Morning Lines vs the tote.

[Ray2000]

This might interest some betters who like me,
make their bets early and forget about watching the tote board.

How does the Morning Line compare with actual Final Odds for different tracks?

The Morning line for top 3 finishers in various races from 2/1/08 to date,
was compared to the final odds at post time.

A score of 1.0 would be almost perfect, 0 means no correlation at all.

Track....Rating....Horses checked

FRD......0.720.....1350
CALX.....0.710.....498
NFLD.....0.704.....1289
BMLP.....0.702.....678
STGA.....0.701.....894
MAY......0.689.....464
WR.......0.683.....1121
HAR......0.678.....1662
WDB......0.673.....1614
MOH......0.663.....1950
PCD......0.658.....1311
BR.......0.657.....915
MR.......0.649.....642
HOP......0.647.....1527
HP.......0.640.....1202
GEOD.....0.639.....960
YR.......0.636.....1227
NP.......0.636.....1155
M........0.625.....5717
HM.......0.592.....483
PPK......0.592.....711
HAW......0.585.....504
SCD......0.576.....815
FLMD.....0.569.....2784
LON......0.566.....1956
KD.......0.566.....801
GRV......0.561.....807
TGDN.....0.560.....573
VD.......0.558.....459
MEA......0.548.....1479
FHLD.....0.547.....534
PRC......0.543.....441
CHST.....0.530.....1356
ROCK.....0.518.....516
RIDC.....0.492.....2453

Probably not enough comparisons to mean anything.
DD.......0.726.....45
BANG.....0.724.....63
RCR......0.687.....348
LEB......0.645.....126
INDY.....0.603.....132
OD.......0.575.....381
RP.......0.575.....138
HAY......0.514.....111
SCAR.....0.494.....192
QUE......0.489.....189
TRRV.....0.477.....267
ACES.....0.411.....147

Of course this could change tomorrow if the guy who does the Morning Lines quits,
or if it's being done by computer and they get a new program.;)

[Stick]

Thanks Ray. Interesting stuff. Would you happen to know how often in % one of the top two ML choices goes off as the chalk? Might help for people to know if they are playing a horse only if the horse will not be the favorite.

[Ray2000]

The % of races where one of the Morning Line's first 2 choices became the Tote board favorite

All races 13084
ML Choice1...was fav in 4943 races
ML Choice2...was fav in 1988 races

53% of the time ML1 or ML2 was Favorite

Correction to table above rating the tracks for ML correlation,
The BigM is M......0.679.....1182 see attachment

[njcurveball]

53% of the time ML1 or ML2 was Favorite


Sounds like they should fire all of them if they handicap harness races and cannot get the betting favorite in their top 2 ML more than 50% of the time.

That sample includes a whole lot of "gimmes" like Somebeachsomewhere and Deweycheatemandhow as well.

Horrendous work by these people. I will have to check my database for thoroughbreds tonight to compare but I am about 99% sure the percentage is higher.

And that is when horses change tracks, distance, surface, workouts, first time starters. routes, sprints. etc. Most donot run every week against similar competition at the same distance like Harness.

Pretty poor showing by those guys and I think you should send this data to the USTA. Sounds like a lot of these guys pin a larger ML on the horse they are going to bet.

Good data, thanks for posting. :ThmbUp:

Jim

[Ray2000]

A terrible mistake in the data, I apologize if I wasted anyone's time.
Thanks njcurveball, your reply prompted me to recheck for errors,


Here's the corrected numbers for the races where ML was chalk

Track...Races...MLChoice1...MLChoice2...ML1 or ML2 was chalk
WR........364........248........63........85%
CALX......177........125........26........85%
HP........402........250........89........84%
STGA......299........190........62........84%
BR........306........186........69........83%
FRD.......466........301........87........83%
PPK.......246........156........48........83%
HAR.......553........345.......112........83%
MR........216........137........41........82%
PCD.......440........279........82........82%
BMLP......249........166........35........81%
NFLD......429........265........79........80%
MAY.......160........104........24........80%
LON.......673........385.......149........79%
YR........413........234........92........79%
M.........410........239........79........78%
GEOD......322........189........59........77%
SCD.......274........155........56........77%
HOP.......518........299........98........77%
VD........154........93.........25........77%
TGDN......193........113........34........76%
WDB.......544........292.......120........76%
ROCK......173........94.........36........75%
NP........399........225........73........75%
FLMD......955........533.......179........75%
MOH.......657........381.......108........74%
KD........285........147........64........74%
PRC.......153........84.........29........74%
MEA.......504........271........91........72%
FHLD......178........86.........41........71%
GRV.......286........150........52........71%
HM........175........98.........25........70%
HAW.......177........89.........33........69%
RIDC......875........422.......167........67%
CHST......455........205........89........65%

ACES.......59........40..........6........78%
INDY.......49........32..........5........76%
RP.........47........27.........11........81%
LEB........43........28.........11........91%
HAY........40........22..........3........63%
BANG.......22........12..........6........82%
DD.........16.........7..........4........69%

All.Races.13356....7704.......2562........77%



I should have realized the numbers were low.:blush:

[njcurveball]

Good stuff Ray. Very surprising the guy at Freehold does so bad. Has that track changed? It use to be a rare day when 2 winners paid over $8 there?

Kudos to the Meadowlands capper! 10 horse fields on a mile track are much harder to handicap than 8 horse fields (where 3 horses are guaranteed not to leave) at 1/2 mile tracks.

Thanks for posting. :ThmbUp:

[botster]

Great work posting this data Ray...Thanx:ThmbUp:.

[Stick]

Ray. I was shocked after the first set of numbers. Glad to see it was not that off. I still think anything below 80% on half mile tracks is low. Thanks for taking the time to do this. I , like you, play a lot of races ahead of time and it is tough when I don't know if the horse will be under my MAO.

[njcurveball]

Poorly formatted, but a quick query showing the top 2 ML favorites as they relate to the betting choices. Only 57,796 out of 132,653 races did the selector get the favorite in the top 2 ML choices. That is only 43.5%! WOW!

I have to do some further research on this, but ML sectors in thoroughbreds need some serious training!

betting ch tot # $2ROI
--------- ------ -----
1 57796 1.63
2 39475 1.61
3 19715 1.54
4 9420 1.52
5 4007 1.34
6 1538 1.34
7 531 1.53
8 133 1.30
9 38 1.77

Good thread Ray! This is some interesting stuff. Especially for people who live and die by the morning line.

Jim

[Ray2000]

Jim

The 43.5% is for the ML choice 1, compared to 57.6% (7704/13356) in harness, right?
ML 1 or ML 2 would be 73.3% in your numbers, if I'm reading them right.

BTW
In harness tracks I knew Rideau-Carleton has terrible Morning Lines, (that's why it shows up so many times in my longshot posts here), but I'm amazed Chester is so low.

Ray

[njcurveball]

Jim

The 43.5% is for the ML choice 1, compared to 57.6% (7704/13356) in harness, right?
ML 1 or ML 2 would be 73.3% in your numbers, if I'm reading them right.



I combined ML choices #1 and #2 in my table and then sorted by betting choice. Thoroughbred ML makers stink! :mad: Unless I made a mistake in my query. I will check again tonight to make sure.

Seems they should be able to get the favorite a lot more so I may have put an extra filter in my query. I will do separate ones next time.