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Recap & Week Ahead – It’s really here! My goodness how time flies. It seems we were just celebrating the Kansas City Chiefs getting the win and cover in the Super Bowl, then UConn winning the National Championship at a juicy +1800. Then we blinked and another damn football season is upon us! It is one of those things that gets me both excited and terrified. Why? The excitement is obvious, the terror is for the unexpected. I don’t care if I lose, but I know many of your hopes and dreams for the football season ahead rely on me, and the content I can bring to the table. I don’t want to let you down! So, I put a lot into content, I work hard in the offseason to lock in my network of information providers, to fix things I saw as issues in the previous season, to expand the technology to make what worked well work even better…and bring some new features and twists to the content. I just hope all that time and effort pays dividends for all of us!
There is a lot I want to discuss below, so I will keep it brief for this section. The most important thing I can tell you, and if there is only one thing you listen to me on then let it be this…please be sure to manage yourself and your emotions this season. The death of most gambler’s betting career and bankroll is simply because they could not control themselves and their emotions…which led them to press and chase…and before they know it they were blown up financially and had a mess to deal with. Their football season went from hope and excitement, to bankruptcy. Don’t go down that road. It can be avoided so easily because YOU control how YOU bet and where that betting takes you. It’s not anyone else…not the book, not me, not your friends, not your bills, not your wife…but you! Keep it together and let’s have some fun this season! I look forward to celebrating a great end to a great season with all of you again this coming February. Goodness knows it will be here before we know it!
If you are looking for expanded premium sports content, don’t forget to check out TSP Live! Signup is at https://TSP.Live/tsp-live. Options ranging from 7 days, 1 month, 6 months, and up to 1 year are available. TSP Live Analytics members have access to analytics & content such as the TSP Live Radar, KB Consensus (32-13-3 last season), the daily Degenerate Club Report, the Oddsmaker’s Report alerts and more (CLICK HERE FOR RECORDS)! It’s the Sports Information Buffet…and you have a front row seat! For more details or to signup for TSP Live Analytics click here or visit TSP.Live/tsp-live.
The Financial Market Analytics (FMA) subscription is chugging along in its fourth year providing regular financial commentary, market analytics (including the new Path Predictor charts) and trade setups. FMA access is part of the All-Inclusive subscription, or can be purchased as a separate subscription each month. For more details, visit TSP.Live/fma.
As always thank you for your support through the premium content! Your subscription purchases support everything I do at The Sharp Plays (free & paid), expand the content and technology utilized, and support things important to me. I am continually grateful for your support! I would not be here without you.
Lastly, don’t forget about the TSP Telegram channels (Sports, Trading & Twitter)! For details on each channel and how to join them, visit https://thesharpplays.com/tsp-telegram-channel/.
Now let’s get into this week’s action…
Early Sharp Buy (0-0-0 for +0.0 units) – In this section of the newsletter I look for what wager is seeing the cleanest and largest sharp buy at this point in the week. The section is graded based on the result of the play here, however this play can be used for a few things. We have seen situations whereby the newsletter’s early buy sees counter buying later in the week. These reverse buys have shown to be a VERY STRONG and profitable to follow. So, keep the below game. and wager in mind as the week goes along, even if you aren’t interested in action now.
For the week ahead, the Early Sharp Buy is on Saturday with BUFFALO/WISCONSIN OV54.
Early Algorithm Look (0-0-0 for +0.0 units) – The section here is quite simple. I run my favorite NFL & NCAAF side algorithms and my favorite NFL & NCAAF totals algorithms each week. I then post the play below that shows the most value out of the four programs.
The algorithm is showing value on MIAMI OH +16.5 over Miami Florida. The algorithm calculates this price should be +13.5, so we get a nice field goal of extra value on this one.
