Odds-and-ends handicapping is the guide to cashing for profit, Part 1
by Frank Cotolo
The doctor looked me square in the face and said, “You have to get an operation. More like a procedure. But you have to go under.”
“Are there any problems usually connected to this kind of surgery?” I said.
“Just one. Pancreatitis.”
“Not a good one. But tell me what are the chances I get it during this particular procedure?”
“Fourteen per cent.”
“Well that is 6-1 odds.”
“If you say so.”
“Yes. It means 86-1 I do not get pancreatitis. Make my appointment, please.”
I came out of the procedure successfully and without pancreatitis. It confirmed again that the odds-to-percentage chart I use when handicapping every horse race, I play or pass, represents the essence of handicapping. It is not a system or a gimmick that picks winners; it is a mathematic tool that tests the breadth of my expertise in any situation. My surgeon used it. Scientists use it. Astrophysicists use it. And on and on. Even if they do not invest in pari-mutuel wagering.
The percentage side of the two-column chart defines its value in odds. Both columns need to be memorized so a bettor can handicap a pari-mutuel race by definition. Forget the morning line. It does not qualify as a strong tool because it lists odds that are skewed because the percentages add to more than 100 per cent. Accuracy counts. One-hundred per cent is the correct percentage to any odds line made for any outcome.
I explained in my previous Among Ourselves columnthat every act we take part in as we move through life is measured — handicapped — to express its chances of success. We think success or failure that suggests a 50-50 chance for each result. Translated to odds it means one-to-one. Even odds. But chances for success doing anything is not always 50-50.
My surgeon knew the exact percentages of getting pancreatitis was 14 per cent, based on solid data. By trusting it I was able to see the odds were on my side because 86 plus 14 equals 100. Whamo. My chances of no complications were excellent. The odds were on my side.
Learning to establish how you measure the chances for any outcome is the one tool few to none use when handicapping horse races. Professional players cannot persist in gambling — no less make a profit — without learning to make an accurate personal odds line (POL). Not that a POL will always be a perfect measure. But it beats picking one winner out of any sized field of horses in a race. It represents your total opinion to make the most money while wagering against all the other folks betting into a wagering pool.
Learning to use the odds-to-percentage chart became essential to long-run profiting at pari-mutuel racing because — believe it or not and you better believe it — the majority of players contributing to wagering pools are weighed down by the tropes of betting on horse races. They wager with strange mixtures of opinion and unaffected information which they can rarely explain with any objective evidence:
“I like the 3,” said bettor A.
“Why?” said bettor B.
“Almost won last time out. Better post here. Good driver.”
“What about the 6?”
“I would never like the 6.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t like how he looks in the warm-up.”
“What about his class? Isn’t he stepping down in class?”
“So what?”
“I like that. What about the 8?”
“Never bet the outside post.”
“Trainer is doing well.”
“I bet his trainer twice and lost both times. So coming out of an outside post is death warmed over, you know?”
There are countless conversations like that between bettors and even though others may be based upon a great deal of knowledge and experience it is rare they meet a professional level; when the player has interpreted a choice to bet with odds to play that demand a bet or — dare I say it — pass the bet because a horse does not offer the odds worth the bet.
Many times I spent a 10-race card making only two bets and losing both with no regret because the same handicapping decision in the past brought me profits by betting or passing. I learned to reduce my opinions on any wager I made based on the odds I demanded; not on the driver or the trainer or the morning line or the post position or what the public handicappers explained in the program or on their podcasts.
This is only the handicapping part of tossing a profit for anyone. The other element is money management. The two are married in the evidence of math. Not in astrology or any other magical theories. Their bond enjoys the gifts of collecting money our fellow bettors add to the wagering pools they stuff with a passion driven by ego and a fair shake of luck.
