Episode 45

Shane Mercer [00:00:00]:

He says, the betting numbers have continued to be strong in the US, stronger than we thought they'd be. The thing that we underestimated that I think is going to be a benefit for all these companies for a while is what bad bettors the US gamblers Hello, and welcome to another episode of Behind the Lines, the only sports betting podcast purifying the sports betting industry. How do we do that? Well, we talk about the sports betting landscape and give you tips and strategies to navigate it, hopefully, making you a better bettor over time. Remember to like, download, subscribe, and you can follow us on all the socials @inplayLIVE. And if you want to see what inplayLIVE is all about on the inside, we've got a promo code for you that is 'BEHINDTHELINES'. All caps. It'll get you the very best pricing. Alright.

Shane Mercer [00:01:00]:

I'm your host, Shane Mercer. That guy over there, Andrew Pace, the founder of inplayLIVE, and we were supposed to have a special guest on the show today. It didn't happen. I'm a little bit pointed about it, Pase, I know you're a little bit disappointed about it, but I'll give you all a little bit of, well, we'll peel back the curtain a little bit, and I'll sort of shed a little bit of light on what's going on with that but, Paes, first, I just wanna ask you, how was your weekend?

Andrew Pace [00:01:23]:

Oh, great great weekend. One of those betting weekends where it's a good reminder of all the things that we preach because execution is always key, and it wasn't easy. I think, we netted Saturday Sunday, if you followed every one of our bets and got the same odds as called, we netted not It's 0.03 units. So if you're disciplined and you, you know, ended up with a small profit. You did a fucking tremendous job over the course of this last weekend. So for me, I had a great weekend. I got to watch sports and have have some fun and, move move some money around where some books go to 0 and others go up, but, not not one to put on the banner. That's for sure.

Andrew Pace [00:02:07]:

Actually, you should put it up on the banner. You should celebrate if you, survive those weekends where you go, hey, I only lost this much or, hey, I only, you know, made this much, because when you do that, it shows that you can weather the storm. I think I've referenced survival as one of the greatest, if not the greatest thing, when it comes to this this business, shall we say, and if you survived, that was, pat on the pat on the back.

Shane Mercer [00:02:37]:

Yeah. Yeah. It was a it was a challenging weekend, to to say the least. But I do wanna give a couple shout outs because, I I managed to weather the storm. And I did a couple things that I don't normally do, but when I saw these, these bets get posted. I was like, I really like these. And so a big shout out to Schroeder on, the Bills call because I put a little bit more on that than I would usually do on a pregame, play, but I really, really loved it. And and I he showed that he really loved it, and so that gave me extra confidence to put a little bit more on it than I might normally do on a pregame play.

Shane Mercer [00:03:10]:

And, also on the pregame front, that came through in a big way was Tim and Tim's, teaser, which I just absolutely loved. So big shout out to Tim as well. That was another one where, again, I I don't normally take a lot of pregame calls, but I saw that teaser. He was calling it for 2 units. I absolutely loved both the plays that were involved in this teaser, Miami minus 2, KC minus 2, and, and I went a little heavier on that one as well than I normally would for a pregame play. And both those came through. They really kind of helped, keep keep me level for the for the weekend, and I helped me survive. So so big shout out to Tim, big shout out to.

Andrew Pace [00:03:45]:

Well, if you, reference stress Free betting. I think those 3 games in the sides you're on were pretty pretty stress free. I think they were Yeah. Schroderall had also had Kansas City minus 9a half, which because of Kadarius Toney actually got a little bit sweaty, but, overall, I think it was, the Chiefs had that 1 in the bag for more or less, the better part of the game.

Shane Mercer [00:04:05]:

Yeah. And for all of you out there who, you know, aren't a part of the inplayLIVE community, Tim and Schroeder are a couple of guys who post regular pregame stuff within the inplayLIVE community. We're not huge on on on pregame, but these are guys who are pretty sharp, and they post some pregame calls. And, they've been doing really well. They've been kicking butt this season. And, so it was it was easy for me when I saw those calls that I really like to kind of go in a little heavier than I normally would, because they they just look so good. But they also have a very strong track record, between the 2 of them. So it was, it was pretty easy.

Shane Mercer [00:04:36]:

And if, if you guys are looking for those kinds of calls, they we do have them at inplayLIVE. While we do focus mainly on live calls, those do exist. And, if you're not a part of, inplayLIVE pro, I think you might not get all of those pregame calls necessarily. So, if you're just part of members, a reason to maybe come and check out Pro. And if you're not an inplayLIVE at all, well, you know, another reason to to come in, and see what we're all about on the inside. Okay. That was, that that was a challenge over the weekend pace, and then I was kind of dealing with a with a separate challenge, which was this podcast and the guest we were supposed to have on our show. And so, I'm a little bit disappointed here because last week, I had promised all of you, the audience, our listeners, our viewers, that we were gonna have a special guest on, and here we are.

Shane Mercer [00:05:16]:

It's just the end piece again. You know, not not exactly, what I was hoping for, today. But I wanna, maybe peel back the curtain a little bit based on on what we're doing to try to get, you know, this particular guest or guests on the show because, I think it'll it'll shed a little perspective. So let me kind of set the scene for everyone here. So me as a journalist, I get pitches on a regular basis, for for different things and sometimes they apply to the stories I'm covering, and sometimes they don't. And, in this case, I received a pitch from, a, a PR professional who I've worked with on a regular basis, he runs his own PR firm. And so Powerplay, which is the sportsbook, we were supposed to have couple of members of the sportsbook on our show, they had reached out to this PR guy, asked him to create a press release because they were celebrating a major milestone 5 years in the Ontario market. And the press release gets sent out, and they're offering up the CEO, a a guy by the name of, Dean, Sorayo.

