San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
OVER/UNDER
Oddmakers have yet to post a number for Padres’ projected win total for 2021, but expect it to be quite inflated with moves like Ha-seong Kim (left).
Three professional sports bettors project the Padres’ season-victories total to open in the mid-90s, and they’re preparing counters to expected reactions when sportsbooks release those numbers.
As he outlined his strategy, Long Island handicapper Tom Barton unwittingly conveyed a potential nickname alteration for the major-league franchise. The San Diego Helium. “All this San Diego helium,” Barton says of what experts also term steam. “I think they will come in at 96 or 97 wins, and I just don’t see them getting there.”
Las Vegas capper Teddy Sevransky pegs it at 95.5. Books establish a number, with over and under prices, punters make their bets and the books adjust according to the action.
Sevransky hopes his projection is accurate and money pushes it down. When he perceives he’s getting optimal value, he’ll bet over.
Dana Lane predicts 94 and says, “I have a rule of thumb, to go against the ‘sexy’ team. I think the team that has made the biggest offseason moves is always a little over-valued.”
Barton forecasts many people pumping his opening number higher, like a helium balloon. Before bursting, he will wager on under.
“People are loving them,” says Barton. “They’re saying, ‘Oh, my god, San Diego is the greatest team of all time!’ I just smile from ear to ear. Please keep saying that. Every time there’s a mention of Slam Diego, that number will just keep rising.
“I want that number to go up and up and up, then I’m going the other way. I think they win 88 to 90 games.”
The hot-stove champs
The Westgate Superbook sliced the Padres’ odds of winning the World Series from 12-1 to 10-1 when the team got left-handed pitcher Blake Snell from Tampa Bay in late December.
Twenty-four hours later, the property cut that to 7-1 after the Padres obtained pitcher Yu Darvish from the Cubs. To win the National League pennant, San Diego’s 6-1 odds were shortened to 5-1, then 7-2, respectively, after those transactions.
“All based on those trades, not because betting moved the numbers,” says Superbook Vice President
Jay Kornegay, a Rockies fan and Colorado State graduate. “I will keep reminding everyone that there’s a team named the Dodgers in the same division.”
At Station Casinos, whose books dot the Las Vegas Valley, the Padres (7-2) have supplanted the Yankees (11-2) as the second-lowest World Series favorite, just behind the Dodgers (17-5).
Golden Nugget sportsbook director Tony Miller also has San Diego at 7-1 to win the Series and 7-2 to win the pennant.
“One of the hot teams in the futures market,” says Miller. “I hope they can get there. It’s a great story. With that team, I’d be excited if I were living in San Diego.”
Kornegay, Miller and their bookmaking brethren, however, will not release season-victory totals until they are certain how Major League Baseball will structure the 2021 season.
In mid-summer, MLB released official spring-training and regular-season starts, for a normal 162game campaign, with playoff dates. Multiple reports have stated that’s still MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred’s plan, which the players’ union also expects.
MLB played a pandemic-abbreviated 60-game schedule in 2020, in which the Padres (37-23) recorded the game’s second-best record. The best, however, was chiseled by the Dodgers (43-17), who swept San Diego in the playoffs en route to their first World Series championship since 1988.
The Padres appear to be winning the hot-stove crown.
Typically, Vegas books release victory totals in late January.
“We just don’t know,” says Miller. “The season was shortened last year, and there were a lot of refunds. We just don’t want to go through it all again.”
The Dodger-blue behemoth
Miller, an Astros fan, raves about Padres shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr., first baseman Eric Hosmer, third baseman Manny Machado and Tommy Pham, “the Vegas boy.”
“Their pitching staff is second to none,” says Miller. “Now they’ll make a push at the Dodgers. The Dodgers are still loaded. They are the champs, man. When was the last time the Padres were in the World Series? Nineteen ninety-eight?
“Been a while, so we’ll see.”
The Padres, established in 1969, won 90 games for the first time (at 92-70) in 1984, when Detroit defeated them in the World Series. They accomplished that feat again in 1996 (91-71, swept in divisional series by St. Louis), ’98 (98-64, swept in World Series by Yankees) and ’10 (90-72, no postseason).
Sevransky points to the penchant of select franchises constructing super teams and says those are the elite squads that will contend for the title, “and anyone else will have to get real lucky.”
“The Padres, frankly, are right there,” he says. “They’re absolutely one of the megateams for 2021. When you have a behemoth in your own division, it forces you to play at their level or give up. Padresdodgers is kind of like the Yankees-red Sox.”
To which Barton objects. The lifelong Bronx Bombers fan calls such a comparison ridiculous and insulting. New York-boston first took root in 1903 and intensified in the 1920s. Dodgers-giants, he notes, began decades ago when both called New York home.
“It’s a good rivalry because they’re both good teams and they’re fighting for first (in the same division), but it’s not a heated, bloody rivalry,” says Barton. “Yankees-red Sox bad blood goes back more than 100 years.”
Lane will monitor both on the road and giving 1½ runs — the run line — to soften probable high prices.
“The Dodgers returned eight times the money to their backers on the road last year than they did at home,” says Lane. “I suspect the same type of parallel for the Padres in 2021.”
Sevransky is wary of Snell and Darvish — how injuries and inconsistency have plagued both, how batters are eager to see each a third time in a game — and that bullpen.
“Do they have someone who can get outs in the sixth inning? And do they have someone who can get outs in the sixth inning after someone else got outs in the sixth inning yesterday?” says Sevransky.
“That’s going to determine where they’re a 90-win team or a 100-win team. That’s going to determine whether they’re capable of winning a title or not.”
A team, but not a team
San Diego surprised Barton
with a stellar acquisition. Not Snell. Not Darvish.
“Their signing of Haseong Kim was one of the most underrated moves, one of the smartest moves, of the offseason,” says Barton. “He’s 25, a potential 2020 threat and might hit .300. He crushed it in the KBO.”
In seven seasons in Korea, Kim hit .294. In 138 games for Kiwoom last season, he hit .306, with 30 homers and 23 stolen bases. He swiped 33 in 2019, when he hit .307. Barton trumpets his ability to play nearly every infield position.
“And they want to give him some time in the outfield,” says Barton. “That’s the kind of guy San Diego needs.”
Snell, 28, answered a 2018 Cy Young season by going 6-8, with a 4.29 earned-run average, in ’19. In 11 starts a year ago, he was 4-2, with a 3.24 ERA. He nearly logged 181 innings in ’18, his only season above 130.
Darvish, who turns 35 this season, went 8-3 in 2020, with his first under-1 WHIP in 10 seasons. Before that truncated year, he threw more than 145 innings twice in seven seasons.
Chris Paddack regressed in 2020, and Mike Clevinger’s Tommy John surgery shelves him for all of ’21. Barton questions Dinelson Lamet (elbow issue last season) and relievers Matt Strahm (knee), Emilio Pagan (career-worst 4.50 ERA), Craig Stammen (career-worst 5.63 ERA) and closer Drew Pomeranz.
“I like him, but Pomeranz had one good year after they converted him to a reliever, then he got injured,” says Barton.
Barton hopes bettors f lock to wager on the Padres. At the proper moment, he will aim cash the other way.
“It’s a roster filled with a lot of talent, but not a team,” says Barton. “In MLB, you load a team with talent and hope it succeeds, or you load a team that’s a team. I think San Diego, right now, is a talent-laden team, but I don’t think they’re a team yet.”
Go, Helium.