NYRA adding third daily Pick 4 to wagering menu

[classhandicapper]

The higher the track take for a bet, the more horse players will lose as a group per dollar bet.

Math is math. End of story.

What exotic bets allow you to do is leverage multiple opinions into better value than a win, place or show bet.

In other words

If you think some 5-1 shot is decent value and you hate the 2nd choice in the same race, you can make exactas that key on the 5-1 shot on top and leave off the over bet 2nd choice. That will create greater betting value than betting the 5-1 to win. The two value oriented opinions compound into greater value.

If you think a horse in the 1st race of a Pick 4 and the last race of a Pick 4 are both good value, the tickets combining them will be greater value than the individual horses are, because again, value to value compounds.

The reason these exotic bets pay more than the parlays (which is the standard way to think about them but imo a terrible way to think about the values) has nothing to do with the value of the bets.

It has to do with the amount of money you put through the window in each case.

A four horse parlay will involve putting a ton of money through the windows taxed a lower rate (which no one does anyway) than a pick 4 where you will put a smaller amount of money through the windows taxed at a slightly higher rate.

Imagine one coin flip at 3/5 vs 20 coin flips at 4/5. 4/5 is the better deal but not if you have to flip 20 times.

But critically, unless you are good at discerning value and structuring your tickets properly, your ROI will be LOWER in the exotics with higher takes than WPS. And as a group, that's exactly what happens, because well, math is math and fantasy is fantasy.

[InsideThePylons-MW]

Originally Posted by the little guy

In other words, you have none.

You also fail to understand that extrapolating through four slots at 24% is better than one slot at 16%.

So a P-10 at 60% takeout is better than a win bet at 16%?

If you'd like to extrapolate further it gets worse.

[classhandicapper]

Originally Posted by InsideThePylons-MW

So a P-10 at 60% takeout is better than a win bet at 16%?

If you'd like to extrapolate further it gets worse.

The misunderstandings about these bets are so beyond mind boggling to me I don't even know what to think anymore. It must be some kind of mental block. We are going on decades now with these fallacies.

[Rutgers]

Originally Posted by InsideThePylons-MW

So a P-10 at 60% takeout is better than a win bet at 16%?

If you'd like to extrapolate further it gets worse.

In theory, yes.

Assuming 8 horse fields, a win wager has 8 possible outcomes (assuming no dead heats)..with takeout at 16% the effects of the takeout is spread out over 8 possible outcomes.(2% per possible outcome)

The P10 has 1,073,741,824 possible outcomes (assuming no dead heats)..with a takeout out of 60% the effects of the takeout is spread out over a billion plus possible outcomes. (A number so small I don't even know how to write it)

Of course, in reality the pool size for the P10 would need to be in the billions, even with fractional betting, for it to be a good bet. So any P10 wager, even with zero takeout is going to be a bad bet.

But NYRA is not introducing a P10, only an additional P4. 8 horse fields give you 4,096 possible outcomes. With a 24% that's .006 per possible outcome much lower than win betting.

With fractional betting, NYRA pools are large enough to make the wager profitable.

In order to win long term win betting you need to find and bet horses that are under bet by 16%. With only 8 possible outcomes (in an 8 horse field) it is very difficult to do, especially in today's world of rebates.

It is much easier to find combos that are under bet when there are 4,096 possible outcomes, even if those combos need to be under bet by more.

As a disclaimer, my views should not be construed to mean I'm in favor of high takeouts. I wish they would be lowered, but I was merely trying to show why some bets with higher takeout may be better than others with lower.

[MonmouthParkJoe]

Originally Posted by Rutgers

In theory, yes.

Assuming 8 horse fields, a win wager has 8 possible outcomes (assuming no dead heats)..with takeout at 16% the effects of the takeout is spread out over 8 possible outcomes.(2% per possible outcome)

The P10 has 1,073,741,824 possible outcomes (assuming no dead heats)..with a takeout out of 60% the effects of the takeout is spread out over a billion plus possible outcomes. (A number so small I don't even know how to write it)

Of course, in reality the pool size for the P10 would need to be in the billions, even with fractional betting, for it to be a good bet. So any P10 wager, even with zero takeout is going to be a bad bet.

