Friday Four-Pack 4.5.24

You should be rooting for UConn. Pats' plan at No. 3. Good news for horseplayers. Friday Notes!

I mean…

Yes, it’s a few days and a very dumb ‘April in New New England’ snowstorm later, but come on.

30-0.

This was not UConn against Quinnipiac in early November. This was UConn pantsing a legit Top-25 Illinois team on national television. The Illini offense came into Saturday’s game as the No. 1 ranked unit in the country on Ken Pom numbers.

Based on the advanced metrics, Illinois arrived in Boston for the Elite Eight with one of the best offenses in college basketball history.

And you know what happened?

The pressure from the Huskies on both ends of the court turned this historic Illinois offense into a team content to just chuck up contested, no-chance threes at the end of the shot clock. Seriously. UConn made Illinois look like an intramural team…IN THE ELITE EIGHT.

It’s not being talked about enough.

The crowd helped. Even watching in a crowded Westin hotel bar in Portland, ME, you could feel how emphatically TD Garden had transformed into Storrs North.

Maybe people are bored with UConn? Is that why Saturday’s run and the run of the last two years are not getting the recognition they should? Because they don’t have a flashy No. 1 NBA draft pick? Because people don’t like Dan Hurley?

It’s probably all of the above. But it should have received more attention: should be receiving more attention.

A lot of people will be rooting for Alabama on Saturday night. And N.C. State a few hours earlier when they take on Purdue. People like upsets. They like betting the dog. I’ve been there, I get it.

Me? I’ll be rooting for UConn to blow doors on Nate Oats’ Tide team. UConn has now won TEN STRAIGHT NCAA games by double-digits. I hope they make it 11 on Saturday night in Arizona. I want my kids in bed at halftime with a comfortable UConn lead.

And I’ll be rooting for Purdue, too. Because this UConn team - players and coaches - deserve to be celebrated for their greatness over the last two years. And the only way they’ll get that recognition, as Dan Hurley mentioned on Pardon My Take this week, is by winning two more games. And I’ll add specifically by beating Purdue, one of the best teams in the country.

Bring me UConn-Purdue. You should be rooting for it, too, by the way. Your bracket is busted. Get the chalk home. Who cares. Give us the game we’ve wanted all year.

Huskies v. Boilmakers. Zach Edey v. Donovan Clingan: two guys so big they can each block out the sun, squaring off the same day as the total solar eclipse.

It’s fate.

Meanwhile, the Patriots can’t really take JJ McCarthy at No. 3, can they? And some good news for horseplayers.

That and a lot more in today’s Four-Pack.

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On the Pats’ plan at No. 3 in the NFL Draft…

A Patriots draft party. Probably.

I’d never heard of NFL Draft analyst Tony Pauline of Sportskeeda before this week, but it doesn't mean he’s not passing along good information.

The vehicle for this information was Tom E. Curran’s Patriots Talk Podcast.

Pauline was a guest of Curran’s and tried to explain the buzz of the Patriots willing to use the No. 3 overall pick in this month’s NFL Draft on Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy.

"What I heard from other general managers -- not from the Patriots but other general managers -- is that Eliot Wolf, the de facto general manager for the Patriots, is in love with J.J. McCarthy," Pauline said.

"And right now, the feeling is that J.J. McCarthy -- or at least Eliot Wolf is pushing for J.J. McCarthy, and that seems like it's going to be the pick. I could understand the love for J.J. McCarthy. I don't agree with it, but I understand it because whether it's J.J. McCarthy or any of these Michigan kids, they have acquitted themselves well during the interview process."

Again, I’m sure Pauline is a good guy. But boy am I rooting for him to be wrong in this case.

It just doesn't make a lot of sense. Last year, McCarthy was considered by most draft analysts to be a late first-round or early second-round pick. Michigan had a championship season, McCarthy reportedly interviewed well with teams, so he started trending toward a mid first-round pick in January and February. Makes some sense.

His teams went 28-1 in his two years as a starter at Michigan. Those Michigan teams were loaded and had an established offensive line and running game. In eight games against ranked opponents in 2023, McCarthy averaged: 15 completions on 23 attempts, 183 yards and 1 TD per game. Pedestrian numbers, for sure.

His NFL comps are Jimmy G and Brock Purdy. He was considered a game-manager, even at the college level.

You don’t take that player at No. 3 overall.

You take the talent of Jayden Daniels or the potential of Drake Maye at No. 3. You take McCarthy multiple spots later.

I’m reminded of the scene from Moneyball where Brad Pitt, playing the role of Billy Beane, asks his scouts “If he’s a good hitter why doesn’t he hit good?”

If McCarthy is going to be such a good NFL quarterback, why wasn’t he unleashed at Michigan?

A quick look at ESPN box scores (not perfect, I get it) shows that in his college career, Caleb Williams had 15 games with 300+ passing yards. Daniels had 14 at LSU. Maye had 12 at North Carolina.

