Both of the primetime games this week have featured spread drama revolving around field goals, or rather lack-thereof. On Thursday, we saw Josh Scobee’s career with the Pittsburgh Steelers end after he missed two late field-goals which eventually lead to the team’s overtime loss to the Baltimore Ravens (after Justin Tucker nailed one from 54 yards out). After that game, I discussed the importance of shopping for the best line, as there was no excuse for anyone to have bet anything other than Ravens -2 / -2.5 or Steelers +3. Regardless of how much work you put into getting your Sunday Night Cowboys line, you got a swift kick in the nuts. At least you have a five-day work-week to look forward to.
The line on Sunday’s nightcap was 2.5 at the standard betting sites, and 3 / 3.5 at the square ones. Despite the outcome, what I said earlier still stands – there is no reason for anyone to have bet anything other than Saints -2.5 or Cowboys +3 / +3.5… but, damn.
Losses suck, but they are not the worst. The average bettor will suffer hundreds of them per year. The only ones that he or she will remember are demonstrated tonight. At least they make good conversations. With under 5 minutes left in the game, Dallas’ quarterback Brandon Weeden lead a remarkable 89 yard drive, which ended in an unbelievable 4th down touchdown on what would have very well been the last play of the game in most scenarios.
Tied 20-20, Dallas bettors holding onto +3 or +3.5 sat back up in their seats. With just over 2 minutes remaining in regulation, the chance of the game ending in either a regulation/overtime Saints field-goal or an outright Cowboys win were very high. And just for that moment, the biggest mistake was made. Some call it “hope”.
Don’t get use to it. After Brees marched the New Orleans offense down the field with no time-outs, kicker Zach Hocker set up for a short 30-yard game-winner. Only to be distracted by this guy:
*Boink*…
Off the uprights and back out onto the field. That was the sound of Mr. Chubby pictured above taking your money, Cowboys bettors. He knows it now, every dollar. Think of that while you try to fall asleep tonight.
There goes the 23-20 final, where most people go home happy (including those who needed to rely on a full-field Weeden drive for the push). As soon as it happened you knew what was up. A flip of the coin and a completion later, and it was all over. C.J. Spiller houses it for a 26-20 final, keeping the game under the total but ruining the lives of those brave enough to back a primetime underdog.
My teachers always told me not to do drugs when I was in high-school. What about hope? That shit ruins lives.
5Dimes tweeted out from their official Twitter account that there is a fraudulent set of e-mails circulating claiming to advertise a deposit bonus for users who use Bitcoin.
The e-mail does look “legit”, considering that it follows the basic theme of the website which is to look like it was designed in the early 2000s. They use a lot of the same fonts and colors.
The scammers claim that if you deposit today via Bitcoin, you will receive a bonus. The reason why they are targeting this payment method specifically is that one of the key features is that it is absolutely non-refundable. We know there are some buyer-safety methods incorporated with every other method such as PayPal, Skrill, and Western Union. None of that exists in the land of cryptocurrency – as soon as you send something, it is gone. And there is no way of knowing who it went to.
A quick look at the address on BlockChain indicates that they have already profited 1.5 bitcoin from this scam (which is $359.79 US). This was ten hours after the first official 5Dimes warning was released. Crime pays.
No funds were sent to the “+$1,000” Bitcoin address luckily enough.
If you follow me on Twitter you probably know that I get into arguments with a lot of people regarding the importance of line-shopping. One would think there really is nothing to debate, but there is a corner of the world that believes points do not really matter. Most of these people are individuals who use Bovada as their only sports-betting website, which is a serious problem.
The line on Thursday night’s football game pretty much stayed as expected following Big Ben’s injury. It opened up at 2 and 2.5 on the normal betting sites, and 3 on the square ones. There was a bit of fluctuation between 2.5 and 3 for those that offered the former at some point. I probably do not need to describe what went on in the game (especially if you were a Steelers backer), as two missed field-goals from kicker Josh Scobee set up the game-tying marker in the closing seconds of the game for Baltimore.
