2022 Kentucky Derby
- Thread starter bcuster
- Start date
bcuster
Well-Known Member
EXPLAINER: How 81-1 shot Rich Strike won the Kentucky Derby
This doesn’t happen. Horses at odds of nearly 81-1 don’t win the Kentucky Derby. Jockeys who have never won any big stakes race of any kind don’t win the Kentucky Derby. Owners with fewer than 10 career wins don’t win the Kentucky Derby.
apnews.com
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
There have been 147 races over the years. Surely an 80-1 shot should be expected to win about one or two of them? Claiming "it doesn't happen" is therefore a bit silly.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Nope. You don't understand odds and bookies. 80-1 is not a fair price. No bookies prices are strictly fair prices.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Nope, it’s in the ballpark, sufficiently so for this calculation anyway. If it was impossible for such a horse to win they’d offer longer odds to rake in more cash.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Like I said, you don't understand odds. They are in no way a reflection of a horses' chance to win.
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platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Go on then, explain why 80-1 doesn’t broadly reflect the chance of such an entry winning such a race.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Because odds are a reflection of how much a bookie can win or lose, dependent on all the other money taken on the race, with a built in profit margin. They are not a 'probability', which is what you are taking them as.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
Yeh even the favourite's 4-1 peculiar odds, when it's the weight of betting that changes odds as bookies look to limit their losses or attract money into their pockets by less favoured horses
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
But they will reflect probability, unless all the punters putting the money on are entirely ignorant of any details about each entry. Sure the odds won’t be the same as the probabilities, but I didn’t suggest that, simply that it‘s not outlandish to expect an 80-1 winner in such a race at some point.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Do you know what a 'mug punter' is? A mug punter is most punters. The idea that a massive range of people with no or little knowledge about a sport come close to reflecting probabilities is...naive. And that's what bookies work with.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
How will they reflect probability?
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Sure, but if lots of mug punters move the odds too far from the actual probabilities, a few wise punters will pour some money in causing the bookies to trim some risk.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
What actual probabilities?
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
If you can't explain it then you're not going to persuade anyoneWith a looking glass you numpty.
AverageJoe
...
Only one in five sports bets wins.
Ergo the bookies win four out of five bets.
Ergo the bookies win four out of five bets.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Margin is what’s relevant, and I’m pretty sure it’s not in the hundreds of percent range, which is what would be needed if an 80-1 shot was pretty much guaranteed never to pay out in 147 horse races.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Sigh. The margins are usually around 17-30% (it's called 'over-round' - because 'cheating through maths' doesn't sound so great) and often higher. On every race. This is one advantage the bookies have. Another is laying off bets with other bookmakers - they all do this. You put a tenner on an 80-1 shot and I decide I can't afford to pay you £80, so I put £2.50 of your money on the same horse with another bookie. Another advantage they have is to cut the price. This will only happen with significant money.
Lots of horses are 80-1 or more in many races. Far more than 147 races taken in isolation. It is nothing to do with probability. 80-1 shots do not win every 81 races. If two have done so in the Kentucky Derby this is a statistical freak. The more 80-1 shots win, the more a bookie will win overall.
twistedAM
Left Of The Dial
But sometimes, just sometimes, the bookies can get it wrong. I used to bet a lot on cycling until about six or seven years ago when bookies started doing some proper research and the odds on any half decent rider were slashed. It's crap nowadays though I did get a 100/1 each way in the biggest race of the year so far.
ouirdeaux
Caring, Understanding, Non-judgemental Type
They get it wrong all the time, technically. The odds of you profiting from this are not great. But they exist.
In the 2009 National there was an unconsidered horse priced up at 500/1. It was a cast-off from a very good stable. There was no way it should have been that price, even in a 40-runner race. But nobody considered it, apart from me, apparently.
I didn't have much on it each way, but I made a tidy profit when it came fifth with the Tote, which was paying out on the first five places. I have a vague idea it was a quarter of the odds, although generally bookies pay out on extra place races at a fifth of the odds. Either way, 100/1 or 125/1 isn't bad.
If I had tried to put much on it, I'm pretty sure they'd have cut the price sharpish.
If you regularly bet each way on horses at prices like that, the probabilities are that you will end up down in the long run. Because 99% of punters are down in the long run. Even if 99% will tell you that they're making a profit.
In the 2009 National there was an unconsidered horse priced up at 500/1. It was a cast-off from a very good stable. There was no way it should have been that price, even in a 40-runner race. But nobody considered it, apart from me, apparently.
I didn't have much on it each way, but I made a tidy profit when it came fifth with the Tote, which was paying out on the first five places. I have a vague idea it was a quarter of the odds, although generally bookies pay out on extra place races at a fifth of the odds. Either way, 100/1 or 125/1 isn't bad.
If I had tried to put much on it, I'm pretty sure they'd have cut the price sharpish.
If you regularly bet each way on horses at prices like that, the probabilities are that you will end up down in the long run. Because 99% of punters are down in the long run. Even if 99% will tell you that they're making a profit.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
Sure, but none of that suggests it’s an outrageous surprise for an 80-1 shot to win the Kentucky Derby once does it? Why would two doing so be a statistical freak? Seems like you don’t know anything about statistics. And claiming it’s nothing to do with probability is just bizarre, do 2-1 horses win as frequently as 1000-1 horses? I never claimed odds matched probabilities exactly.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
Sure, but none of that suggests it’s an outrageous surprise for an 80-1 shot to win the Kentucky Derby once does it? Why would two doing so be a statistical freak? Seems like you don’t know anything about statistics. And claiming it’s nothing to do with probability is just bizarre, do 2-1 horses win as frequently as 1000-1 horses? I never claimed odds matched probabilities exactly.
A horse starting at 2-1 and a horse at starting at 1000-1 are not 'probable' odds. They are a reflection of a market. The market dictates the price. There are many, MANY runs on horses odds (16-1 down to 4-1 let's say). That 4-1 is not a sudden reflection of 'probability' but a reflection of money gambled. And 'gambled' is the key word here. And most of those gambles, a massive majority of them, fail. It has sweet f.a to do with probability.
You simply don't understand this. But are determined, like every mug punter, to believe you are right.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
I didn’t say they were probable odds, I said they had something do with probability. I don’t know if you’re being deliberately obtuse or you really have no clue. And I’m not a punter, not a mug one, nor one as clever as you evidently are.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
S.P have nothing to do with probability. How many different ways can I say this? And cut the snarky crap. I've remained polite trying to make you see you're wrong.
I'm every bit a mug punter, as almost all punters are. But I've been a bookie and I understand percentages, which is how odds are worked out. Not through probability.
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
I mean, it's even called a market. They are that honest at least.
platinumsage
HaveMyPassword123
You keep saying “nothing to do with probability”. How do you think bookies set the market for something like a white Christmas then? Can you see any link at all between where the money goes and actual events that take place?
Sure odds aren’t themselves probabilities, but to claim there’s invariably no correlation between odds and probabilities is just weird.
I think you’re arguing against something I never claimed, tilting at windmills, and not exactly politely as you claimed.
You understand percentages though, so I suppose that’s me told.