But NYRA is not introducing a P10, only an additional P4. 8 horse fields give you 4,096 possible outcomes. With a 24% that's .006 per possible outcome much lower than win betting.

With fractional betting, NYRA pools are large enough to make the wager profitable.

In order to win long term win betting you need to find and bet horses that are under bet by 16%. With only 8 possible outcomes (in an 8 horse field) it is very difficult to do, especially in today's world of rebates.

It is much easier to find combos that are under bet when there are 4,096 possible outcomes, even if those combos need to be under bet by more.

As a disclaimer, my views should not be construed to mean I'm in favor of high takeouts. I wish they would be lowered, but I was merely trying to show why some bets with higher takeout may be better than others with lower.

R! U! Rah! Rah!

[the little guy]

Math gets 'em every time.

[cj]

Regardless of how it is spun, 24% isn't good. Is it better than a 4 horse win parlay? Sure, because 16% compounded 4 times is terrible.

[the little guy]

Originally Posted by cj

Regardless of how it is spun, 24% isn't good. Is it better than a 4 horse win parlay? Sure, because 16% compounded 4 times is terrible.

It's hardly spin, Craig. We bet in a pari-mutual system, with takeout, because we believe that our handicapping acumen is better than enough other players in the pool to overcome takeout. Every time you add a slot, be it a double or exacta, Pick-3 or Trifecta, etc, we are able to stretch a theoretical advantage even farther. This gets to the heart of playing pari-mutually. I understand less money is returned, obviously, but as a player, these wagers are better, if we actually have an advantage, even with a higher takeout. That is what is being discussed by the reasonable people in this thread.

None of this has anything to do with personal opinions about takeout. You know how I feel about that.

[classhandicapper]

>It is much easier to find combos that are under bet when there are 4,096 possible outcomes, even if those combos need to be under bet by more.>

That's another way of saying what I'm saying.

In a horizontal there can be errors in 2 or more legs and in verticals there can be errors in 2 or more positions. Those unique double error combos (or worse) will typically be off by enough to overcome the higher take and more. However, the higher the take relative to the win pool, the harder it is to find combos that will be better than Win. 24% is tricky but doable if you bet well. IMO 60% in a 10 race sequence would be close to impossible.

That's all different than saying that the track take of 24% is through 4 races or that the Pick 4 paying more than the parlay is proof of anything. No one should ever mention the parlay price in relation to a horizontal bet ever again in the history of humanity.

Let's say I have 4 horses with an estimated win% of:

1. 20%
2. 50%
3. 25%
4. 33%

That's an expected hit% of .008333%

Let's say my win parlay comes back around $120 and my Pick 4 comes back around $182.

Wow, the Pick 4 is way better than the Parlay, except that "typical" Pick 4 payoff is wildly EV- and will cost me around 24 cents on the dollar which is worse than the Win take. So it proves nothing except that putting a lot more money through the windows with a parlay costs the player more. The value of the Pick 4 is determined the same way as all other bets. It's probability of cashing and the payoff. I want a lot more than $240.

[The_Turf_Monster]

Originally Posted by Rutgers

In theory, yes.

Assuming 8 horse fields, a win wager has 8 possible outcomes (assuming no dead heats)..with takeout at 16% the effects of the takeout is spread out over 8 possible outcomes.(2% per possible outcome)

The P10 has 1,073,741,824 possible outcomes (assuming no dead heats)..with a takeout out of 60% the effects of the takeout is spread out over a billion plus possible outcomes. (A number so small I don't even know how to write it)

Of course, in reality the pool size for the P10 would need to be in the billions, even with fractional betting, for it to be a good bet. So any P10 wager, even with zero takeout is going to be a bad bet.

But NYRA is not introducing a P10, only an additional P4. 8 horse fields give you 4,096 possible outcomes. With a 24% that's .006 per possible outcome much lower than win betting.

With fractional betting, NYRA pools are large enough to make the wager profitable.