My Handicapping (0-0-0 for +0.0 units) – I provide the same disclaimer every year, I SUCK at handicapping. If it weren’t for the information, tools and analytics I can access and utilize, I would be like any old Joe. Thankfully, I have all those tools and assets which allow me to be a sports betting genius (LOL)! However, for this section each week, the selection is just based on my handicapping of a game or price. I take pride in this section and want to end the season a winner! At a minimum, hopefully we have a few laughs.
I always prefer to handicap NFL, but I will take a shot in NCAAF and hopefully start my season of handicapping in the newsletter with a BANG! My hope for a BANG will come in betting NORTHWESTERN +6.5 over Rutgers. Perhaps I will embarrass myself here, but it would not be the first time I did that with my handicapping. The bottom line is this line is fishy. The books know they will get Rutgers public money, it’s only one of three games on Sunday…and it is the first one…and thereby will get even more attention. Yet, despite all those points, the books are hanging Rutgers -6.5 and giving the public a deal instead of -7…knowing the public would still bet that “-7” price. Seems the market as a whole is taking a Book Position here by sucking in public money on the lovely “-6.5” that seems so easy for a Rutgers cover. Nothing is easy in gambling, so I will take the tough bet to stomach and go with Northwestern +6.5, solely because it doesn’t make sense and the line looks fishy. I will hold off personally on buying this to +7…but there’s also nothing wrong with locking in the 7 if you are so inclined.
The Sharp Plays Review – Last season, to switch things up, I provided a review each week on something I thought the TSP audience would be interested in. So, keep an eye out for reviews in the weeks ahead. The first week of the NCAAF regular season is always chaotic with setup and content, so I did not get a chase to put one together, but I expect to have one for next week.
My Two Cents – New to the TSP Newsletter and wondering what the hell this section is about? Well, it’s about anything that is on my mind. Sometimes it is a rant, other times a topic in the news or just the ramblings of an insane person (me). I put this section in the newsletter as a therapeutic release for myself, little did I know it would be so popular among readers. I hope that enjoyment for both of us continues this season.
I love operating The Sharp Plays. It takes my passion (everything sports gambling) and allows me to deal within it on a daily basis…yet with far less intensity than my previous career in the sports gambling industry. At first, it was all free content, but of course far, far less content than I do today. Fast forward to today and the content has expanded exponentially. While I thankfully am at the point in life where I don’t need the money, I definitely would not operate The Sharp Plays to the extent I do without it. If that’s being a sell-out, well, I am fine being an honest sell-out and not like the countless blowhards on Twitter who will criticize the monetization of gambling content…until they do it themselves…and EVENTUALLY THEY ALL DO! If you go back 1,2,3,5 years you would see Twitter posts from some of the top names you know in gambling content discussing how awful it is for someone to sell gambling content or services…fast forward to today and here they are asking you to join their analytics website, their odds screen, their selection service, their betting conference, their app, their newsletter, their forum, their podcast, or signup for the sportsbook they are promoting…whatever! It’s all good that they want to monetize their content, I definitely don’t begrudge them for it…just don’t pretend to be holier-than-thou all along. I am by no means a saint, never pretended I was one. I operated in a very dirty industry of offshore gambling since the late 90’s. I made my money, sold my business, and retired in 2010. However, it’s tough to let go of the gambling industry. It grabs you like heroin. So, I got involved in the sports gambling content business in 2011 as a way to pass some time. It was a great way to continue being involved in my passion on a regular basis, to still be in the mix of the industry, but in a much more passive way than the high intensity, in the trenches, 24/7/365 that was my involvement in my prior endeavor for well over a decade.