Shane Mercer [00:06:21]:

And so I responded back saying, yeah. I would love to have, Dean Sorayo here on our show on on Behind the Lines. And, usually, this this PR guy, he's he's very quick to respond. Well, it took him a little while to respond. By a while, I mean, it took him, like, over a week to get back to me, which is really unusual for him he's usually getting back to me, like like, within minutes and saying, oh, I'm setting it up. I'm working it out, and we work out the details, and it's all booked. So took a it took a little bit for him to get back to me. So right away, I could tell, oh, things aren't moving as quickly as they normally do here.

Shane Mercer [00:06:50]:

He gets back to me and says, okay. It's not gonna be, the CEO, but they wanna offer up their head of content, and I'm gonna connect you directly with him. Okay. Great. Wonderful. Okay. We'll talk to the head of content. I'll I'll, you know, see what he's all about.

Shane Mercer [00:07:03]:

Well, you know, immediately after it took about another week or so before I connected with the head of content. So now here we are about 2 weeks in, and I got this press release on November 23rd. So almost a month ago now from when we were recording. So it took a couple of weeks before I was able to connect with this guy. Then we went back and forth about dates and times a little bit. We had locked in today, and we thought everything was gonna be a go for today. And then last week, I found out that, oh, you know, he's only been with the company for about a month, and the company is not that they want him to do the interview, and they certainly don't want him to do it alone because they're worried about how he might answer some questions or perhaps not be able to answer questions. And so then they offered up their COO, to come on and and do the interview, as well.

Shane Mercer [00:07:53]:

And now, you know, the COO isn't quite available. And so or or isn't available today. And and so we are looking at rescheduling it for for next month, and I hope they'll still come on the show after after hearing this if they are even listening. But and I'm not I'm not telling the story to make anybody look bad, but I'm sort of laying it all out to say, here, they were sending out a press release, seeking media attention, seeking publicity back towards the end of November, I offered them up the opportunity to to take advantage and and here gain some publicity and speak to a whole community of sports bettors out there. And and they haven't quite really kind of been able to, completely get it together to make that happen. And and sort of I I say all of this to kind of make the point that we often look at these sportsbooks. And on the show, in in particular, we often sort of look at the sportsbooks as kind of these big, you know, faceless corporations that are raking in 1,000,000,000 of dollars and, you know, they're they're they're huge organizations, and we and and they're preying off of of us little fish, you know, who, you know, are just average bettors and that kind of thing. And, in in many ways, that is true for the big ones, the the DraftKings, the FanDuels, the Bet 3 6 Fives, and the Bet MGMs, and, you know, maybe the the top 10 sportsbooks that that are out there.

Shane Mercer [00:09:13]:

But there are so many others that are significantly smaller, and they're almost like small businesses or, you know, mom and pop shops. And they're so they're so small and tiny, and they don't have, you know, an entire communications team, and they don't have in house PR professionals, and they don't have a lot of media training. And, you know, they aren't necessarily, they don't necessarily have the tightest knit, management and organization. And, you know, they don't necessarily run the tightest of ships. And I I think, you know, we often pace here on the show, look at sportsbooks like these really, really kind of big massive corporations that have all their shit together, and they were just preying on us, the the small guys, the little guys. But there are so and you know this probably better than anybody when it comes to small kind of unknown books or or, you know, smaller books out there. You know, here they are. They're they're they might not you know, they're trying to compete with the DraftKings and the FanDuels and all of these big sportsbooks.

Shane Mercer [00:10:21]:

And sometimes maybe we look at all sportsbooks with 1 kind of brush that they are big great white sharks eating all the little fish, but I think there are probably more sportsbooks out there that are not great white sharks. They might not be sharks at all. They're kind of like maybe barracudas. And and and the other side of that is that, Pace, you and I, and and especially you more so than I, but you and and guys like Kenny and some of the other pros at inplayLIVE aren't exactly little fish either. And you guys are, in many ways, sharks. And those sportsbooks, those smaller sportsbooks, they aren't necessarily always attracting little fish. Those little fish are flocking to the FanDuels, the DraftKings, and the 3 six fives, and instead, they're attracting sharks like you, Pace. And so, it can be dangerous waters out there for them as well.

Shane Mercer [00:11:21]:

And and sort of this whole process of trying to of kinda booked this interview, really kind of got me thinking about how how these organizations aren't aren't the Walmarts of the world, and a lot of them are more of the neighborhood convenience store.

Andrew Pace [00:11:34]:

Yep. For sure. Yeah. There's a lot of good points there, and I think, you know, it brings us back to the conversation of talking about books like WynnBet or FOX Bet. Those are massive names. Those are not, you know, your little fish, and they got eaten alive.

Shane Mercer [00:11:50]:

Right, So,

Andrew Pace [00:11:52]:

bad books, attract sharp bettors. It's just simple. Right? Books that you have to refresh, you know, because the lines don't automatically update, who would play there? Why would you ever use that interface? Why would you ever use their site? Well, it's because they're taking your bets for whatever period of time that they're taking them. Right? So, yeah, I mean, I I'd love to have them on and chat with them. And at the same time, you know, it is certainly something where, you know, you you are a smaller book that could be exposing you to, some more Sharp Bettors, I guess. I don't know. But I mean, you're in the regulated Ontario market, like, I think you gotta be ready for anything. So, yeah, there's tons of sharp bettors that play there already and that that have come and gone, and there will be more to come.

