Bet the Under and the Draw. Do It.

Once again this season, a great betting angle is to look for the draw and the under in MLS as the teams go through a mid-season slump accompanied by the international call-ups. Every MLS match yesterday was under 2.5 goals, meaning if you had laid down U.S. dollars in legal international betting markets on a 6-game under parlay, you would have made at least 40 to 1.

5 of the last 9 MLS games have been draws.

The reasons for this are simple. Landon Donavon and other goal scorers are on call-up. Teams have higher injuries, and the mid-season stagnation is setting in for certain clubs. Fewer goals means more under bets come in, and more draws are likely.

El Luchador will be looking closely at this week's matches and making recommendations on good value under and draw bets in the coming days.

First up is our own Columbus Crew at home versus the dreaded teetotaling polygamists of Real Salt Lake. This one is NOT a lock, but we will have analysis by 1/2 hour before kickoff once the odds are posted.

As the Luchametric Institute for Predictive Sciences has instructed the Faithful for years, the soccer draw is the highest value bet in the world because people don't like to bet it. You collect from all the suckers who bet one of the teams to win because they couldn't bear them losing.

Bet the draw. Do it.

Luchametric Dot Com: Soccer Statistics

What Bill James did for Baseball, the Luchametric aims to do for soccer.

The Luchametric is a weighted statistical score that represents the net number of Goals plus Chances Created (events that could have led to goals) each team produces per game, minus Goals plus Chances Created Against. The Z-Score gives the relative differences among the teams in Standard Deviations. The metric considers and weights the following variables: Home Goals, Away Goals, Home Wins, Away Wins, Draws, Losses, Shots, Shots on Goals, Quality Shots on Goal, Corners For, Corners Against, Goals Against, Shots on Goal Against, and Recent Form.

The weights for each category were derived by looking at a range of variables (statistical categories) and subjecting them to simple regression analysis to identify those stats which are the strongest measure of a team's strength relative to other teams.  We are currently doing a multiple regression analysis of the entire metric for both EPL and MLS in order to develop both a predictive model for individual teams across an entire season and for predicting individual matches.  

Currently, across most professional leagues, the home team wins 50% of the time, the away team 25%, and the remaining 25% of games are draws.  When there is a substantial difference in relative team strength, the home team win % approaches 65% or more.  The Luchametric Power Rankings are designed to measure team strength in order to give fans and punters an edge on these basic percentages.  For serious punters, a gain in predictability of just 5% is  substantial.   Currently, a team with an advantage of 1 full Standard Deviation in the LM indicates a sizable advantage over the other team.  We are tracking games week by week  in our effort to test the predictability of the metric on a game-by-game basis.  We do this for fun and madness only and have absolutely no connection to any commercial venture whatsoever.

To download Excel files containing the comprehensive team stats, click on the appropriate link below. To be put on our mailing list and receive the Luchametric Power Rankings as soon as they are up, including an Excel file with that week's data, click  here.

The Nordecke Luchador and his associates are indemnified from liability from the misuse of these powerful tools. 

MLS Owners Gambling with League's Future: The Luchametric Mission Statement

The Nordecke Luchador and his associates do not condone illegal activity, but we believe that Major League Soccer will never enjoy the respect and attention of other world football leagues until there is more widespread betting interest in MLS. This will never happen until the monopolistic robber barons who control MLS abandon their childlike obsession with the anti-competitive, indeed, anti-American, single-entity system.

Ironically, it is the anti-competitive single-entity model that results in a hyper-competitive MLS. And it is this very hyper-competitiveness that is in fact holding the league and American soccer back.

More than $70 billion per year is wagered in online sports betting alone (not including street bets and legal sports books in places like Las Vegas). The number is projected to reach $100 billion by 2015. By far the most popular sport for gamblers worldwide is soccer, representing by some estimates one-third of the total wagers placed online.

You can place a bet today on who will win the Spanish La Liga title (which will not be decided until May), who will win the World Cup (which doesn't even start until June 11), first-half results for any first division match anywhere this weekend, or even whether Rafa Benitez will be fired from Liverpool (if the Scousers drop out of the top four, he will).  

By contrast, there are no lines available today on who will win the 2010 MLS Supporters Shield or the marketing gimmick that is the MLS Cup. Most bookies won't even take bets on the over/under for this week's opening games.