In order to win long term win betting you need to find and bet horses that are under bet by 16%. With only 8 possible outcomes (in an 8 horse field) it is very difficult to do, especially in today's world of rebates.

It is much easier to find combos that are under bet when there are 4,096 possible outcomes, even if those combos need to be under bet by more.

As a disclaimer, my views should not be construed to mean I'm in favor of high takeouts. I wish they would be lowered, but I was merely trying to show why some bets with higher takeout may be better than others with lower.

You started with a false premise and I didn't keep reading. Takeout is not spread evenly against betting options in the WPS pool, it is applied to the pool in total before betting options are calculated.

[Poindexter]

Basically the math is as follows.

On a 4 horse parlay .84*.84*.84*.84 is .4978 which means as CJ mentioned that by parlaying 4 horses you subject yourself to a 50.22% takeout theoretically.

Tlgs's argument is that by applying the greater takeout of 24% just once you get back 76% on the dollar vs 49.78% on the dollar so over a typical 4 horse parlay you would expect a 50% higher payout on the pick 4 than you would get on the 4 horse win parlay.

Now I would suggest if there are rolling doubles and the pools are large enough (which depends on how big a bettor you are) a third option would be a daily double parlay. The double has a 18.5 % takeout so you are getting 81.5% back twice or 66.4%. Now this option gives you 30% higher than the 4 horse parlay, eliminates the blind pool concern because you know the probable payoffs up until post time (so if you were planning to key a horse that you thought was going to be 6/5 but he is actually 2/5 in the double pool you now have that option to skip if he is in leg 3 or leg 4-an option you do not have with a pick 4) and also gives you the flexibility of being more selective on your races (if the races you really think you have some good value in are races 3 and 4 and 7 and 8-you can now play a pick 4 in those races by parlaying the double and not be stuck playing 2 races you do not like just to play a pick 4. So all things being equal I think the daily double parlay actually makes a lot more sense than the pick 4.

The other variable that comes into play in pick 4's is the nature of how people play them. If you are looking to play a pick 4 consisting of a lot of chalk, you very likely aren't going to see that 50% bonus that you are expecting. Most pick 4 players are singling, doubling, or even just combining the obvious horses, so you need some outsiders (all 4 races no favorites-maybe one favorite max with a couple of horses above 8-1.....) I haven't done the research, but if you are interested it is very easy to enter each days results with the winning 4 horses odds, public ranking, the pick 4 payout, compare it to the parlay amount see if you are above that 50% expected value or not).

Then in NYRA, there is that Caw factor. Assuming they are not in the win pools as TLG has stated and they are in pick 4 pools getting double digit rebates (speculation on my part but with a 24% takeout I would think they are probably getting at least 10% back in rebates), then the math changes again. Because let's say hypothetically they are getting 10% rebates and are investing 30% of the pool in your typical pick 4. That means that they are like losing about 6% on their 30,000 of a $100,000 pool. Since the takeout on $100,000 pool is $24,000 and they are contributing $1800, that means the public would be losing $22,200 on $70,000 bet. That means there 24% take has just climbed to over 30%. That also means that expected 50% bonus likely doesn't occur often (I have not researched it-if anyone has they can correct me if I am wrong). Of course not everybody in the public loses30% long run. Some may actually win, some will lose 0-10%.......on up. All these people that do better mean that there are some people that do a lot worse. So some really bad bettors might lose 40 to 60% on the dollar long run pick 4. Think long and hard about what I have just posted and what it does for the longevity of the casual bettor that is involved in this game. If they are losing 30% or 40% on the dollar in these pools long run, coupled with the real low probability of hitting these tickets(2x2x4x6 for $48 might buy you an 8% chance of hitting or 1 in 12 shot). That means they can go 10, 15, 20 or even 30 times before hitting one. You have to look to what this does their psyche, how it shapes their betting goals (if you are a $20 a race bettor and you are down $1000 bucks chasing pick 4's, when you hit a 9/2 for $112 does it do anything for you emotionally). To assume the casual and novice bettor is going to have the sophistication to take in all in stride is a grave mistake imo. In fact the whole ideal of putting the lower takeouts in the pick 5 and pick 6 pools is the complete opposite of what racing should be doing. They are training the casual bettor to bet over their head in very low probability wagers that end up shaping the personality of their patrons. Racing was and should be built on churn. This training does not create any churn. Thus the game becomes more reliant on Caw.