Andrew Pace [00:12:42]:

And the the reality is is that if you wanna succeed in this business, you have to figure out how, where, why, what. You're going to be dealing with people that win money off the sportsbooks long term. That is essential, to succeed. And, obviously, the the the easy response is to just get rid of them all as they as they come and as quickly as they possibly can. But then where does that leave you in the market? Certainly, you're not gonna be getting, the people that love same game parlays with parlour boosts and, player props and flash props and all that stuff because you don't offer any of that. So your interface in general is just not power play in general. Your interface sucks. You gotta refresh the page.

Andrew Pace [00:13:24]:

You don't have competitive markets. You don't have competitive limits. Who are you attracting? Right? So just from a business standpoint, forget about anything to do with sharp betting. Look at your business and look at your competitors and what makes you have any reason for a player to to play on your side as their primary book if they're a losing player. There is no reason whatsoever. None.

Shane Mercer [00:13:47]:

Yeah. Oh, well, that's exactly it. Right? And it's it's sort of, you know, how if you are one of those sportsbooks or pace let's say, for example, that you wanted to start a sportsbook. Right? You wanted to go out there, and I'm not saying that you do, but I'm just, you know, hypothetically, if you want to go out there and start a sportsbook, you would actually start it knowing that the vast majority of your clientele are going to be sharp bettors looking for another book because they've been limited on countless books already. Right, and they're looking for a new book to possibly take advantage of, you would at least go into it with that mindset. But I don't think a lot of these smaller books go into it thinking that. I think that they go into it thinking that, you know, there's there's a a sports betting gold rush going on, and they're just gonna mine. And, you know, I think they're met with a very different reality.

Andrew Pace [00:14:34]:

Well, I mean, this has nothing to do with with sportsbooks. This is business. This This is just business. And if you're gonna start your own company in a competitive landscape, you have to ask yourself, what differentiates you? And I think that, there are major brands. And going back to Fox and Wynn, those are massive, massive multibillion dollar brands, where you're going to get a certain amount of players and commitment from, the marketplace simply based on your name. People are like, oh, did you try ESPN bet? Tons of people are asking about ESPN bet right now. Do you think that they would have that kind of traction with new players if the name was not ESPN bet and it was Christmas tree bet, you know, probably not. So because it's ESPN bet, that's a name that's synonymous with sports.

Andrew Pace [00:15:36]:

Obviously, a lot of people use ESPN to track games in the 1st place. So you're getting you're reaching an arm into an existing marketplace, that is going to get some traction right off the bat. But if you eliminate the name and you just factor in, you know, multi let's say, multimillion dollar there were there's no one in this space that you aren't gonna be talking about 1,000,000 of dollars. So Someone that has the ability to spend 1,000,000 of dollars to enter this space. You you have to ask yourself that question of of what will differentiate you, to the to the degree that will attract, new players, new customers, so forget about the sportsbook, business needs needs customers, so that you can make a long term profit, and succeed in in any industry. And a lot of these books, cannot answer that question in any way, shape, or form. So oh, we have the best promotions. Okay.

Andrew Pace [00:16:37]:

Do you? Oh, we have this. Oh, a lot of books that say those things, they'll have some crazy rollover, things like that. ESPN came on the scene with this, no touchdown score parlay market. And to to attract people, I I don't know whether that's good or bad. I haven't looked at it. I don't have ESPN bet. I'm not in an area that offers it, at least it's something. It's them saying, hey.

Andrew Pace [00:16:59]:

You know what? We're doing something that no one else is doing. And then, you know, that might attract the customer. So same game parlors are relatively new. Right, but you pretty much had to offer them. Once Bet365 started offering those, it was like everyone has to offer these same game parlors. And, that that became like this really fun thing to do to build this lottery ticket in 1 game. Also, it allowed for people to get the lottery payout in 1 game. So, you know, the the basic model of betting oftentimes, is, you know, whether it's baseball, football, whatever, you build this parlay, in a in a time frame.

Andrew Pace [00:17:36]:

And then as soon as it dies, you need more games to build the next one. So sometimes that could be the night slate of baseball versus the earlier slate. Once you get to Sunday night football, Monday night football, you oftentimes now lose the ability. There's not a lot of other games going on. Maybe there's 1 other hoops game being played with Sunday Night Football. So you lose the ability to build this lottery and the same game Parla allowed for people to make a lottery out of any one game. Right? And that was really exciting for a lot of players where they go, okay. I don't need to find some crazy odds to parlay this with.

Andrew Pace [00:18:09]:

I'll just add in Ja'Marr Chase's receiving yards and Joe Mixon's rushing yards,

Andrew Pace [00:18:14]:

And all of a sudden you build, you know, this this, this, you know, crazy bet. So that attracted people, and then that was for the major books. That was an easy button. Oh, let's turn this on. Right? Let's talk to our odds provider. Let's make sure that they're offering this as well. It's, it's all the same things that are built in the system. It's just a a new a new look on them.