J.J. McCarthy had three. That seems significant.

And as a totally random point, how likely is it the Patriots nail it with Tom Brady and then another Michigan quarterback?

I’m hoping this is a massive smokescreen from Eliot Wolf and Co. He comes from an NFL family, saw how the draft misinformation game is played, and is going along with it. That’s my hope, anyway.

I’d rather have Maye. I’d rather take Marvin Harrison Jr. I’d rather trade back - and maybe that’s the point of all this - to get a haul for No. 3 and still end up with your quarterback. I don’t love it, but it’s better than sitting at No. 3 and taking a quarterback 10 picks too high: a quarterback who wasn’t expected to go in the first round as recently as last season.

Let’s all hope Tony Pauline is wrong on this one.

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McCarthy? Maye? Harrison? Trade? Comment below on your hopes for the Pats’ pick

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On a pair of race tracks looking to help the horseplayer…

If you wanted to label my writing on the racing industry over the past year here at MutStack.com as ‘negative,’ you’d probably have a point.

As someone who comes at this game from a gambling perspective, there have not been a lot of instances to celebrate racing for doing things that help the hobbyist or weekend player.

So when there are attempts to make changes that help the guys (and gals) who download the Form or Friday to handicap the big tracks for Saturday and Sunday, I want to applaud those attempts. And this week there are actually two that I need to mention and as a horseplayer, you need to be aware of.

We’ll start Friday in Lexington, KY, where the opening of Keeneland’s spring meeting is as celebrated there as much as opening day at Saratoga is around here.

Last week, Keeneland announced a takeout reduction in their daily double pools for the spring meet. Usually 22%, the takeout on the bet that acts as a two-race win parlay, will be lowered to 15%.

“This pricing is advantageous to our core horseplayers but also is a great opportunity for emerging bettors to try horse racing’s equivalent of a ‘two-game parlay,’ ” said Jim Goodman, Keeneland’s director of wagering development.

Takeout is essentially a tax on each bet you make at the track, with the rates varying by bet and track. Lowering the takeout, in theory, increases the return on your winning bet. That’s good for you and also good for the track. You win, you then bet those winning again - that’s churn.

In this case, when I reached out to Goodman, he had an idea of what the takeout reduction could mean for the player.

“We hope that it encourages players to participate in low takeout pools with better chances to cash tickets.  The takeout reduction will result in a 9% increase in double payoffs,” Goodman wrote to MutStack.com via email on Wednesday.

I’ll be attacking the double pool more than ever this spring, thanks to the reduction. As players, we need to support reductions like this to make tracks aware we’re paying attention.

One thing to watch for will be the CAW play in these pools. There’s a theory that those huge groups don’t target the doubles because everyone can see the ‘will pays,’ so there is no real advantage for them. Plus, they already get great deals in other pools. Something I’ll be watching this spring, but at least to start the meet, it’s not going to damper my enthusiasm for playing the Keeneland doubles more than ever.

Some credit is also due to Emerald Downs. Tucked in the northwest corner of the country in Auburn, WA, they’re set to become the first track outside of Kentucky to go to penny breakage. Without getting into too much detail, by rounding winnings to the nearest penny and not nickel or dime, they expect to pay out an additional $400,000 to bettors during their 54-day meet. That’s a good thing.

They also announced they’ll be 'live updating’ morning lines throughout their race cards. From DRF.com

Emerald also announced on Monday that it will update its morning line throughout its race card to better reflect the anticipated odds on horses and reduce the potential difference between the morning line and a horse’s final odds. Large differences between the two figures are a consistent source of criticism from some horseplayers who view “late-odds drops” with suspicion.

Vince Bruun, the track’s director of media relations and line-maker, said that he will manually adjust the morning lines for the track’s simulcast and online data feeds approximately 20 minutes before post of each race, using information that can be gleaned from the will-pay pools in multi-leg bets, such as the daily double and pick three.

“It’s not quite scientific, but I’m pretty sure I can get it reasonably close,” Bruun said, noting that he typically makes the first morning-line four to seven days prior to the live card. “For the people who aren’t already checking the will-pays, we’re hoping it will be helpful.”

It might seem like a small item, but it’s a great way to help new players avoid the sticker shock that scratches, early money, and multi-race will-plays can all have on the first flash of the odds for a particular race.

I’ve leveled plenty of criticism at racing executives for ignoring the horseplayer over the years. It’s only right to highlight when people in the game are actually trying to make things better for us.

In this case, it feels like Keeneland and Emerald Downs are doing just that.

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On the future of player prop bets in collegiate sports…

They’re not allowed in Massachusetts. And if the former governor of the Bay State gets his wish, betting on player props for college athletes won’t be allowed anywhere in the United States.

Be careful what you wish for.

