WHEN GOOD NUMBERS GO BAD
The NBA Standings are what typical drives gamblers, but those that have been around for awhile and do this for a living, don’t pay attention to the standings at all. It isn’t wins and losses that puts money in your account, it is wins and losses against the spread. One thing I like to do, as the season reaches the halfway mark, is create a different type of standings. It is what I refer to as “above and “below” the line, or pointspread standings. I think it is truer than even the ATs Standings of the teams, because one team might be lucky, and cover 6-7 games by a half point, or 1 point, and insted of being 21-21 they are suddenly 28-14, and look like a pointspread demon, but the reality is not the case.
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WHAT IS PLAYING OVER OR UNDER THE LINE?
let’s make a sample game and show how this works. Let’s say the LA Lakers are -10 at home vs Philadelphia. The lakers win that game by 13 points. that would mean they are given credit for playing 3 points above the line in that game, or a +3, while Philadelphia would get a -3 for playing 3 points under the line. It is simply the margin a team beats the pointspread by as a plus, or loses to the pointspread by as a negative. What I do is make standings according to the best teams above the line, all the way down to the worst team below the line. This becomes my ATS power rating, much more valuable than a stricter power rating of teams that really dosn’t show you where the money is, and what teams are over or under-valued by the oddsmaker.
I’ll give you some savvy artillery to take down your book, or use as a guideline for this. We have seen for several years now, that the Western Conference teams in the NBA are much stronger than the East. Western teams that become the 7th and 8th seeds are ofen well above .500, and some teams are often left out of the playoffs with .500+ records on the season. The East on the otherhand, usually have teams in the 7th, and 8th seeds with less than a .500 record for the season. So what happens? The odds-maker knows the public perception is that the West is better. This has been true up until this year! The gap has become much more narrow, yet the oddsmaker continues to inflate the numbers on the Western teams.
WHY HAS THE GAP GOTTEN SMALLER AND HOW CAN YOU PROVE IT HAS?
The gap gets smaller for a few reasons. A couple teams seem to be good almost every year, while others bounce around. Good teams begin to age, or lose players to free agency, and their draft position is never good. Bad or mediocre teams are building through the draft, and start to bridge the gap, or exceed it in some cases. Good trades by some, bad trades by others. here is the proof that the West is completely over-valued right now, and the east is completely under-valued.
Remember the true measure of a team being over or under-valued is how they have performed all season against the pointspread. The Western teams as a whole have 12 teams out of 15, or 80% playing BELOW the line. The total number of points below the line is 736 points by those 12 teams. They have 3 teams playing above the line, at a total of 169 points. That means the West as a whole is playing under the line by 567 points. let’s turn to the East. The east has 9 teams playing above the line by a total of 821 points, and 6 below for a total of 306.5 points.
The East as a whole are playing 514.5 points above the line. Combine the west deficit, to the East’s surplus and you have 1,081.5 points in favor of the east.
Most at this point are saying wait a minute, but there has been 661 games played in the NBA, so doing the quick math, that 1,081.5 points only equates to 1.64 points a game. That is a true statement, but a misguided one as well. remember that is the total games, involving West vs west games, and East vs East games where the plus over the line value and minus under the line value washes out to 0. There has been 264 games pitting east vs West, so doing the math now shows 1,081.5 divided by 264 or 4.1 points per game!!!
So putting this all together we now have to look at games where the Eastern teams have their most value, and that is as an underdog. If the preliminary testimony accurately projects winners, then the added 4.1 points ber game, should equate to 10%+ more expected winners than the expected value of 50%.
The East teams facing the West on the season as an underdog, home or away are 88-58-5 ATS or 61.1%. So if you just followed this market inefficiency blindly you’d be making money in the NBA, but the future holds no promises. There is something else missing from this equation, and that is removing the teams that are playing below the line in the East. That removes teams underachieving the line, and shoots the winning percentage up to 69%!!!
There you have it, a way to uncover a present day market inefficiency in the NBA, that is based on solid premises, and uses the public perception, and most recent seasons, to show the oddsmakers tilt the lines in favor of the Western teams, based on percieved strength, and public perception. The reason this works is because that strength has diminished, but the lines have not caught up yet, and likely won’t this season!!! Next season may be a whole different story!
This is part of my methodology in handicapping, a fragment of the whole, but an integral part. If I can be of assistance to you in your gambling, or investing endeavors, check out my track record here, and if you decide I can help, I’ll work my tail off to make you a winner!
East
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