Andrew Pace [00:18:34]:

Well, a lot of these, you know, rinky dink smaller sportsbooks, they can't just turn that button on. They don't exist. So, yeah, you're just gonna consistently get sharp action coming to your sports book and maybe people that you know where you're like, oh, I use this book and people are like, why? Like, you you I remember being a recreational bettor, and everyone's using that 365 as it came onto the scene. And then you you'd meet the guy that was using sports interaction. Actually, sports interaction is is quite a good site now if they let you, if they let you play more than an hour on it. But he's using sports interaction at a 32nd timer to get a bet in. And you look at the guy and you're, like, why the hell are you using the sportsbook? Do you know about this one? And that's what everyone says about the other books that they're using, because you would never use that other book for for as soon as you see any you'd be like, do you know you can bet on all these other things on this other book and it's easy? Like, this is the easiest this is the easiest book to use. It's so simple.

Andrew Pace [00:19:36]:

Right? So

Shane Mercer [00:19:38]:

Yeah. You you know, you raised some great questions in there, and those are all questions that we're hoping to put to the team at Powerplay, and we hope that they'll still join us. And and, you know, we'll at least attempt to answer some of those questions, the invitation is still out there, and we are still hoping to have them here on the show. So for all of you out there that were hoping for that interview today, we're sorry. It's not happening, but it may still happen. Fingers crossed. We're hoping that'll happen in the new year. And, you know, on that note too, we'll just let everybody know that we will be taking a little bit hiatus over the holidays, you know, we're heading into it, so this will be our our last episode until the New Year.

Shane Mercer [00:20:11]:

But, you know, we hope that we'll start the New Year with this with this interview, and and that'll be pretty pretty interesting. And, it'll be interesting to have them on the show and really kind of have this this conversation around. Well, how do you plan to operate in a space where most of your bettors are gonna be sharp bettors. And, it'll be interesting to see how they how they kind of answer that question. Alright. So that that sort of is is it on that pace. I've got a couple of other things I wanna talk to you about. Last week, we began the episode.

Shane Mercer [00:20:44]:

I just ripped off on a couple of, stats, some records that were broken. And, I'm I'm not sure you'll have too many thoughts on on this latest record, but I'm I'm sort of using it to set up our our next topic. But, New Jersey over the weekend. Not over the weekend, but the the stats came out over the weekend. In the month of November, the state of New Jersey had more than a 171 and a half $1,000,000 won from online table games and slots by casinos as well as, sports betting, it took in, it took in horse betting as well, horse racing, and the total handle in the month of November with all of it combined in the state of New Jersey was $1,620,000,000. So that's another record there. I mean, it's, it seems like every month they're breaking records in the sports betting world. Does does any of this surprise you?

Andrew Pace [00:21:38]:

Breaking records does. Yeah. For sure. I actually think New Jersey to break records is tremendous because they were the 1st state to legalize. Okay? So being the 1st state to legalize, what do you think people near New Jersey that wanted to bet on sports did?

Shane Mercer [00:21:55]:

Yeah. Well, what the you know, they they probably went to New Jersey. So if you're in New York, you probably head head right across, right, and and and, head to the state.

Andrew Pace [00:22:03]:

Say There's videos there's videos on social media of people crossing the state line in their car and following the games, like a whole area along the state line where all these vehicles are piled up right on the side of the road, like, pulled over into, like, the grass on the side of the road, and they might not even be watching the games. They're just betting. So I know Atlantic City was getting a huge wave of New Yorkers pouring in to, watch NFL on the weekends and then be able to legally bet on it. Our very own golden Feckin' Goose, who've we've we've had on the podcast quite a few times, obviously, Kenny was a person who was in a legalized state, Pennsylvania, but he bought a place in New Jersey to be able to go there on the weekends and have different sportsbooks in different markets when Pennsylvania hadn't caught up to New Jersey yet. Not only that, his group, we we'll call them the Jersey mafia. They, they regularly frequent New Jersey for sports betting purposes even though they're in a legalized state, some of that can be, you know, recreational purposes where, yeah, you can pop down to a you know, if you do wanna play some table games, some of that can be for, you know, going out to some of those restaurants in Atlantic City, having some drinks, whatever the case may be. But overall, there there certainly is, you know, that tendency to for for that tendency to happen. Now, you know, you rewind the tape, you think about Las Vegas.

Andrew Pace [00:23:35]:

That's where you had to go to bet on sports. You go place the the bet in the window, and that's that's where people kinda live to bet to bet on sports, you know, cash and getting the slip and all that kind of stuff before betting was legalized. So the fact that New York has legalized and all the states around, a lot of the New England states have legalized. I know we were touching on, like, Maine or something last, last week. Yeah. The fact that they've broken records, that is surprising because they're not getting the same amount of travel into the state because of the fact that people can do it in their own state now. That's crazy. I'm I'm actually I am genuinely surprised that that's the case.

Andrew Pace [00:24:12]:

You could argue that's a bad thing. You know, people are gambling and they're losing money. That's a bad thing. But I think it's a good thing from the standpoint of You want this industry to be able to have sustainable, long term success which implies sustainable long term growth, in order for people to, become winning long term sports investors. So if I look at it from the lens of inplayLIVE, I go, hey. This industry, I don't want to fall apart. I wanted to be here. I wanted to be something that I can rely on for income for years to come.