But things got much worse than that. Despite having one of the best running backs in the league, the Steelers refused to use his skill-set on two 4th down situations (since they could not count on their kicker in those spots). Baltimore eventually won the game on a 52 yard attempt by Justin Tucker. While Scobee should and will take the majority of the blame, one cannot overlook some of the decision making from Pittsburgh’s coaching staff.
There was absolutely no reason for anyone to be standing with a pushed -3 or a lost +2.5. Getting the best number is really not that hard. I do not need to even open up a line comparison page to know that a square site like Bovada is going to be shaded at least half a point to the public side compared to a site like 5Dimes or BetOnline. You do not even need to keep a running balance at a handful of sites, all you need is two: One square, and one fair. The only time I hound people for using Bovada is when it’s their only site. Someone who uses it to bet on sharp sides (typically underdogs and unders since that’s how things go) knows what they are doing. Every single point matters, regardless of where the number is. But since people are obsessed with “important numbers” like 3 and 7, I thought tonight was a good night to drill it into your skulls. This is just a simple thing you can do to increase your edge in the long run.
The night is still young, but I imagine I will get into a few arguments with Bovada-defenders who believed there was nothing wrong with their -3 tickets.
I have been very vocal about my thoughts on Bovada in the past, but I won’t get into that today. We need to focus on the massive troll-job that they pulled on the poor tortured people of Buffalo.
One of the few things that I commend Bovada (and Bodog) for are putting their NHL season point totals up fairly early (and in the case of American bettors, putting them up at all). Due to the fact that they are one of the few betting sites which actively e-mail their odds to every beat writer in the world, whom which blindly tweet it out without any regards for anything, sent Buffalo’s corner of Twitter into a frenzy when the seemingly-improved Sabres were set to have a 5.5 point improvement on last year’s last-place effort of 54.
The additions of a now-healthy Evander Kane, as well as free-agent Cody Hodgson, goaltender Robin Lehner, as well as the not-first overall draft pick of Connor McDavid made most fans believe the team was in for a larger improvement. We will get to whether or not this is a warranted reaction in a moment, but the best part of all this is that the tortured fanbase were in for a surprise when they went to sign-up to place their bets:
Bovada are one of the US betting sites that do not allow customers from New York or New Jersey. So any Sabres fans who have not escaped the, er… nice… city of Buffalo have yet another thing to be disappointed about.
But is this the worst case circumstances? All Sabres fans who followed any hockey beat reporter saw the odds, and were sent into a frenzy. But is this team better than the one we saw last year? I would say it would be hard to be worse, but I hardly find this line an insult. It is important to remember that the odds that are set are not direct representations of how many points a team is get in the season. While they may get a bit more scoring this year with Kane and O’Reilly (who will also improve poor Matt Moulson who has been rotting away), their defense still has a ton of questions. Cody Hodgson has holes in him, and he is going to be their most reliable option? Under the offense-first system that we will expect from new head coach Dan Bylsma, I think it is safe to assume they will be leaking goals are a similar rate.
Through some early projections, I believe the Sabres point total is right where it should be, leading to no significant edge betting on either side. Does the fact that Bovada knows it will not receive a large fraction of homer action on the line influence where they set it? I would imagine it does, but no more than one point.
A pricing error on SkyBet’s Australian football markets sent Twitter into a frenzy. This evening, Matt Findley posted an image of a ticket that appeared to show a 500/1 wager that was won. The 20 pound wager would have returned just over ten thousand equivalent units of currency.
As the tweet has been flagged for mature content (fuck the communists), here is a screenshot to ensure that everyone can see it:
The wager was on a -7 goal handicap in a match between Adelaide Victory, and the youth squad of Adelaide United. The wager was placed when the younger side was leading 7-3 at the 55′ mark. The final score of the match was 12-3, causing the market to cover, and the wager to win.
Here is a closer look of the betting slip from SkyBet:
After he appeared to have won 10,020.00 British pounds, SkyBet altered the wager to change the price from 500/1 to 20/1. This sent the British corner of Twitter into a frenzy. Threats were sent from multiple people claiming they would close their accounts if this individual was not properly compensated for this wager.
