not clear to me from this string, however,
> is how horizontal players determine \"value\" in
> races for which they cannot see betting.  Do
> people really rely on the morning line, or do they
> have their own sense of who is likely to take
> money?

Consider decision making on the margins...say I want to go a little deeper in a leg but not too deep.  I have all the main contenders, but I view the race as having variance and if any logical outsider is too long a price, I want to be covered if that price horse comes in.  Imagine two horses I peg as having 8% chance of winning, but who are 6-1 and 15-1 in the morning line.  I will always include the 15-1 and exclude the 6-1.  Now maybe the 15-1 swings from 12-1 to 18-1 and the 6-1 between 9-2 and 8-1.  That sort of variance is okay and fine and I can live with choosing the longer one and letting the shorter one beat me (remember, they have equal chance of coming in).  However, if the 15-1 goes off at 7-2 and the 6-1 goes off at 18-1, I am going to be furious if the 18-1 comes in and I do not have it because I was choosing the longer of the two and I ended up with a 7-2 that had the same chance of coming in as an 18-1.  

Now people are right, I can do the analysis to see for myself what I think those horses will go off at.  Prior to this meet, i just trusted the prior guy, saved myself a lot of time, and can\'t ever remember being disappointed.  Now, I am too snakebit to make a bet.  In addition to handicapping the Pick 4, I have to also redo the line for all 4 races to make sure I dont get stung as per my example.  That takes me double the time my usual handicapping takes me.  Okay, that is all good and fine -- when I do it, I get an advantage over other people.  My problem is I do not usually have double the time, so I need to cut back and just analyze and play less races.  It makes playing a lot less fun.  

The NYRA is allowed to make its choices, and I am allowed to make my choices.  I have chosen on this Saturday to play Mountaineer (Waterford Park) rather Saratoga.  I never in a million years would have believed I would ever say such a thing, but I am psyched to give it a try. Screw em.  I am sick of being treated like dog doo.

[bellsbendboy]

MJ,  This thread indicates that most \'cappers use the morning line in their analysis, or at least in their misdirected quest for perceived value.

While no issue with your assertion that the line maker should post his opinion, numerically, of how the public will ultimately assess the field, it was not the original intent of the first morning line makers.

Churn, is how tracks increase their handle and old race track owners/executives decided, correctly, that hiring someone who would \"help\" the public lose less, was good business. Consequentially the handle increases. It\'s proven an effective marketing tool over the last two hundred years or so.

For me, the morning line is a largely irrelevant data point given the ocean of material, certainly more relevant, information. bbb

[mjellish]

All I can say to this is the Morning Line has no impact whatsoever on how I play any horizontal wager.  It really doesn\'t impact a vertical wager for me either.  I will note if I think a horse is taking more money than it should, but that\'s not in comparison to the ML.  It\'s in comparison to what I think it should be taking in the pools.  Not trying to sound arrogant, but you probably only get to that point with any reliability by betting and watching thousands and thousands and thousands of races and situations and having some familiarity with which stables bet and which ones don\'t.  And even then, it\'s still someone else\'s money and I don\'t know who\'s it is, so I\'m not necessarily going to trust their judgement better than mine or let the action make me second guess myself.  Could just be the a drunk in the crowd trying to impress a girl, or an owner betting, and those types of things usually doesn\'t mean much in most situations.  I\'m certainly not going to bet a Ramsey horse, regardless of trainer, that is taking more money than I think it should.  But I will absolutely pay attention to a Rusty Arnold horse, regardless of owner, that is taking money.  Etc.

[bellsbendboy]

Agree again.  Most races are for non winners, in fact two/three years ago, on the Delmar backstretch, of the 1200 horses over 500 had NEVER won!

California, for instance, offers, outside of staters and youngsters two maiden classes; straight and $20K.  With the plethora of firsters the morning line is worthless, as a rule.

On Ken, he bets heavily.  Often Maker, and others, will serve up a free squares in a sequence, clearly giving an edge in the pools; such is racing; and many perceive drugs as a problem.

As for Rusty, I kept his books for a few years and will not comment beyond he has few clients, most of his stock are future broodmares and it would be foolish to slight their chances on the basis of odds; as history has shown.  bbb

[PapaChach]

I\'m with you on the time factor. I get an hour or two on a Friday night to handicap and an hour or two on a Saturday afternoon to play. I make my own lines on the races I look at, sometimes it\'s more quick approximations, but I\'ve been taking the ML as a given for years.

Capt. Moss on Saturday was a good illustration of the problem, at least as it affects me. I was looking for a single beyond Flintshire in the P6. I didn\'t think Capt. Moss would be any part of the 10-1 ML but with the ML that high and a short-priced Brownie in there I convinced myself he\'d go 4-1. Figured beating the fave with a 4-1 shot who looked really good on paper was a good way to go. Maybe I should have, but I didn\'t see him going off 2-1, and if I\'d known he would, I wouldn\'t have singled him. Wouldn\'t have mattered in the end as I never would have had Laoban, and I know this is mostly my fault, because I shouldn\'t have, but did, let that 10-1 ML affect the way I looked at the race.

