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I think the Preakness odds were a scream in the face about how critical the loss of casual bettors has been to the potential for beating the game. Without them, it slowly becomes a competition between serious handicappers and computers.
I’m biased on the issue, but that’s one reason I wasn’t thrilled with the demise of NYC OTB like a lot of other people. That place was loaded with casual bettors that were seeding the pools with inefficient money. Many of them dropped out. The tracks (mostly NYRA) may have recaptured many of the OTB phone bettors and added some more. Some of the handle from a couple of OTBs may have moved to AQU or BEL simulcasts. But they didn’t recapture a lot of the older and other neighborhood bettors. Even people I know dropped out.
The economics of the OTBs sucked. So there may not have been any easy solution. But imo getting more participation from casual players helps both handle and opens to door to more overlays. The Preakness was just an extreme enough example to make everyone notice, but even an extra tick here or there helps.
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Last edited by classhandicapper; 05-23-2022 at 08:14 AM.
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