It turns out that there was a significant pricing error. Rather than having the market at 500/1, the youth squad should have been 5/1 to win with an applied handicap of -7. No pitchforks today.
In a sign of good faith, and given the fact that this person was the only human being to bet on a -7 spread in the most random Australian football game possible, SkyBet offered him a 20/1 payout in the end. Skybet have always been fair to their customers, which was witnessed just a few weeks ago when they paid out both Silva and Toure goalscorer markets when the scorekeeper made an error in City’s match against West Bromwich Albion.
One of the most controversial betting sites of all time, Sportsbook.ag have always been surrounded by payout disputes. This gained steam last month, when they refused to pay a large portion of their customers due to reasons that did not make much sense. But as a sportsbook that accepts American customers (who are not suppose to be gambling outside of Nevada or New Jersey), they hold the power of tyrants.
When I am on Twitter I am always monitoring certain keywords incase there is an incident that warrants reporting. Sure enough, I encountered a user (who will remain anonymous) sending complaints to Sportsbook’s official Twitter handle. I approached him via direct message to collect more information:
Anonymous claimed that he had $2,500 US tied up in a payout. This is a significantly large amount. We are not talking about a small withdrawal request, which any sportsbook would honor to keep the village people satisfied. He stated that he has received funds from them in the past, and that this was the first time that he was running into any issues. This is consistent with the recent scandal that Sportsbook.ag was involved in. They claimed that all withdrawals are processed in 6-8 weeks, and that the reason for his payout being delayed was due to their third-party handler being backed-up. Oh yeah, and my bookie ate my homework.
6-8 weeks for payouts is ridiculous in the first place. There is absolutely no reason for that to ever happen at an honest operation. The logic behind slow payments has nothing to do with whoever is handing the money. It is actually one of the most dirty moves a sportsbook could do. During the time that your withdrawal request is pending, there is a very high chance that you will lose the small amount of funds you have remaining in your account, developing the urge to gamble. Rather than making another small deposit, most betting sites will force you to cancel your pending withdrawal. Now you have yet another opportunity to lose money, and if you ever get the chance to request another payout, your timer has been reset to zero weeks passed.
It is a horrible thing to do, and any sportsbook that has the slightest ounce of respect for their customers would never do it. And even if your sportsbook had that policy, they should damn well stick to it. If I am going to beg my teacher for an extra week to complete the previously referenced homework, I am not going to tell her to fuck off after I refuse to hand it in one month later. If you demand extra time, do something with it.
But thats not the purpose of this article. I asked Anonymous if he could send me information regarding his situation so that I could include them in an article. I have noticed many users complaining about their payouts all of a sudden not being processed, which is very concerning as we are not far removed from their most recent incident. He sent me a picture of the payout request, which was dated June 26th.
It is currently August 27th. Sportsbook appears to be playing a one-sided game of chicken with Anonymous. They are daring him to cancel his withdrawal so that he can place a few bets. “C’mon, you know you want to!” sings the Devil.
Anonymous won’t give in. He sent me a copy of an e-mail exchange they had one week ago, after his payout request eclipsed the upper-limit of their projected time cap:
Anonymous states that they indicated in a prior e-mail that they have never missed a payment outside of the projected 6-8 week processing range. We already know this is false due to past incidents of Sportsbook.com withholding payments from customers for no reason. Their discussion continued throughout the week, with some notable responses from the betting site’s customer support department:
First of all they cannot count (this was seven days ago, which marked the middle of week eight). Secondly, they indicated that he would be receiving a payout confirmation soon. One week later, outside of the insanely slow projected processing range, still nothing. Except, you know, a ton of excuses…
Sportsbook.ag puts all of the blame on their third-party payment processor. In the next e-mail, they indicate that all of their withdrawals are processed in batches which vary in size. The support team tells Anonymous that he will be contacted as soon as his request has been sent to the third-party.