Andrew Pace [00:24:50]:

And I think a lot of people at inplayLIVE would, you know, agree with that sentiment. Right? So, Yeah. I think it's I think it's good that there's new records in New Jersey. I know one of the guys that's been on the podcast with us, the great Gosu Thune, he's based out of Tennessee, and I think sometimes some of the things he bets on, he might be the only person in that State betting on them. So I think there is, a lot of professionals or sorry. There are a lot of professionals that think to themselves, if I'm going to do this, I have to be in New Jersey. And that is something that I has been shared with me from a few people where they're essentially saying New Jersey has a better handle. New Jersey has a longer leash.

Andrew Pace [00:25:38]:

New Jersey has more sportsbooks. New Jersey has Atlantic City where you can place physical bets in at kiosks. I know a lot of the other states have that, but more of a concentrated area of that happening, so perhaps New Jersey is becoming a little bit of a hub for people like you and me, Shane.

Shane Mercer [00:25:57]:

Wow. That that's really interesting to think. You know? Traveling not to get access to the books, but traveling to hide behind the handle. You know? The thing that only a sport a true sharp sports bettor would kind of think about. Right? Big time. Yeah. It's, it's interesting in that sense. And, you know, PACE, you recently, I think, posted a a reel on the socials there of, travel setups.

Shane Mercer [00:26:22]:

So maybe we're gonna have to do a whole episode on travel setups and and car setups maybe or something like that. You know? You you had a pretty sick travel setup that that you take with you on the road.

Andrew Pace [00:26:31]:

I think to this date, the best setup I ever had, and this is when inplayLIVE was, was first kicking off, it would have actually no. It was our for it was our 1st full NHL season, but it truly wasn't a full NHL season. It started in January that year. It was only 50 game schedule instead of the typical 80 game schedule. But, you know, we're a smaller group then. And, like, you know, for hockey for me was always like, I'm I'm not kidding you at all. Like, literally on the Lions Gate Bridge, on my bike, biking to Park Royal to go have a beer with a buddy and an alarm goes off and I've got my headphones and I'm listening to music and I hear doodle, you know, the alarm starts going off doodle loo or whatever. And I'm like, oh, shit, hockey.

Andrew Pace [00:27:14]:

I might not have even known a game was on at the time. And I oh, shit hockey. So pull over on the side of the bridge, make sure I'm not blocking any bikers. And I flip open the game. I see what the score is, and I either put my phone back away right away and keep biking, or I go, okay. I'm gonna be placing a bet in the next little bit, check some data, maybe check 1 or 2 books from my phone, get a wager in, you know, back on the bike, wagers in, you know, roll down the other side of the bridge and flip open my phone as my frosty cold beer comes out with my buddy and see that, hopefully, but in this exact story, because it's a real story, was refreshed to a a nice one wager, which is which is great. But I guess what I'm getting at is hockey to me was just always this thing you could do on the go, obviously, being on a live stream changes things where it's like, okay. I've gotta get to a setup.

Andrew Pace [00:28:08]:

You know, I gotta be able to call these wagers to the group, and and hopefully provide some profit to them. I was like, we're we're going golfing. It was NHL playoffs, and I'm like, we're we're going we're going golfing here. And I was like, gosh, I'm gonna have to livestream for this game. And I was like, there's a chance I'm done. We'll we'll play fast, and we'll see how it goes. And then sure enough, I was like, I I better just bring my stuff, just in case so I was lying down on the t deck with 3 laptops around me on the 17th hole, and I was like, people the rest of the group's like, we gotta get going here. So, teed off.

Andrew Pace [00:28:48]:

People watched the team watch me probably shank 1, you know, a 100 yards into the other fairway and then, back down, called the wagers, carried the laptops onto the golf cart. I had them moving with me for the final hole, and then, it was NHL playoffs, and we we played rock me like a hurt rocked you like a hurricane, on on the golf course after Carolina won a bet for us, but, yeah, we went 3 for 3 on the stream, that day. And when you talk start talking about setups, it's like you can do this anywhere if you have the stuff. So in that particular case, I oh, I have my phone and I had 3 laptops. But, you know, that that mobile setup. Yeah. It's it's like you can you can carry it with you anywhere. And, you know, if you do have some if you do have the ability to extend your computer into an extended display, and that could just be any any TV, so hotel TV, whatever.

Andrew Pace [00:29:39]:

I find that, know, all of a sudden you do have good screen real estate, you do have a good bedding setup, and you do feel like you're at home versus, you know, if you just have 1 device, oftentimes, it can be really I don't know. It can be inhibiting. You feel like you're not getting the information that you need.

Shane Mercer [00:29:55]:

Yeah. Yeah. No. It's it's great that you can that you could sort of have a little travel setup because, you know, just I would never encourage anyone to to bet. If you're betting seriously, I would never encourage you to do it just from your phone. You know, that that that's, that that's really challenging. So it's it's you know, having having those extra devices is, is is really a big deal and and Helpful. That's a great story too.

Shane Mercer [00:30:17]:

I love that pace. Maybe something for story time. Put that 1 in the can. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Shane Mercer [00:30:22]:

Will do. That that's a that's a bet related story for all of you out there who aren't a part of the inplayLIVE community yet, but something that you could look forward to if you do decide to join. Alright. I wanna I wanna move on to the to this next topic, though, because, you know, we brought up the record in New Jersey, and we brought up how many people are betting. Well, this is something I found really interesting here. So this is a story that was published over the weekend in the Financial Times, and it's about a guy named Jim Channels, who's a hedge fund manager in the UK, and he had been shorting DraftKings, since I think it was, May 2021 so in May 2021, as everything was opening up and legalizing and DraftKings was sort of launching their big push into the into North in the North American market, he started shorting DraftKings. And for all of you out there who aren't familiar, it's an investing term, and it's essentially making a bet against a company's success. So he was betting against DraftKings, and he started that in May 2021.