So, as The Sharp Plays enters its 13th football season, what’s the ultimate goal with The Sharp Plays at this point? To me, it’s about building a brand. A name that is well known in the sports betting industry because of the quality of its content. I am extremely biased, but I think the content I offer eclipses all others in the sports gambling space. Is it perfect? Absolutely not. Do I always make good decisions? Absolutely not, but the content is still lightyears ahead of most of the competitors out there. Think of the Top 5 sports gambling content providers. Maybe you have one or more of their apps on your phone right now. Maybe you visit their websites, subscribe to whatever content they offer, or simply follow them on Twitter…radio stations, podcasts, whatever. OK, how many of those…have records for their content going back 12+ years? How many put out consistent graded and logged winning content year over year? How many tell you parlays are sucker bets versus showing you how to use your edge through parlays to cash over +300 units in profit on parlays since 2011? How many could ever complete a rollover turning 0.1 units into +6.2 or +7.3 units of profit…and I did it twice within the last five months…the odds of which are 62 and 73 to 1? Some of those brands couldn’t pick their ass with both hands, instructions, a map, GPS and a sherpa. Yet, those various providers, those brands, are the names most people know in sports gambling…and The Sharp Plays is not there among them…yet. LOL!
Sure, The Sharp Plays is in the Top 20 or 30 sports gambling brands in the world. I realized that within the past year. It’s not just by comparing Twitter followers or mentions with these other brands…which I do pretty well in. It is actually seeing The Sharp Plays in real life places. One of the fun ways this revelation came to me was when I was at a basketball game and saw an “I Fade Mr. Poison” t-shirt in the section I was sitting. I was floored and would have loved to grab a photo if it wasn’t so obvious to the fan of what I was doing. Another, and easily my favorite, occurred just this past July. I sent a TSP Live alert from my phone while unknowingly sitting next to one of you in the United Polaris Club at Washington Dulles airport. YEP…you know who you are…but you didn’t know I was RIGHT NEXT TO YOU…LOL! I sent a TSP Live alert and within 1 second your phone erupted with the “ding” of a Telegram notification. Out of reflex of the coincidental timing I peeked at your screen to see “The Sharp Plays War Room” notification. WOW! I’ll admit, it was pretty surreal. Here I am, at a large airport, sitting in a lounge, and right next to me is a TSP follower. It was hard not to say something or to contain my laughter…but there I was…sitting right next to you. I thought about sending an alert saying, “I see you sitting there in the Polaris Club at Dulles with your green shirt and cookies”, but I didn’t want to freak you out. Will always be a moment forever in my memory. It’s awesome, and I am proud that TSP has gone from nothing 12 years ago to the brand it is today. It’s just that I think the rightful place of TSP, based on the content it provides compared to the others out there, is in the Top 10.
I see what the Top 10 provides right now and frankly it is pretty pathetic. Instead of giving you consistent winning selections, or peeling back the myth about parlays and exotic wagers…their featured content are the ticket and money splits?!?!? COME ON! Speak with any serious player in the gambling business (book managers, directors of trading, professional bettors) and they will tell you those are useless (sorry to tell you). I know, there are those religious followers of ticket and money percentages that think they mean something because they have shown you success this or that time. Sportsbooks are not stupid. Books would not openly provide their ticket and money percentages to the masses if it provided you any material or long-term edge. The edge is in your head. Don’t believe me, there are people who do the “reverse line move” tactic with ticket and money percentages on various shows. Take the time to log and track the bets they mention…you’ll see how “awesome” those angles really are….and the type of edge they provide. Of course there will be winners, but there will be just as many losers…the same as flipping a coin….and you will get vigged out in the process…which is why the books openly provide that information. People who use ticket and money percentages to “success” tend to have recency bias…they remember the winners with glory and bury the losers from their memory banks.
The Top 10 of gambling content providers offer you content that doesn’t perform, API odds screens that scrape data from the sportsbook’s websites, bullshit sound bite articles that use no facts, math, nor statistics, just a lot of recycled garbage and BS the pundits in this business repeat over and over (“you can’t make money betting NFL on Sundays”…what a fucking joke…I bet NFL every year on Sundays and it is the best performing content across all sports for 12 years running), they give you league/team breakdowns that a middle school student could have put together, or just antics you would find at a frat party. Sorry, this industry should be about making you a better bettor, not magic tricks and shiny things to distract you. Then there’s the selection content…most of which you could flip a coin and do a lot better long-term. From my experience, fading the content offered by the Top 10 providers is much better than following it. So, I know The Sharp Plays has a place, a good seat at the table. What does it take to go from here to there?