Still, one week after the last e-mail, nothing has happened. This means that not only is he potentially weeks away from getting his payout request included in the “batch”, but also weeks away from actually receiving his funds. I know Americans are limited in their options, but it is absolutely unacceptable to have to potentially wait four months to get your money.
Is it possible that there is some truth to Sportsbook.ag’s side of the story, where it actually is the third-party processor’s limitations? Perhaps. No one can doubt that it is suspicious that this comes immediately after their latest scandal. You would think that they would make an effort to up their processing outs to ease the angry mob from last time. However, it is more likely that this is just another case of an American sportsbook abusing their customers because they know they have no other options.
What is Anonymous to do… Call the police? And tell them what? That an illegal sportsbook stole the money he was illegally gambling with? These sites know that they have you by the balls, and they take full advantage. The goal of this blog is to give everyone a voice, in an effort to bring some form of honesty to this cancerous industry. If you would like Frostbet to write an article about a situation you are having with your sportsbook, please contact us via Twitter or E-mail.
European betting site titans Betfair and PaddyPower announced their merger this morning.
The companies announced that Irish PaddyPower would hold 52% of shares, while London-based Betfair would stake 48%. This is a massive merger worth over $5 billion dollars, bringing the new groups combined total to nearly $8 billion. Both companies individual shares jolted 20% following the announcement.
The new group plans to expand deeper into Europe, as well as tackling the Australian market which has always been a challenge due to unusual gambling restrictions. This merger also gives them a great opportunity to rival the current leader Bet365.
This announcement came after Ladbrokes and Coral declared their merger earlier this month. Although much smaller than today’s news, the recent mergers may be foreshadowing for more to come. With high taxes, it could be beneficial for these companies to operate as one. Both parties have not made it clear if there are going to be any changes to either website.
European gambling sites are among the most profitable in the industry given how nearly their entire client base are obsessed with parlaying everything together. Keep getting those accas in, lads!
It has been a while since I have posted a pick on Frostbet. I am working my way to being a more active contributor. We picked up a win in our last appearance, bringing my record on this site to 1-1-0 for a complete break-even of +/- 0 units. I have two MLB unders that I would like to share with everyone.
Los Angeles Dodgers at Cincinnati Reds (BEST BET)
Our play on this game will be the under 8 at -115. This is our best bet for today. I will be risking $2,300 to profit $2,000 (2.3 units / 2.0 units). I have taken the line from BetOnline.
This is a very confident play. For anyone who has followed me on Twitter for a while, you will know that my plays are rarely higher than 1-unit. I made an exception to that earlier this week when we picked up a 3-unit win on Tampa Bay. That required two 9th-inning runs which was a little too-close (I actually went to sleep out of frustration early, and did not check the score for an entire day. Seriously, I am not even kidding, look at my Tweet history…)
The new acquisitions to the Dodgers have not performed well, Wood included. He has conceded at least 3 runs in each of his starts, failing to go very deep in games. Since joining Los Angeles, his ERA has risen from 3.65 to 3.79. Despite giving up many runs, he has not conceded a significant amount of hits. This leads me to believe that Wood is pitching much better than his perception would indicate.
Los Angeles’ bats have been very quiet since getting no-hit by Mike Fiers in Houston over the weekend. The acquisition of Chase Utley made the most expensive team in baseball a lot more expensive. As the season progresses, I believe LA’s offense will improve to the form they displayed earlier this season, including Utley. Does that take away from some of the value on tonight’s under? Sure. But I have not mentioned the pitcher he is opposing.
I always love backing a guy who is pitching in his first few starts, especially for a team that is out of contention. The advantage is more or less in the favor of the pitcher. Lamb has conceded 5 (8 hits) and 3 (9 hits) runs in his first two starts, respectively. One of those was against the very same Dodgers that he faces tonight. It is meaningless to try to take information from a small sample size, and I would make a fool out of myself if I did. All I know is that Lamb pitched much better than the results of the first two starts would suggest.
I believe the true total of this game should be 6.5, with a -120 price to the over. Do to the significant margin between my true-spread, and the perceived odds set by the sportsbook, I have elected to make this a two-unit play.