Shane Mercer [00:31:29]:

Well, he recently revealed that over the summer, he switched sides. He cashed out of his short position. He made about $10,000,000 for his, for his hedge fund, and now he's actually very bullish on draft Kings. So why is that? Well, his initial reason for for shorting them was that he felt like they were spending so much on marketing, which we've talked about a a lot on this podcast in terms of the marketing spend that these sportsbooks, that these sportsbooks do. And so he was concerned that, you know, that they were spending so much on marketing without a certain path to profitability. Well, like I mentioned, he's cashed out of that. He did that over the summer, and now he's very bullish on DraftKings. And here's why.

Shane Mercer [00:31:28]:

Here's the quote. The betting numbers this is Jim Channels saying this to the Financial Times. He says, the betting numbers have continued to be strong in the US, stronger than we thought they'd be. The thing that we underestimated that I think is going to be a benefit for all these companies for a while is what bad bettors the US gamblers are. Like, here we go. We've got a guy who's a hedge fund manager, very wealthy already, who had been betting against DraftKings for a couple of years and over the summer, cashed out, changed his position, and now he's bullish on DraftKings, because of how bad the bettors are in America. I mean, sorry for all of you out there who are listening and and hearing this maybe and thinking that you were a good bettor all along, but maybe maybe you aren't, if you found your way to this podcast, you know, and you're not a part of the inplayLIVE community. And that's kind of why we exist.

Shane Mercer [00:33:21]:

Right, PACE? We wanna make all of these bad bettors better bettors.

Andrew Pace [00:33:26]:

Yeah, precisely. But I mean, I also think that the, the whole, the whole craze of the social media stuff that we've touched on, has been a real driver of his his sentiment. Yeah. So, May 2021, you're looking at, you know, the this peak of DraftKings hitting, close to $80 a share, and I remember, obviously, post COVID, the of the whole betting space, like, Penn was trading at, like, $2, at the time, and I personally was invested in it it was a company. I can't remember the name of it, but anyone in the betting space that's listening to this will be like, how do you not remember the name of it? It was, Caesars acquired them, and it just absolutely skyrocketed. And as soon as Caesars acquired them, I I sold, my position. And now the the chart for for, for all of these betting companies or gambling companies is very similar to this. There was just a a total craze as they entered the market, post COVID, the crash in COVID.

Andrew Pace [00:34:31]:

The whole stock market obviously went nuts, and then the whole betting landscape just absolutely plummeted. So, he obviously did well on his short position there. And you see kind of the steady growth kinda towards the end of 2022 until now, with DraftKings. But, their PE is that that whenever you see a company that has this dash next to their PE ratio, that's profit per earnings. If it's a dash, it it means it's inverted and there is no profit Mhmm. To report there. But, obviously, their market cap, $16,400,000,000. So, the fact that he's he's bullish on DraftKings, is is interesting.

Andrew Pace [00:33:20]:

But I think, I guess, what I'm getting at here is regardless of of what the stock price is doing, them is the them as a as a business, they still have a lot to figure out, to to, you know, be profitable long term, and they still are doing a lot of these promotions and different things that, are a little bit nuts where you go holy smokes. Like, they've got some really good programs to incentivize players, that obviously is costing them money, and and they were, you know, trying to acquire the whole market, which is just not gonna be possible, in the betting landscape, but there are a lot of fucking dumb bettors out there. Like, it is just a 100% true, and you see some people come into our group at inplayLIVE, where you just right away go, this is just not for you. You've come in here with a gambler's mentality. You think that you know the outcome come of games before they've happened, you know, you'll justify your success based on hitting a parlor. When we're out there doing what we're doing, you're not necessarily following us and then you tell us that you're just cheering in your last leg, it's like, why are you paying me money to, to come in here and be an idiot, not listen to me, and and it happens. And the thing is is it happens at inplayLIVE so infrequently compared to the rest of the market because we attract people that take this seriously is a general statement. Right? Mhmm.

Andrew Pace [00:36:33]:

So we see it far less infrequently. And when you leave the parameters of inplayLIVE, you jump into the score chat, jump into some of these Discord servers of these, social media betting platforms where they're trying to sell you pics where there's a free section in the in the Discord. It's disgusting. It is downright disgusting. The way people behave, the way they act, people thinking that Vegas calls in to the refs to make a call that goes against them, it is it is relentless. It's ongoing. They think it's happening to them. It's just awful.

Andrew Pace [00:37:05]:

So this guy's right. There are a lot of really stupid sports bettors that are out there, and the thing is is that no matter how bad of a sports bettor you are chances are you've hit a bet before. So you get gratification, and you get rewarded from time to time for stringing together, you know, your your locks for the week and and hitting it and then thinking that you made the right decision. And it's rampant, and the sportsbooks are promoting it relentlessly. They're promoting it over and over. They're sharing the parlays. You know, they're encouraging the parlays. They're doing all these negative expected value promotions and and things to loop you in long term.

Andrew Pace [00:37:47]:

So I get it, but but also at the same time, like I just said, it it's a part of the ecosystem you need, you need these these poor, uneducated sports bettors to present value for for the sharp bettors. It's it's it's why we exist. We don't exist without them. It is a total symbiotic relationship that has to continue.