"Well that's just because the MLS sucks," you say.  OK, yeah, it's not the EPL. But like most things in life, the answer is not so simple.  It is also because the league is too competitive. "Too competitive" you say?  How can a league be too competitive? Competitive is good, right?" Not if you are a sports gambler. 

As Leandro Faria writes in Simple Soccer, "the smaller the number of big teams within a league, the more predictable it is."

In other words, the more competitive a league is, the more parity; the more parity, the harder it is to make predictions about the outcome of matches. Obviously, betting is nothing other than predicting the outcome of matches. Ergo, betters are interested in leagues that are more predictable, which is the same thing as less competitive -- but not necessarily less interesting or with inferior quality play, as we shall see below. Faria developed a "predictability index" based on actual team parity within leagues as measured by diversity of championships. The top four most predictable (least competitive) first division leagues in the world are in: 1) Scotland, 2) Netherlands, 3) Portugal and 4) Turkey.

The least predictable(most competitive) first division soccer leagues in the world, according to Faria? Brazil and U.S. Major League Soccer.  

The numbers clearly back this up. Last year the Columbus Crew won the Supporters Shield with 49 points. Of the other 14 teams in MLS, 12 were within 9 points of the Crew. Contrast that with the rest of the world. In EPL right now 56 points separates Manchester United from last place Portsmouth (nine of those are a result of the penalty Pompey suffered as a result of going bankrupt, but still). In the Italian Serie A,there are 39 points between No. 1 Inter and last place Livorno. In Der Bundesliga it's 38. In La Liga it's 52.

Now, predictable is a relative thing. Any team in any first division soccer league anywhere in the world can beat any other team in that league, as they say, on "any given Sunday" (or Saturday). So it's not as though less-competitive leagues are boring.The leagues that are actually more fun to watch are those that (perhaps counter-intuitively) are a little less competitive and thus have less parity.

(Two other factors also are at play here and are tragically missing from MLS: relegation and a single table, but  we will deal with these in a subsequent article).

The MLS league bosses are applying a simplistic, American (in the pejorative sense) paradigm and business model to the league. Their thinking is that by maintaining strict parity, there is more likely to be more widespread interest in more teams, deeper into the season, and that this will maximize revenue (which is all they care about). In fact, if they would allow for clubs to develop true competitive advantages with perhaps only a few teams each season vying for the top, there would be less parity, more excitement, more betting interest (not just in the U.S. but worldwide) and ultimately more revenue.

Whether you happen to be among those who love or hate (it's one or the other) the Yankees, Manchester United, Dallas Cowboys (of the '70s and '80s) or the Chicago Bulls, dynasties are a critical part of generating excitement in any sports league. Fans love narratives about underdogs and champions and the inevitable falls from grace that occur each season.  There will be no dynasties and no such story lines in the MLS until there is less parity--less vanilla and more funk, anger, despair and agony.

The Players Union's success in negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement is a major step forward in breaking down the owners' monopolistic scheme. Most fundamentally, it is a victory for the working man and for economic justice. But it also moves the MLS toward less parity, which in the long run does more than anything to support the long-term viability of the league by making it more interesting and more viable for the $70 billion sports betting market.

So, this brings us the mission statement part of this post. As El Luchador and El Chupa travel the world, from Cuba to Caracas, from LA to C-Bus, we are often asked, "Why do you do it? Why do you work so tirelessly, risking the wrath of Don Garber and his minions on the Dark Side of the Force?" Here's the answer:

Luchametric.com has two purposes. 1) Speaking truth to power, fighting the populist soccer revolution in the United States by taking it to the streets. 2) Supporting American soccer by supporting worldwide interest in placing wagers on U.S. soccer.

Do it.

Luchametric MLS Pre-Season Power Rankings: Houston and Crew to Vie for Supporters Shield

By El Chupa

These past few weeks, while El Luchador has been in the streets waging guerrilla war on the establishment, and the Major League Soccer season has hung in the balance, El Chupacabra has been scouting the league, reviewing his notes from last season, and analyzing the off-season moves by each MLS club. Now that El Luchador and his brothers-in-arms in the Players Union have emerged victorious, and the 2010 MLS season is set to kick-off this week, we present the patented Luchametric MLS Pre-Season Power Rankings.