Exposure through engagement! Engagement is what drives social media and you need to have it push your brand into the world. When I first started out I had none. For years I had a few hundred followers…loyal followers. From 2011 through 2018, despite my efforts, I just could not build an audience in any material way. Then along came Mr. Poison. I never would have imagined, but in the blink of an eye, I went from 300 followers to 1500 to 2500 to 6000 to 12000 and on it went. It was all the likes, retweets, and comments on Mr. P tweets that provided the engagement and the Twitter algorithm did the rest in getting me out and in front of people. I owe my success to Mr. Poison of all people. It was Mr. P’s run during March Madness 2019 that really put me on the map. Sometimes that’s all it takes…right place…right time. Getting exposure through VSiN (Follow The Money with Mitch & Paul…still the best show on the network) and then Mr. Poison going on a 4-28 ATS run at that same time in his 2019 March Madness selections was the perfect recipe to take The Sharp Plays from just a hobby to very minor player in the sports gambling industry. You want to say I made Mr Poison up, OK, that means I was a handicapper that went 28-4 on my selections in March Madness 2019…I’ll take that!! In the year’s that followed the Mr. P action dropped a lot, but thanks to all that initial exposure and those followers, The Sharp Plays continued to put out good content and expand its base of followers. Today, I have over 84,000 followers on Twitter and have “virtually” met hundreds of great people along the way…and the content has gone places I never imagined…bots, analytics, A.I, reports, alerts, popular rollovers, audio/video…and plenty more to come!
So, for the season ahead I am going to make a deal with you. If you help to bring The Sharp Plays up the ladder, I will return the favor by putting money into your pockets. How? Through winning some rollovers AND through giving money away for your engagement. Ava, my new A.I. assistant will be helping me in this endeavor.
I was never a fan of those handicappers out there who would do the “I need 500 likes and retweets to release my 10 unit BANGER for today.” That’s stupid and the selection usually sucks. However, unfortunately that is really the only way to expand your exposure and reach…through engagement and using the social media algorithms.
Unfortunately, I am not a popular person like some of the blowhards in this business who suck everyone’s balls to get on their podcasts and radio shows. I am true to myself and gladly call out stupidity, hypocrisy, and how useless most of these providers content turns out to be. My blunt nature doesn’t exactly make me a popular “get” for media. Maybe I am a sellout for revenue because that’s what makes The Sharp Plays work, but I will not be a sellout on my gambling morals. If I see stupidity I am not going to pretend it doesn’t exist so I can get exposure.
So, how will I be going about increasing engagement this season? I will be doing a little twist to the “like & retweet” method on rollovers. There will be a giveaway to followers involved, a giveaway to charity and hopefully a winning rollover! So, it’s a win-win-win…you get something (hopefully a winning rollover selection…or there will be a giveaway of cash), I get something with further TSP exposure, and a great charity gets something too in a risk free donation every step of the way….and potentially a healthy donation on successful rollovers! Some good karma and money together…can’t beat it!! Stay tuned as I might get one of these going this weekend as I test the idea and some A/V content as well.
The above is just one idea, but be aware that I will be testing some new ideas to increase engagement…and to make it worth your while to engage. The more people who see the brand, the more content and information I can acquire, the more advanced I can make the technology, and the better The Sharp Plays content performs in terms of profits in our pockets from wagering…myself included. So, hopefully this season will allow me to kick it up a notch and the expansion to audio/video and a new platform in YouTube will allow me to do it! We’ll see how it goes and thank you for participating!
Who knows, it might be the dumbest and stupidest thing I have ever done, but you never know until you try. So, try I will! Appreciate your help!
That’ll close out this week’s newsletter for me! Thanks for giving the newsletter here a read today! Stay safe out there! I am always open to any feedback you may have. I might not listen to it, LOL, but I am open to it! 😉🤙🍀
Good luck in your action!
~ The Sharp Plays