Wanted to start a thread for discussion about how people approach these handicapping contests, as they may really start to take off with more TV exposure.
I, myself, am stuck in Ohio with 3 younger children and don\'t get the chance to travel or play in live contests, and to be honest, had never really paid much attention to the online ones until now.
Watching the show the past couple weeks, and especially last night, I was struck by the number of parallels between these handicapping contests and poker tournaments. Consider the following points:
1) Back before the late 90s when participation picked up, there was a much lower number of participants in major tournaments like the WSOP. With fields smaller than 100 ppl, you saw a high occurrence of repeat winners and the more skilled players made the final table more often than not.
2) Compare that today, the WSOP main event has fields in the 5000-8000 range and even getting anywhere near the final table back to back years is an incredible accomplishment, and many of the more skilled players dont even get a whiff of the final table, many of them not even cashing.
3) In a larger contest, you do still have to be skilled, but there is definitely a #gethot factor that vaults people to victory in these larger tournaments, and it very rarely is with the same person 2 tournaments in a row.
4) Experienced players know that it is extremely arrogant to assume you have a huge skill edge over everyone else in large major tournaments, and the likelihood of you winning is very small, no matter how well you are playing, how high your confidence is, or if you have just recently won another tournament. Some recent WSOP champions have gone on to do other things, but by and large they are flashes in the pan and never win another major tournament, despite many additional tries.
5) Because of this, experience players who know who the other skilled players are frequently swap % of each other prior to a tournament even starting. That way they know, even if they should happen to bust out, there is still a possibility of winning something based on having a piece of another player or 2. If ppl aren\'t doing this in handicapping contests, I\'m not sure why they wouldn\'t unless its some sort of pride or ego thing.
6) When we start talking about in-game play, when you get down to a final table (which might equate to there only being 2 or 3 races left in a contest), once again, no matter your chip lead or perceived skill advantage, experienced players know anything can happen and that the big payoffs really only happen in the top 3 or 4 spots most often. Being chip leader with 10 left doesn\'t mean you cant end up finishing in 7th or 8th place, and I think this is also very true of the handicapping contests.
7) As a result of this, deals are frequently made in final tables to spread the money out more between the players and lessen the risk of a bad beat hurting your expected payout. Yes, this also limits the potential amount you will win if everything goes your way, but after playing tournaments over and over again, experienced players know that things have a good chance of not going your way and getting a guaranteed better payout is better than a risk/reward scenario.
When making deals, consideration is made to who is in better shape than the others and a larger % is paid to that person/people.
9) It\'s my guess that Helmers was trying to apply points 6 and 7 during the episode last night to the handicapping contest. With only 2 races left, yes some people are in better shape than others, but if there are possibilities for anyone to win it, they are smart to look for a deal, and anyone ahead of these people that might be caught would be smart (in my opinion) to consider such a deal so that you have a better opportunity of at least turning some kind of profit.
10) But much like poker, a deal should be made to pay out an advantage to the person that is ahead at the time the deal is made. The 60/20/20 split that was offered across the board in the episode last night doesnt make sense. With Beychok\'s superior position, he should have been offered something like 70/15/15 to 60/20/20 from the people that were behind him (for example).
Because handicapping tournaments are held far less frequently and the even larger ones have fewer ppl than large poker tournaments like the WSOP, its hard to know for sure if the theories I\'m putting forth here really hold true or not, but would be interested in hearing other opinions or just general comments on how people approach these tournaments, be it fixed win bets or virtual/real-money bankroll.
As an aside, I think they should really put some production value and thought into making a handicapping contest like they do the WSOP. Show race-to-race who has bet (or who is abstaining) on what and updated leaderboard after each race, with interviews with the top players explaining their plays. A multi-window view of several players watching the stretch run unfold and showing the payouts and updated standings. If there is 6 or 7 figures at stake and it worked for poker, as long as the right production values are put into it, seems like it might work.