Shane Mercer [00:37:04]:

So, on that on on the same kind of, topic here, and and why inplayLIVE exists, a big part of it's all in the name. Right? inplayLIVE. It's about live sports betting versus pregame sports betting and although at the top of the show, I thanked a couple of the pregame pros at inplayLIVE for some great calls that they made. They do may we do make a few pregame calls at inplayLIVE, but the vast majority of wagers placed, and and the strategies that you learn about from after joining inplayLIVE and and through inplayLIVE are all focused on live sports betting. And so I'm reminding all of our audience about this space because I wanna take you to to Jim Chanos' next comments here, which I thought were really interesting, and I think we've we've seen examples of of this. So, he basically says that during the the 2022, 2023, so the last previous NFL season, not the one we're currently in, but last season, he realized that gamblers were rapidly switching from pregame wagers to in play wagers. And here's what he said. He said such wagers have really bad odds bets for gamblers.

Shane Mercer [00:39:22]:

So it's become a better business than we thought it would be, and we saw that during last here's football season, and that's why we've covered our short. So he's essentially saying that, that the shift from pregame to betting live during the game is actually, something that the sportsbooks are really profiting off of, which I thought was interesting. So here's some of the stats too. In game bets typically command a margin of about 8%. And, the proposition and accumulator bets, so these are in game parlay bets, those margins are well over 10%. And so I thought that was interesting because even though all of the strategies at inplayLIVE, which are extremely effective, are focused on on live betting, pace, I think you'd probably be the 1st to say that you see you do see some live odds, some live markets that offered terrible odds during the game.

Andrew Pace [00:40:24]:

Yeah. So so that's that's a really good point actually, and and he's a 100% right, in in what he said there. Now I'll just share my screen here. We got a a college bowl game on. Well, Well, we're we're recording this, which is a really good example. So I'm just gonna go to the sports menu of Bet 365 here. I I'm gonna go to an NFL game. Tonight's Monday Night Football, we're recording this on a Monday.

Andrew Pace [00:40:49]:

Now that 365 does not offer a competitive pregame, vigorous. So when you the fair if the if minus 3a half for Philadelphia on Monday night football, is a coin flip, theoretically speaking, a fair wager would be 2 point o or plus 100 on both sides of these. If you guys are used to American odds, these are both minus 110, on on these sides. Now if we were to go over to Pinnacle right now or Bookmaker, they are gonna have better lines on both sides of this game. They're gonna have less vigorous, less cut, that the house will be taking. But we see this 1.9 on both sides. Let's go over this bowl game here. Now, look at these lines, 1.86, 1.8 61 point oh, this one just switched to to minus 110 and minus 121.9 and and and you're seeing it because it's live.

Andrew Pace [00:41:40]:

You're seeing

Shane Mercer [00:41:41]:

It's live. Shift.

Andrew Pace [00:41:42]:

Yeah. But, you're you're seeing minus 115, minus 115 on this spread right now as opposed to minus 110, minus 110 or 1.9, 1.9. So that's what he's referencing. And what do the majority of betters actually place their bets on? Well, they're looking at who's going to win the game. Yep. They're looking at the live spread, and chances are, they are chasing a pregame position that they thought would happen that is now not working out in their favor. And you see here in the top left, new, same game parlor. Okay.

Andrew Pace [00:40:22]:

So you go over and you click on this same game parlor. You'll notice that, the spread lines won't be the same in the same game parlor as they are in the menu over here for all of the things that are available. Okay. So when you actually go to build one of these same game parlors, a lot of the bets have a correlation, but they charge you on top of the correlation itself. So I guess, ultimately, what I'm getting at is those wagers that and what he's referencing is a 100 percent true. It is absolutely true. Now at inplayLIVE there's a whole other side of this, obviously, and that is where we will have potentially higher vague lines.

Andrew Pace [00:42:56]:

But one side of it, even though the big is higher on the entire wager, one side of it has huge amounts of theoretical value, in it depending on the game, the situation. And and that's where, you know, you do look at our over the time stream tracking, which you can see in our free tool suite at inplayLIVE.com, that's why you see net positive results, and they're not over the course of one day or 1 month. They're over the course of years. Right? So there there is another argument to that. It's just that the bettors that he's referencing don't don't see that.

Shane Mercer [00:43:35]:

Yeah. Yeah, it's the vast majority of of sports bettors out there. They're they're bad bettors, and they're they're they're making bad bets live during the game and so if you think you might be one of those bettors out there and you wanna actually learn how to live wager on games and identify actual true value that will make you money over time, sign up. Join us. Come see what it's all about Behind the Lines, all caps, promo code. Alright, pace. There's gonna be a lot of games between now and the next time we do a show, which will be some point in the New Year or early in the New Year, not not too far into January, but we are taking a bit of a hiatus. In between now and then pace, what would you tell sports bettors to focus on? You just brought up a college bowl game taking place.

Shane Mercer [00:44:26]:

It is bowl season, and, there's a lot of other sports going on over the holidays. Right?

Andrew Pace [00:44:31]:

Yeah. So, I mean, you know, we've got this, this NFL I'll schedule on Christmas day now, where they're they're doing it like Thanksgiving. Mhmm. Christmas was the basketball day, NBA. I hate that the NFL's on Christmas day. I hate it. I don't mind a little NBA on Christmas in the background. So my first piece of advice is, there's a lot of events.