If you happen to live in a jurisdiction where sports wagering is legal, these rankings are offered as a tool for handicapping the early MLS season, a period during which we will have little fresh data available to inform our predictions--and punts ("wagers" for our fellow American gaming enthusiasts). Pre-season rankings aren’t predictions--they’re observations. There are always “ifs” on each club, the season is long, and much can happen. We aren’t predicting the season will end in the following order, but this is how we think the league stacks up out of the gate. The Luchametric Institute for Advanced Sports Prediction Science is indemnified from liability for misuse of these powerful tools.  

Luchametric MLS Pre-Season Power Rankings
1. Houston
2. Columbus
3. LA
4. Seattle
5.Chivas
6. Chicago
7. Colorado
8. D.C.
9. Real Salt Lake
10. Philly
11. Dallas
12. K.C.
13. New England
14. NYC
15. Toronto
16. San Jose

1. Houston – Houston finished second in the Luchametric Power Rankings last season, tying LA in the West with 48 points. Houston and LA were tied for second in the league overall behind the Crew. Houston are stingy on defense, giving up only .97 GA/GM (tied with Seattle for first in the league). Their 4.03 SOGA/GM puts them well below the league average of 4.8. Offseason they lost Holden and Clark but completed a trade for Kevin Harmse with LA. Harmse will add depth and toughness to the midfield. They also have just signed Jamaican International midfielder Lovel Palme. Even with the loss of two key players, we think with their defense and Ching and Landin leading the attack on a team with a Goal Differential last season of 10 (tied with the Crew for best in the league) and a unique home field advantage due to the scorching, humid Texas heat, Houston will make a run for both the MLS cup and the Supporters Shield.

2. Columbus – We’ve put the Crew second and feel strongly that last season’s slow start and weak finish were flukes. Their strong showing in their two CONCACAF Champions League games against Mexican side Tolouca was impressive. If Schelotto is healthy and can play all season; and if Lenhart and Rogers continue to mature, and if Sergio Herrera settles in and helps create up front, the Crew will again find themselves competing for both the MLS Cup and the Supporters Shield. We should know by the end of the first six games or so whether the real Crew is the team we saw in June and July—or September.

3. LA- The Galaxy finished third in the LM and tied for second in the league table with 48 points. Offseason they acquired Clint Mathis from MLS Cup champion Real Salt Lake and three players on loan from Brazilian club Sao Paolo FC. Donovan is back from a stellar performance for Everton in the EPL and although Beckham is out indefinitely, LA’s overall production last season was excellent in spite of a dearth of goals. As such, should the acquisitions improve the team’s goal production, LA will be very tough.  They will have to hang tough while Donovan is in South Africa for the World Cup, however.

4. Seattle – The Sounders finished last season at the top of the Luchametric Power Rankings and fourth in the league table with 47 points. They were very tough on defense, giving up the fewest SOGA per game in the league and the fewest GA/GM in the league (tied with Houston at .97 GA/GM). As such, they were very tough to beat, amassing 11 draws. Off-season they needed to improve their attack, and they did, signing Swiss International Blaise Nkufo. He has been with Dutch First Division Club FC Twente since 2003 and has been their leading scorer each year since he joined. He is 34 (another aging European/South American player comes to the MLS) but he has nine goals in the Eredivisie this season and has scored in all six of Switzerland’s World Cup Qualifiers suggesting he is in fine form. He will finish the Dutch season before heading to South Africa and then joining the Sounders. If the Sounders can hang tough until mid-July, he should make an immediate impact.  If they had Nkufo from the first game, they'd be our number one.

 5. Chivas – The City of Angel’s “other” team (let's face it, LA's Mexican team), Chivas was a bit of a puzzle last season. The club was tied with Dallas and New York for the fewest number of draws at 6, but the club still managed to produce 45 points. The club either won or lost virtually every time it went out, testing the theory that a team needs to settle for draws if it hopes to succeed over the long haul. The club scored only 34 Goals, below the league average of 38, but gave up only 31, much better than the league average of 38. Their ability to shut down opposing teams was their greatest strength last season and perhaps explains how they scratched out as many points as they did in spite of a less-than-impressive offense. Their two major offseason signings, Osael Romero (Vista Hermosa - El Salvador) and Michael Umana (Liberia Mia - Costa Rica) don’t suggest there will be more goals for Chivas this season.