The last point on this is the way people play pick 4's. If I were to pick out 1 or 2 anticipated good value horses in each race and combined them in a pick 4 (and passed when these opportunities did not exist), though I would rarely hit, the times I do I likely would get that 50 % bonus from the parlay or more and this would be a winning strategy long run. But let's face it, hardly anyone plays the pick 4 that way. Typical tickets will be 2x2x4x6 or 1x2x4x10 or abc type plays etc. When people are playing so many horses in some races they are including a lot of undervalued horses and they are just erasing the edge that the extra bonus is supposed to give them. So the assumption that the bonus of having one takeout instead of 4 is a good thing is not fully analyzing the situation. Lots of folks play the all button in a one or more races of a pick 4. You certainly are not going to bet every horse to win a race, so when you are doing so you are just giving back some of that edge you think you are getting with a one takeout wager. Do this over multiple races and suddenly that extra edge has more than evaporated. We all remember that one longshot we threw out that cost us dearly, but we end up losing a fortune trying not to make that mistake a 2nd time.

[PhantomOnTour]

Just bet the Pick 5, it's the best value IMO, with a 50cent minimum and a lower takeout at 15%

[classhandicapper]

On a 4 horse parlay .84*.84*.84*.84 is .4978 which means as CJ mentioned that by parlaying 4 horses you subject yourself to a 50.22% takeout theoretically.

Tlgs's argument is that by applying the greater takeout of 24% just once you get back 76% on the dollar vs 49.78% on the dollar so over a typical 4 horse parlay you would expect a 50% higher payout on the pick 4 than you would get on the 4 horse win parlay.

That's the wrong way to think about it.

In the first case you are getting subjected to 16% on a lot of money bet.

In the 2nd case you getting subjected to 24% on a small amount of money bet.

If you put as much money into the Pick 4 you as you did the win bets you'd lose more betting the Pick 4.

I am granting that the exotics offer you a chance to find overlays that are far enough out of whack to overcome the higher exotic takes. That why I focus on exactas and trifectas. But imo it's a TERRIBLE idea to encourage people to play exotics on the very false premise that the value is better or that the payoffs are higher than the parlay.

Most people can not only not identify those value combinations well, even if they do, like you said, they piss away most or all of the advantage with other combinations and wind up losing a lot more in the exotics. The typical ticket construction obliterates a player's chance to use these bets well. I did that for years.

[cj]

Originally Posted by the little guy

It's hardly spin, Craig. We bet in a pari-mutual system, with takeout, because we believe that our handicapping acumen is better than enough other players in the pool to overcome takeout. Every time you add a slot, be it a double or exacta, Pick-3 or Trifecta, etc, we are able to stretch a theoretical advantage even farther. This gets to the heart of playing pari-mutually. I understand less money is returned, obviously, but as a player, these wagers are better, if we actually have an advantage, even with a higher takeout. That is what is being discussed by the reasonable people in this thread.

None of this has anything to do with personal opinions about takeout. You know how I feel about that.

Comparing the P4 to what would be a god awful bet, a four race win parlay at the current rates, is the spin. I would never tell somebody Spam is great because it tastes better than artificial crab meat. The rest, sure, I know the advantages.

But 24% is too high in my opinion. I'd bet racetracks would make more money with more reasonable rakes, particularly in the P4/P5 arena. But my opinion doesn't really matter. People are being paid a lot of money to make these decisions.

[$w1fT]

I guess Fairgrounds didn’t get the memo about their 25% takeout pick 5 as “better than the win parlay” since they lowered takeout to 15%.

And guess what, I will play the bet there now. Didn’t before. Won’t play the NYRA pick 4 until they lower the takeout.