Powered by:
Betting Year in Review: The good, the bad and the ugly
Published
Break out the oversized glasses and the bottles of champagne. The new year is almost upon us.
Soon, the clock will strike midnight, and everyone’s year-to-date records will reset to 0-0-0 in the betting community.
I would argue Jan. 1 is one of the most important days of the year for any sports bettor. You only get one chance to make a good first impression (that’s why I showed up wearing my Sunday best to meet my nephew in the hospital when he was born) and only get one chance to start the new year 1-0.
But before we turn the page, we must reflect on another year in sports betting that has nearly come and gone.
This year was filled with crazy winners, close calls and heartbreaking bad beats.
Here is a recap of my betting year as I highlight some of my biggest wins and a few losers I won’t forget anytime soon.
The Good: Patton Kizzire 170-1 to win Procore Championship
There’s no better place to start the longest tipped winner of the golf season for me.
It had been more than six years since Kizzire’s last win on the PGA Tour, but the 36-year-old pulled a rabbit out of his hat at the Procore Championship in September, winning by five shots for a sweat free 170-1 cash.
The Bad: New England Patriots +480 last winless team in NFL
I started a new tradition a few years ago of picking the outcome of every NFL game before the season starts. This year I grabbed a few buddies and had their help as we went through each and every matchup this year’s schedule had to offer.
Two hours later we had made history, predicting the New England Patriots to go winless as a 0-15-1 team with the tie coming in Week 15 to the Arizona Cardinals.
On paper it made sense. New England was one of the worst rosters in the league, with a journeyman quarterback and a rookie head coach.
When I opened FanDuel and saw New England was nearly 5-1 to be the last winless team in the league I happily clicked the button and added the play to my Week 1 Now We Go article as I spotlighted some of my favoruite plays of the year.
New England won Week 1.
What makes this even worse is over the next month the Patriots would turn into the exact version of the team we predicted to go winless, losing their next six games with an average margin of defeat of 13.6 points.
The Ugly: Cameron Brink +1100 to win WNBA Rookie of the Year
After one month of the 2024 WNBA season I let my mind wander to a dark place.
Caitlin Clark and her Indiana Fever were off to a slow start, meanwhile Cameron Brink hit the ground running and was tied for the lead in blocks after her first four games.
In my mind, the idea of Indiana struggling all year and shutting down Clark made sense. She had just finished a grueling NCAA season and the Fever were one of the worst teams in the league in 2023.
The thinking was Clark could get hurt and at that point, Brink felt like the rookie that would take over the race.
Brink tore her ACL three weeks later. Clark went on to set countless WNBA records and ran away with rookie of the year.
Swing and a miss.
The Good: Summer McIntosh -113 to win the Northern Star Award
After winning three gold medals at the Olympics in swimming, there was little doubt in my mind about who would be named Canada’s top athlete for 2024.
Then I opened the FanDuel app and saw Summer McIntosh listed at -113 to win the Northern Star Award.
I had to double take to make sure I was reading it correctly and was stunned to see it wasn’t an error. The next morning it had moved to -166.
The next day I came into work and put an article together on her being the favourite at -166, by the time I could write and finish an article it had once again moved to -350. I still liked the number.
McInintosh would close as a -4000 favourite to win and was named the 2024 recipient of the award in mid December.
The Bad: Bobby McMann -550 to make opening night roster
If you ever needed proof of someone shooting themselves in the foot, look no further than how I handled Bobby McMann to start the 2024 season with the Toronto Maple Leafs.
I like McMann and thought he would get off to a fast start trying to impress his new head coach on a Leafs’ team that had lost some depth scoring during the summer.
FanDuel offered a new market this year on which players would make the Leafs’ opening night roster and me seeking an easy winner had my attention turned to McMann at -550.
But there is no such thing as an easy winner.
McMann was scratched for the team’s opening game of the season and I lost one unit on him -550 to make the Game 1 lineup.
To make it all worse he was called into the lineup for the team’s second game of the season and he scored, cashing his anytime goal prop at +400.
So instead of turning that one unit into four, I turned it into a loser.
Another swing and a miss.
The Ugly: Buffalo Bills to miss the playoffs
Any time you hear me doubt a Super Bowl contender in the AFC it’s probably a good idea to fade it as much as you can.
Two years ago I told you the Kansas City Chiefs would miss the playoffs. They won the Super Bowl.
Last year I wrote the same Chiefs article. They won the Super Bowl.
This year I wasn’t dumb enough to fade the Chiefs and turned my attention to the Buffalo Bills.
With Rodgers back for the Jets and the Dolphins looking to build on last year’s playoff appearance I thought this was a good year for Josh Allen and the Bills to regress and miss the postseason.
Allen is likely going to win MVP and the Bills are Super Bowl favourites for the first time ever.
You have to take big swings in this game of content, sadly for me this was a giant swing and miss.
What was your Good, Bad and Ugly for 2024 in sports betting? Share with us your picks on X @TSN_Edge