6. Chicago – The Fire finished fourth in the LM Rankings and tied with Chivas for fifth in the league table with 45 points. They certainly will be a different team without Mexican legend Cuauhtemoc Blanco, however.  Chicago had a hard time scoring at home last season, totaling only 16 GF compared to 23 GF on the road. They’re attacking style resulted in above average SOG and CKs, but they had a hard time finding the net overall. Offseason they signed Krzysztof Król on loan from the Polish first division to fill the left back position; Collins John, a Liberian-born Dutch striker with experience in both the EPL and the Eredivisie, but a player who has failed to stick anywhere he has played and who has a reputation as a bit of a head-case; and Julio Martinez, a Salvadorian International winger on loan from Mexican club Leon. If Martinez and John can add to the Fire’s attack and the team finds a suitable replacement for Blanco, Chicago may be in a position to improve on last season’s showing.

7. Colorado – The Rapids had a respectable season, earning 40 PTS and basically establishing the median line in the MLS table. They scored 1.4 G/GM and gave up 1.27. They had a lot of draws (10) but only 2 wins on the road and 10 losses. Both Colorado and Real Salt Lake enjoy substantial home field advantages due to their respective altitudes. But the Rapids’ offseason moves are unimpressive and a bit of a puzzle.  Conor Casey and Omar Cummings can score, and Ballouchy has potential.  So look for Colorado still to be tough at home and playoff bound, but not a serious threat to unseat the top teams in the table.

8. D.C. – El Chupa has had it in for DC since he heckled John Harkes at the very first Crew game back in the ‘Shoe. DC’s success has only made a bad relationship worse, which is one way of saying that DC still evokes fear in El Chupa. However, DC stunk last season. And when you watched them, you saw a team that couldn’t play as a unit and which was constantly bickering on the field. The offseason moves don’t indicate they’ve solved the puzzle. They essentially jettisoned most of last year’s team and other than Cristian Castillo, the offseason signings are uninspiring.

9. RSL – RSL played very well in the postseason. They earned 40 PTS in the regular season which was average. Kudos to the team for making a very good run when it mattered most. But we think that was a fluke and the loss of Mathis will hurt them.  The team made few moves in the offseason and looks like they are building for the future. We expect them to be average once again.  If they don't start winning on the road and away from the high elevation of Rio Tinto, they won't get the chance this year to peak at just the right moment.  And they won't take anybody by surprise and every team will be gunning for them.  Finally, white guys with dreads are like mimes: you see the damnedest things when you ain't got your shotgun. . . .

10. Philly – That’s right. Expansion Philly at No. 10. Why? They did well in the expansion draft. They have a brand new stadium. They will have big crowds all season, and they have a good chance to score goals with Le Toux, Moreno and prospective phenom Mwanga looking to put it in the back of the net.  Given the mediocrity of the teams in the bottom half of the league, we wouldn’t be surprised to see Philly make a run into the post-season. (Look what Seattle did in their first year). Caution has us putting them below the top eight, however.

11. Dallas – Dallas earned 39 PTS last season, one PT below the league average of 40. There are no indications that FCD has made the changes they needed to in order to improve on last year’s mediocrity.  They made few offseason acquisitions and are banking on the core team coming together and improving on last season.  Again, 39 PTS is not that far off the top of the league, and Dallas' strategy could pay off.
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12. K.C. – KC signed some journeyman European players in the off-season but nothing to shout about. They amassed only 33 points last year, and we don’t see them doing much better this season.  Their temporary stadium is such an absolute abomination we refuse to watch any games broadcast from it.  Yeah, there's not much they can do about it.  But it's probably best just to avert thine eyes until things improve in KCK.

13. New England – The Revolution earned 42 PTS last season but were 11th in the LM rankings. Their off-season moves were principally spent signing young players in the Superdraft and we don’t see them doing much better this season than last.  42 PTS is, again, only 7 off the top of the league.  But still. . .

14. NYC – The Red Bulls are going to be better this season for two reasons: First: they can’t really be worse than they were last season; second: their new stadium will give them a bit of a bump at home. Juan Pablo Angel can score, but they need help in the midfield and at the back to stay in matches and produce chances.  There are a lot of ifs on this team.  They have a new and experienced coach in Hans Backe. Regardless, we see them remaining in the bottom half of the league table.