[IK]

Those that play contests where all plays must be submitted prior to the first race have an added burden now.......in addition to handicapping the horses, one must handicap the ML....

[metroj]

jimbo66 Wrote:
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> Hoarse
>
> All your points aren\'t valid, when the ML sucks
>
> Who cares who drifts where off a bad ML.
>
> When a horse takes significant action from where
> any reasonably knowledgeable handicapper thinks
> they should be, it makes sense to take notice.
>
> Same race as yesterday as a case in point.  While
> I correctly pointed out that Stone was clueless on
> the 12 at 12-1 ML, I thought he would be no worse
> than 3rd choice, with the 4 and 10.   When he
> opened shortest pick-4, shortest pick-3 and
> shortest double, in the will pays, it represented
> significant action for a horse with a long layoff
> right after being claimed.  Throw in that it is a
> sharp trainer whose horses often get smashed at
> the windows when they are \"live\" and it would have
> been foolish to ignore the action when looking at
> vertical bets.  (Not saying u have to be a lemming
> and follow the action, but factor the action into
> your pre-race assessment, and if u feel it
> warrants a change in strategy, so be it)
>
> Deviation from where a horse should be always
> worth noting. But u have to know where a horse
> \"should be\" to take advantage of it.   Like most
> people that have spent way too much betting  and
> analyzing horses, I see maybe 1 in 10 or 1 in 15
> races where rhe betting is shocking or I was way
> off (every Kentucky derby it seems).  The problem
> with Stone is this happens to him every 4th race
> at saratoga.  Shameful
>
> Jim

Doesn\'t that go against the argument you guys are making?   Wouldn\'t the 12 have been more hidden because of the bad morning line with all of the casual money in play at Saratoga going elsewhere?   The sharpest guys missed it but all the average Joes still played the horse in the horizontals?

[SoCalMan2]

IK Wrote:
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> Those that play contests where all plays must be
> submitted prior to the first race have an added
> burden now.......in addition to handicapping the
> horses, one must handicap the ML....

Agree. The issue is just extra work that usually you don\'t have to do. Imagine for example the work you do to figure out the race shape. I used to do it without Thorograph race shapes, after getting Thorograph race shapes, I can rely on the race shapes for part (part, but not all) of the job. If all of a sudden, the Thorograph race shapes started to stink, then the work I would need to do would go up. The unreliable ML is analogous to any other bad piece of information....you need to do the extra work you relied on somebody else for before.

[johnnym]

I understand but yet I don\'t if that makes sense.
Do you guys handicap to pick a winner or to find what his correct odds should be which is extremely subjective.
As was mentioned the Derby is a perfect example.
As a sharp investor much like a under valued stock a ML that is way of in my favor I would pound it.
I understand some of you here have probably forgotten more than I will ever know but after reading and trying to understand the points being made I think sometimes you out smart yourselves.
I have enough of an issue picking a winner.
Good luck
John

[Chas04]

lets get Thomas hill home in the Cap baby one more timmmmmmmme. HIT ME

[SoCalMan2]

johnnym Wrote:
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> I understand but yet I don\'t if that makes sense.
> Do you guys handicap to pick a winner or to find
> what his correct odds should be which is extremely
> subjective.
> As was mentioned the Derby is a perfect example.
> As a sharp investor much like a under valued stock
> a ML that is way of in my favor I would pound it.
> I understand some of you here have probably
> forgotten more than I will ever know but after
> reading and trying to understand the points being
> made I think sometimes you out smart yourselves.
> I have enough of an issue picking a winner.
> Good luck
> John

Imagine the following --

You want to bet on a horse to win a race, but at the time of the race going off, you are going to be blocked from the internet and you are not going to be able to see the live odds.  If you are going to bet the race, you need to place your bets ahead of time.  

The race is a match race -- only two horses -- one with a 2/3 chance of winning and one with a 1/3 chance of winning.  In such a match race, I could bet either horse to win.  The thing that will make me decide which horse to bet is what is the price I am being offered.  If I am getting even money on the favorite, I will bet the favorite.  If the favorite is 1-10 and the longshot is 5-1, I am going to bet the longshot.  

If you cannot bet the race live, you need to make your bets based on what you believe the odds will be.  Usually, you trust the linemaker.  If you do not trust the linemaker, you make your own assessment of what the odds will be which is extra work.  

If a good linemaker has the ML on the race at both horses being 4-5, then it is a no brainer to take the favorite.  

But in this case the linemaker who made both horses 4-5 suffered from temporary insanity and it turns out the line actually goes off at 1-10 and 5-1 and any normal linemaker not suffering from temporary insanity would have pegged it right.

The question is -- did I do the extra work or not.  If I did the extra work, then I bet the longshot notwithstanding the 4-5 faulty ML.  If I did not do the extra work, I bet the favorite because I thought the 4-5 was a good price for a horse with a 66.67% chance of winning.

Now, it doesn\'t matter who wins and who loses. I am going to be angry if I bet a 1-10 shot when I could have bet a 5-1 shot.  

The actual winner is not relevant.

[johnnym]

TY for your response..