Andrew Pace [00:44:54]:

Be safe. Don't drink and drive. Disconnect from bedding for the times that you're with family and friends, that's really important. What you are going to be betting on, throughout the holidays, make sure it is something that you can focus on and and not, you know, be between the family and all that kind of stuff. And sometimes, you know what that means? It means you schedule. It means right now in this moment, you bring up the next 2 weeks. You sit down with your partner, your wife, your husband, whoever it is, your family, your friends, whatever, and you say, these are the days that I'd like to be betting. Will this work for you at these times? And they they might put an x through a few of the days.

Andrew Pace [00:43:34]:

You go, okay. I'll be present for those days, but these ones are then all okay. Great. Do a little scheduling. Do a little planning. That stuff's important. One of the things we do at inplayLIVE is we have a stream schedule released for the week. So it allows you on Monday to go, okay, I am going to sit down with my wife tonight, husband tonight, whomever, and show them when I am going to be working throughout this week, and make sure that that works with their schedule.

Andrew Pace [00:45:58]:

And then we have optimized times, which are the highest concentration of creation of games that we're following that night so that in theory, you could miss everything that day, tune in for 1 hour, and that's where you're gonna be getting the bulk of the action in that particular day. Now with that said, we have college football bowl season. We have NBA. We have college basketball running, NHL and, of course, NFL with Fantasy Football playoff implications and NFL playoff implications as we come down the stretch here. So, schedule, plan, keep it fun. With college book football bowl season, my biggest single piece of advice is do not trust the name of the school as your reason for betting. And a really good example of that, there's 2 of them this bowl season, and I'm not saying these teams are going to win or lose. I'm saying their motivations are going to be in question.

Andrew Pace [00:46:49]:

There's more than 2, but these are 2 examples. The first is going to be Ohio State who is playing against

Andrew Pace [00:47:00]:

Who's Ohio State playing against? Are they they're playing Missouri? Missouri. December 29th, Missouri against Ohio State. The reason why I bring this up is because Ohio State is an underdog, and they appear to be at home. So the first thing is, bowl games are not at home. They travel for the bowl game. They're neutral sites. So you're gonna get people that are, like, you know, referencing stupid bettors. Ohio State's at home, and they're underdogs against Missouri.

Andrew Pace [00:47:26]:

Are you kidding me? Well, there's a lot of things that happened to Ohio State. Number 1, they were hopeful not to make the playoff and not to win the division. They were hopeful to win the national championship. Not only did they not win their division, not only did they not make the playoffs, they are playing in a bowl game that is so prestigious in the grand scheme of college football, but it's not where they wanted to be. And as a result, they are, going to be, sitting a number of key players, a number of players that will declare for the NFL and things like that, they just will sit out this bowl game and irrelevant of who's sitting or playing or whatever. They don't care. They don't wanna be there. They're done.

Andrew Pace [00:48:06]:

Right.

Shane Mercer [00:48:07]:

Yeah.

Andrew Pace [00:48:07]:

They're playing this is a consolation prize for them.

Andrew Pace [00:48:10]:

On the other side of the ball is a team that hasn't been in a bowl game this prestigious in years years years. So is Ohio State gonna win that game. I have no clue. Just don't fall for the trap. Right? So that would be number 1. Number 2 is is the exact same argument that I just made, and that is Liberty against Oregon. Liberty against Oregon. The line for Oregon opened at minus 14.

Andrew Pace [00:48:33]:

It's now at minus 17, and I am not saying to bet on Liberty. Liberty is undefeated. They want to prove something in a big way. Oregon had aspirations to win the national championship, to win the Pac twelve, and, again, they are playing for a consolation prize. Oregon could blow them out by 50 points. I have no clue. I'm just saying be careful during bowl season because just looking at the team in the school is not the answer, for covering a spread or winning the game this time of year. A really good example of that last year, I believe it was Auburn against Ohio state, it was whoever Ohio State played, same story.

Andrew Pace [00:49:09]:

They got thumped. They lost the game, and and the sportsbooks clean up in these spots. So, be present, have fun, don't drink and drive, and when and where you can bet, do it responsibly and and don't fall for some of these traps that are being laid by, these teams and sportsbooks.

Shane Mercer [00:49:29]:

Absolutely great advice there. I love that you you called it a consolation prize. I'm just thinking for all of you out there in your fantasy playoffs or in your fantasy, leagues and you missed the playoffs you're getting eliminated from the playoffs like I most likely am going to be after tonight. You know, think of how much time and effort you're putting into the consolation bracket in your fantasy league, and that might be the same effort that these teams are gonna be putting into those games. So so something to think about there. Alright. Pace, we are closing out the year. This has been an awesome year of launching Behind the Lines.

Shane Mercer [00:45:58]:

I am so privileged and thankful that you, Raj, and the team at Amplify Live are, allowing me to be part of this. I've enjoyed this past year so much hosting this show, talking about all things sports betting and the sports betting landscape. And for all of you out there that have been, on this journey with with us, thank you so much for watching, listening, tuning in, and being a part of it. We hope to bring you a whole lot more in January and in 2024. Alright. So until then, all of you out there, pace and everybody at inplayLIVE, keep beating those books. Thanks, Shane. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of Behind the Lines.

Shane Mercer [00:50:37]:

Remember to like, download, and subscribe. We are on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, and everywhere you get your podcasts. Have a betting story or wanna be featured on our podcast? Drop a note in the comments below. And if you wanna join inplayLIVE, use promo code 'BEHINDTHELINES'.