Toronto Blue Jays at Texas Rangers
Our second play of the day will be the under 9 at -115. I will be risking $1,115 to profit $1,000 (1.15 units / 1.00 units). I have taken the line from BetOnline.
I would venture to assume that no one in their right mind wants to bet the under on this game. The total has jumped up an entire run over the past hour. I waited on it as long as I possibly could, but for the sake of the article I need to get it out on time. That is one of the struggles of providing profitable gambling advice, you get handcuffed sometimes.
Both the Toronto Blue Jays and the Texas Rangers have been red hot. For some reason no one seems to want to talk about the fact that the Rangers have snuck into a playoff position. Someone needs to mention it… seriously.
Buehrle had his shortest start of the season last outing, where he only lasted 16 outs against the Angels.
Although being quiet about it, Buehrle has admitted that he had been struggling with a minor injury. This information was released when his start against the Athletics was swapped with Dickey, who has no problem going on days with short-rest. As well as getting a day off yesterday, the short outing adds a ton of value to supporting the Blue Jays’ pitcher, either through the under or a side. When an older pitcher concedes a lot of runs, people believe regression is finally about to hit hard. On top of this, the short outing could potentially have given Mark enough time to recover from his shoulder issue. I believe he will put up another great start tonight.
As for Holland, he looked brilliant in his return from injury. You can be sure that the Rangers do not want to force anything, so he will likely not be seen deep into the seventh inning if all things go right. After crushing the Detroit Tigers in the prior series, their above-average bullpen is well-rested to take the baton. I have the true total for this game set at 7.5, with a -125 price to the over. It was a tough decision to keep it a one-unit play, but in the end there is a smaller confidence here than with the other under, so I believe this is the best way to spread it out.
For the most part, PayPal has been everyone’s first online wallet. Its the most recognized name in the industry, and its very convenient for protecting your information when buying or selling items online. However, this is not without a few major flaws which keep sportsbooks from accepting PayPal as a deposit or payout method. On top of imposing very strict anti-gambling clauses in their terms of conditions, PayPal employs a bunch of idiots in their fraud department who for whatever reason are unable to recognize false-claims. This makes PayPal a dangerous payment option, especially in an industry where you are not always dealing with the most honest customers. Only certain European sportsbooks that are verified vendors accept PayPal.
Although most sportsbooks are very safe, the majority of people do not feel comfortable sharing their credit card or banking information online. And thats perfectly fine. Which is why I am going to tell you how you can still use PayPal to deposit and withdraw from your online American sportsbook accounts even if that is not an accepted payment method.
Understanding Cryptocurrencies
Lets get this out of the way first; no sportsbooks accept PayPal. If you ever run into a sportsbook that does, avoid it at all costs. This is a red-flag that they are running a sketchy operation, and you should not take that risk as there are other viable options available regardless of where you live. You are likely dealing with an illegal bookmaking operation, which is incredibly dangerous.
The work-around I am going to describe today can be used by anyone, but its especially convenient for American users who generally are limited in their payment transfer options due to governmental gambling restrictions. With the rise of cryptocurrencies over the past year, many mainstream sportsbooks have begun to accept Bitcoin as a deposit and payout method. Bitcoin is a difficult concept to grasp for some, so for the sake of this article I will keep it simple. Think of Bitcoin as another currency; its value compared to the US dollar will go up and down from day to day, hour to hour. Its safe and stable, so you do not need to worry about any crashes that could come at the moment you purchase Bitcoin. In fact, Bitcoin is actually safer than most payment transfer methods as its non-refundable. As soon as you send the Bitcoins to someone else, thats it.
Its also untraceable and anonymous, making it a great option for Americans looking to fly under the radar with their gambling activity. If anyone inquires about the nature of your PayPal activity, all you need to tell them is that you were experimenting with cryptocurrencies. Simple, right?
The Work Around
I will go into more step-by-step detail in the next section, but what we are going to do is acquire Bitcoin via a method of your choosing, then fund our sportsbook account with that cryptocurrency. Once we want to withdraw, we will receive our payout in Bitcoin, which can then be sold for PayPal.