15. Toronto – 39 PTS last season and only 33 GF (league average: 38) and no significant offseason moves adds up to another postseason watching hockey.  Gerba and deRosario can score, but there are too many holes in the rest of the team.  They gave up 1.53 GA/GM last year and amassed 10 wins but suffered 11 losses.  Consistency will be the key, but we don't see them improving much.  Plus, their fans are drunken, loutish, mouth-breathers.

16. San Jose – Only one team was worse than San Jose last season (Red Bulls) and there are no signs that San Jose will be any better.  Sanchez brings experience and speed to the midfield and Alvarez could certainly mature.  Ryan Johnson is a great striker but the team as a whole needs to come together to give Ryan good service and to get any better than last season.  Unfortunately, they have a lot of tough teams ahead of them in the standings and on the schedule.

EPL Power Rankings: Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea

By El Chupacabra

The Luchametric EPL Power Rankings have been fully updated through Sunday's fixtures. As always you may download an Excel file with the data here. Chelsea is on top (duh) followed by Man U, Arsenal and Spurs. Chelsea has opened quite a bit of space in the official table and in the rankings. They are now nearly a full StandDev (.92) over second place Man U. We have Arsenal ahead of Spurs by .37 of a Stand Dev. We think the nine goals Spurs scored against Wigan were a fluke and that they'll move further down the rankings in the weeks ahead.

Chelsea's dominance is most obvious on defense. They allow the fewest Goals Against per game in the league (.57), the fewest Shots on Goal Against per game in the league (2.5) and the lowest percentage of SOGA to SHTs Against (.26). This latter stat tells us that only 26% of the oppositions' shots are actually on goal, giving us a sense of how few quality chances Chelsea actually allows its opponents (the league average is 37%)

They also lead the league in Recent Form, and have now beaten Liverpool, Man U, Arsenal and Spurs. The season is far from over, and Man U lurks five points behind with a home game against Chelsea still to come. But seriously people, the Blues have a shot at the EPL crown, the Champions league and the FA cup. I'd still take Barca over Chelsea at this point, but what a match it would be.

For the Punters: Keep Hope Alive

By El Chupa

After a difficult weekend, El Chupa has the following observations for our brother and sister wagerers.

Remember that the reason it is so difficult to make any money is the odds. Picking a likely winner is fairly easy, but picking one where the payout is even remotely worth the risk is very hard. The house always wins. And it's certainly the case that the house sets the odds in its favor not only for individual games, but also in order to steer bettors to certain matches. Man U at home vs Portsmouth is a no-brainer, and the house stands to make very little or even lose money if it is heavily played. So, they set the odds such that even the most die hard Man U troglodyte will lay off and look elsewhere. Do that for enough matches and the number of matches worth betting on gets smaller and thus attract the most attention.

The Luchametric is about to undergo a major revision. We're still very confident in the metric as a measure of a team's production, but we've learned a lot over the last few weeks and it's time to introduce some long-considered changes. Look for the new metric in the next few days.

MLS Parity: The Crew lost to NY yesterday. WTF? SEA lost at home to TOR. WTF? DC beat CHI at CHI. WTF WTF?! It's enough to make one give up on the beautiful game altogether. But a quick crunch of the numbers revealed just how much parity there is in the MLS this season and last season as well. Look for El Chupa's analysis in the next few days. Bottom line? Any team in the MLS can beat any other on any given night. LA and NE are both surging, but we really don't think they are better than the other top teams. We think that there are several teams (HOU, CLB, LA, NE, DC, CHI, SEA, even TOR) all of which are pretty much even. It makes for very frustrating attempts at sound wagers. If the best team in the MLS can't go into NY and beat the worst team, I don't give a damn about home field advantage, then something's fucked up. Either football is not the beautiful game but is in fact a completely stupid game, or the MLS has achieved a sort of parity that keeps each franchise in the hunt for the post-season thus generating revenue for each team and the league, but a parity that levels the playing field to such a point it makes for boring, stupid soccer with teams struggling just to create chances, goals and wins. We want competitive football, not every single team to be average, which is what you get when there is nothing BUT parity in the league. Think about it--parity means everybody is "average" as no one is better or worse than anyone else. Sounds like communism to me.