NCAA president Charlie Baker came out last week and called for a national ban on college player props.

“Sports betting issues are on the rise across the country with prop bets continuing to threaten the integrity of competition and leading to student-athletes and professional athletes getting harassed. The NCAA has been working with states to deal with these threats and many are responding by banning college props bets,” Baker said in a statement. 

“This week we will be contacting officials across the country in states that still allow these bets and ask them to join Ohio, Vermont, Maryland and many others and remove college prop bets from all betting markets. The NCAA is drawing the line on sports betting to protect student-athletes and to protect the integrity of the game — issues across the country these last several days show there is more work to be done.” 

On one hand, I get it. It’s crazy that college kids are getting harassed live or even online for not getting the over in their points prop for the night.

On the other hand, the NCAA created NIL deals so they could pay student-athletes like professionals, and now they don’t want people to be able to wager on their props.

If the idea is indeed “integrity of competition,” then why not ask for a ban on college sports betting across the board? Spoiler - no chance they’ll ever do that because their media deals are worth much more when people can bet on their games.

The NCAA just got $1 billion from ESPN on an eight-year deal, thanks in part to the fact people watch games they bet on.

The reality is once you stop taking bets on these props and the sports betting watchdogs go away, it becomes easier for teams and players to try and get away stuff.

It was a gambling watchdog unit that noticed something going on with Temple basketball this year. Legal sportsbooks pointed out the weird Jontay Porter money in the NBA. Legalized sports betting provides the NCAA and every other league with oversight to make sure betting abnormalities are flagged. Take that away and you’re opening yourself up to even bigger scandals. Bettors will just find illegal and offshore markets to make these same bets.

Estimates have legal sportsbooks losing over $200 million per year if the ban happens, so expect them to have their lobbyists fight this.

States like Louisiana have already said they’ll stop taking player prop bets in 2024. Maybe more states will follow suit. Maybe at some point, after a long legal battle, those bets are off the board across the country.

But that won’t stop the offshore and illegal markets from offering them to their customers. And without legal oversight, it’s a safe bet there are even bigger scandals to come.

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On your Friday MutStack notes…

• Ever since the DraftKings/Barstool Sports alliance was announced, I’ve written about the potential for DraftKings’ horse betting platform, DK Horse, to really see a boost with Dave Portnoy and Elio Imbornone using and promoting it at live racing events. It was announced Thursday that not only did DraftKings re-up as a major sponsor of NYRA and Saratoga Race Course for 2024, but they also added to the deal by making DK Horse the official sponsor of the Travers. This all but guarantees us great content from Dave and Elio in Saratoga this summer, starting with the Belmont Racing Festival at Saratoga in June. We need the boys on Fox Sports Saratoga coverage this summer.

• Just an insane performance by Kirk Minihane and Co. this past Saturday in Portland, ME for his Redemption live show at the State Theatre. Three hours of madness on stage, matched only by the madness of the KMS fanbase. They took over Portland, including the Westin for UConn/Illinois. An electric scene. Did I fight through a Level 10 case of shingles to perform with Kirk on stage and nail Young MC’s Bust a Move? Some people are saying that. I’m not, but others are. An awethome night.

• Shingles update - they still suck. Don’t get them.

• Driving home late Saturday and listening to the Red Sox lose one late in Seattle, refreshing to once again hear Lou Merloni call out Sox players for stupid mistakes. Local announcers seem more afraid than ever to be critical of the home team. Maybe that’s a product of social media? They should know fans aren’t stupid and can tell when you’re covering for the team or ignoring obvious mistakes. Thankfully, Lou is not willing to do that. NESN needs to put him next to Dave O’Brien for 150 games and just get out of the way.

• In a sure sign that Scottie Sheffler is getting the full Tiger Woods treatment from the sportsbooks, as of Friday morning he is just 4-1 on DraftKings to win next week’s Masters. The next closest is Rory at 10-1. I don’t hate Brooks at 18-1 or Ludvig Aberg at 25-1. Austin Eckroat 28-1 Top 10, too. Tiger is 130-1 to win it, if you’re so inclined. Responsibly.

• The solar eclipse is getting all the attention on Monday, but please note there is a mandatory payout at Parx in the Big Philly 5. Huge carryover, races 7-11, friend Jessica Paquette on the mic. You almost have to bet it.

Speaking of racing, we have multiple Debry Preps to handicap. Three more on Saturday, plus opening weekend at Keeneland. Full coverage here tomorrow morning in StackCapping. Hopefully by mid-morning. If you’re subscribed, check your email.

Start your weekend with the final few minutes of UConn/Duke in the 2004 Final Four. UConn was down nine with just minutes to play, found a way to win, and in the process just ripped the soul out of the Duke program and their fanbase. I was there. It was glorious.

Good luck with all your weekend bets.

Thanks for reading. Go Huskies.

Good weekend.