As mentioned above, we know that Bitcoin is non-refundable, and PayPal is. For some unexplained reason, PayPal refuses to hire competent individuals to run their fraud department. The people they staff seem to get off on awarding disputes to the wrong party more often than not. Its an absolute circus, but thats a rant for another day. Because of this, its pretty much impossible to find anyone selling Bitcoin that accepts PayPal as a payment method. But don’t worry, there are plenty of other ways to buy Bitcoins. The most notable method that Frostbet personally recommends is Coinbase – we will discuss this in the next section.
Now you might be asking yourself, when it comes time to request a withdrawal (which we will receive in Bitcoin), and we want to sell it for PayPal, doesn’t that put us at risk? The way Bitcoin-to-PayPal sales work is that the person performing the transfer will buy your Bitcoin for a small percentage below market value. This ‘commission’ is how they earn their money. I will explain how to find a trusted seller below. These individuals have built up a reputation, and would never tarnish all of the commission they earn for a one-time scam. Alternatively, you could also use Coinbase as described above to perform your transfers.
Lets get into the details!
Step #1 – Getting a Bitcoin Wallet
The first step towards using Bitcoin as a sportsbook funding method is to get a Bitcoin wallet. This will be the account that you can send and receive Bitcoins from. If you have an iPhone, this can be as simple as downloading an app. The one that Frostbet personally recommends is Bread Wallet (we have no affiliation to them. We just like their app since it has a simple interface which is important for Bitcoin rookies). You can find this in the app store.
When you download the app, you will be prompted to create an account. It is crucial that you write-down (on paper, and digitally) the information that the app tells you to write-down. In the event that something happens to your phone, you want to be able to recover your account. Bitcoin wallets do not use the traditional username/password log-in system. Instead, you will be given a Bitcoin address which will look like your 4-year old daughter just inputted gibberish on the keyboard.
Once your account is synced up, you are ready to purchase Bitcoins.
Step #2 – Purchase Bitcoins via Coinbase
Click here to create a Coinbase account. For the same reasons stated above, Coinbase does not accept PayPal as a transfer method. However, you can use pretty much any other option to purchase Bitcoins. This means that if you do not trust your credit card or banking information with your sportsbook, you can use Coinbase as a pseudo-middleman for your transaction. This is a company worth nearly one billion dollars, so there should be no reason for you to be skeptical of their authenticity.
You will also benefit from the fact that your payment will be processed through a known company, rather than using illegal payment processors. If you ever deposited funds into an American sportsbook, you will notice that your credit card will your deposit as purchasing outdoors equipment or camera parts from online companies. This does help keep your activities secure to a certain degree, but going through Coinbase will be the grand slam.
Following the AshleyMadison leak, where the personal information of 38 millions cheating assholes were exposed to the world, European betting site PaddyPower released odds on some of the potential victims of the hacktivist attack.
People who cheat are lowlifes, simple. The Ashley Madison leak has allowed the world to identify who should be punished. Leading PaddyPower’s list was a Premier League footballer, who turned up with 1/10 odds (-1000) to be named. They seem very confident, perhaps they have some inside information? They are all horny bastards, but I am not so sure they would need a website to pull some.
Next on the list is a British MP at 1/4 (-250), followed by a member of the British Royal Family at 5/6 (-120). Next as we enter underdog territory, is everyone’s favourite option: A Roman Catholic Cardinal at 2/1 (+200).
Finally, the last item is the biggest long-shot of them all. The Only Way Is Essex (abbreviated TOWIE) is a British sit-com. I am not from England so I have never heard of it, and even if I lived there I probably still would not give a shit. It seems like a prude show, leading to PaddyPower’s 7/1 (+700) line on one of them being named as AshleyMadison members.
And if betting on individual “people props” was not your cup of tea, you could also bet on the Grand Salami “Ashley Madison Fallout”. For a nice return of 6/1 (+600), you can wager if 2015 will break the record for the highest number of United Kingdom divorces. Humans have a strange obsession with ruining their marriages, and making their families hate them.
