You're right that I should have made it clearer that it was an opinion. And it's certainly possible that Bush could become so unpopular in the next 2 years that any Democrat, even Hillary, would have an advantage. Still, it appears to me that Hillary has too many things going against her to win the Presidency.

I would gladly bet you that the line, if Hillary gets the nom, is greater than +120. Having said that, I think the biggest edge is probably simply betting that she does not get the nom.

btw, I don't want this to slip into personal politics, but I have nothing at all against either Clinton.

--Dunbar

you're on for a beer!

Nothng like a future wager on a future wager!!!

On the Jai Alai, exotic pool arbitrage thing, I live in So Florida and go once a year or so to Dania when someone visits and they want to see it. I do not think they handle more than $3,000-4,000 total per game -- about $60,000 a night. I've looked at the Ex/Quin pools and it's very miniscule. Not saying someone can't do ok with it, but I don't see how.

My wife is like that, but if she's winning, I can't go near. If I just stand next to machine she's playing, she stops winning. I think they made a movie about a guy like that. I just need to hire myself out to the casinos. Must be some sort of negative aura (electrical? force field?) or something that I project. No matter, children and dogs like me, even if some machines don't.

that sounds like my brother with scratch tickets...he ALWAYS wins. Makes me crazy...and jealous:o since I never win at any chance thing like that.

heh heh, hadn't looked at it that way! I'm actually at a distinct disadvantage on the bet, because the chance I'd remember having made it 2 years from now is about nil. But if you win and remind me, I'll remember it!

Just to be clear, it's not an arbitrage (although I'm very partial to arbitrage!). It's merely a matter of factoring in the game structure into the outcome. I can give you an example since I went and got the book off the shelf for the answer to Cardus. If all the players are equally skilled, players 1 & 2 each have a 16.31% chance to win the game. Player 7 has just an 8.88% chance to win. Player 8 has an 11.78% chance to win. These aren't stats from real play. These are from a model that simply assumes each player has a 50% chance to win each point he plays. So, Player 2 has almost twice the chance of winning the game as Player 7, even if they are equally skilled. (The reason Player 8 sees a slight increase over Player 7 has to do with the fact that at some point the points have double value.) I think it's fairly amazing that "post position" has such a big impact on the outcome, and I doubt that this is well understood by the bettors.

I agree that the pool size makes it hard to imagine making much money at Jai Alai.

Note to self. Remember beer bet.

--Dunbar

I've spent a significant amount of time trying to devise a jai alai system and I've come to the conclusion that while post position is obviously important, what's really important is each player's average win pay-off. I'm in the process of testing my strategy now. . .