00:00 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
who's even gonna understand? 

00:01 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
all this, this is the chat the inherent challenges rob's like. 

00:04 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I'm gonna just tell them that I have clv who, who, buddy. You can't even get the average better to understand what that is. 

00:10 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Come on, let's go welcome to circles off episode number 131 right here, part of the hammer betting network presented by pinnacle sportsbook. I'm rob pazola, joined by johnny from best stamp 31. 

00:23 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Mr pazola, it's a big goalie number in the NHL. Yeah, we'll go to the Leafs, as we always do. This guy was a bit of a local hero from where we grew up Grew up right across Curtis, joseph Leafs goalie. I've met him multiple times. Yes, has have I. I think everyone has in this area. 

00:45 - Zack Phillips (Other)
I used to practice at his house. He built a he lived like near me. 

00:50 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
He used to rink there. 

00:51 - Zack Phillips (Other)
Yeah, he built a rink on his property and one of the guys on our team, his dad, was like best friends with Cujo and we used to go and practice like our minor hockey team used to practice in his rink. It was sick, the sick. The dressing room was like a little mini replica of the Leafs room at the time. 

01:04 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Couple so cool Couple things about Curtis Joseph when he left in free agency and went to the Red Wings, which he then sucked. I think everyone in Toronto is happy about that. He's very regretful of doing that as well, for sure. 

01:16
But that was the first time I was actually sad about like sports, like my dad had to explain to me that, like he chose to go to another team, like he didn't want to play in toronto, and it's all about the money he sold out for the money and I I didn't know it was even possible. In that my young age, that was fine. You know, rob, you had the the fall. 

01:35 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You gotta tell the fall well, I, I just that's like one of my most memorable clip. I although I can't remember the exact team, but I just remember a goal going in Curtis Joseph being like irate because he thought there was a goalie interference or something. So he's skating towards the ref yelling at him and he trips and falls and he just slides into the ref and takes him out. 

01:56 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It's like the most embarrassing thing ever. But Curtis 2002, sorry, 2002 Olympics, which was probably the best Olympics of all time, salt Lake City. The Leafs coach at the time, pat Quinn, was the coach of the Olympic team started Curtis Joseph in game one. Although he was certainly not the best goalie on the team, he was most likely the third best goalie on the team by a fair amount. Started him over Marty Brodeur and he was pulled in game one. Broder came in canada. Never lost another game. Won the gold medal that's it. 

02:30 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That's how it happened a homer curtis joseph my. 

02:33
My dad's basement is like a shrine to curtis joseph I. I would full disclosure. We're recording here today. I have a massive migraine. I've had a headache all day today. I was gonna pass by. We talked about this last week, how we're gonna like add something new to the studio every week. I'm like, oh, I'm gonna bring in like some Cujo swag. I'm like I can barely even drive into the office right now. I can't make a pit stop along the way or whatever. I was gonna bring in some Cujo stuff, stuff. But curtis joseph's adopted. He's an adopted kid and his stepbrother used to work with my father, so I got invited. 

03:11
Curtis joseph had massive birthday parties in the in toronto every single year some outdoor parks, hundreds and hundreds of people. But I used to go every year. He used to autograph a bunch of stuff for me. So we're going to get some kujo swag. I promise we will bring it in here because he's for number 30. I I grew up with a number another number 31 as my favorite player, but it's actually embarrassing to say it now is it but safety for the dallas cowboys, roy williams, who the horse collar tackle penalty was basically invented? 

03:46 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
because of don't even know who. 

03:47 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That is okay, it'd be embarrassing roy williams was like at the same time as troy palomalu. They were like the two best safeties in the nfl for a little bit. But roy williams used to grab people at the back of their jerseys and tackle them that way and like obviously all sorts of players were getting injured. So when they instituted the horse collar tackle, it was the Roy Williams penalty, but I'll let. I don't remember the exact player, who it was, but Roy Williams. At the Pro Bowl one time, on a pass downfield to, I believe, a Denver Broncos receiver, he absolutely obliterated. It's like this is the pro bowl, like nobody gives a shit. Deep ball downfield. Roy Williams just absolutely murdered a man on the field, got injured, had to leave the game or whatever is. He was like the dumbest player in the sense of like he just went way too hard at all times. But that that was one for me and, uh, because of our italian heritage, mike piazza, mike piazza, mike piazza was a number 31 we also had this guy, antonio cromarty. 

04:53 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Oh yeah, rumored to have. I mean, he's got a lot of kids, got a lot of children which he couldn't remember their names. 

05:00 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Really, I'm dead serious that's tough this is real story. It was like around 2012 where he was asked about like to name it. He didn't know all of his kids' names. He couldn't remember all of his children. 

05:11 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
He has a lot of kids and the rumor was he got a vasectomy and still had a kid. But that was the rumor. I don't know if it's true. I can't confirm, I probably just saw it online. Was the rumor. Uh, I heard actually his oldest is now 25 and speaking of 25, 25 years in business. 

05:28 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Can you believe it? 25 years in business for pinnacle sportsbook, the greatest sportsbook on the planet. Find out what pro bettors have known for decades pinnacle is where the best bettors play and, like johnny said, in business, in business for 25 years, for good reason Very good odds, very good product, very respectful of the players. Bet smart, bet pinnacle. If you're in Canada, use code HAMMER to sign up. It supports us here on Circles Off and the rest of the Hammer Betting Network. You must be 19 plus and, as always, please play responsibly. Our guest on this week's episode is an og of gambling twitter. You can follow him at sizzling sports. He goes by sizzle. He's a member of the gatekeeping community of gambling twitter that's known as seaville. He's got a lot of sports opinions to spare some bad guitar videos as well. Sizzle, thank you for joining us here on Circles Off. 

06:26 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Thanks for having me, gentlemen. 

06:27 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
No problem at all. So we start this like we do with every single guest, but just to get a brief background on you. You don't have a lot of other media appearances that you've done before, so just share a bit of your sports betting journey and basically how you got involved in the sports betting space. 

06:41 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
All right, sure. So I would say it goes back almost 20 years. It was the first time I really got introduced into betting on sports. I went to law school with a guy who was a complete total degenerate and he was basically the first degen I ever met in my life and he's the first person who really ever introduced me to betting on sports. And it was also, I mean, unsurprisingly it was, it was the NFL, it was betting on the NFL and he sort of like introduced me to it, explained it to me. I was interested in it, big spreadsheets guy not professing any sort of like high level expertise at Excel or anything but enough to be dangerous. And at that time the book he introduced me to was the big bookcom. I heard somewhere that that may have been eventually bought up by Bodog, but I don't know that for a fact. But it was the big book and you know you threw a little money in there, credit card deposits. 

07:46
At that time. Betting started betting football, started betting baseball. I mean really really small, really really small stakes type stuff. I mean it was. I was a broke law student at the time. So and you know, I think that interest that just sort of very, very small stakes. Recreational interest continued for a couple of years and then I got into blackjack advantage play and I'm going to I'm going to bring this back to sports betting, so it's responsive to your question but I got into. I got into blackjack AP play for a couple of years. That led me to BJ dot com, the black which blackjack. 

08:26 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
well, wait, wait, wait, what bjcom I don't know yeah well don't add a link in the description the, the, the blackjack message boards. 

08:36 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
To be clear, um, and it was like around 2008 I wanted to say Fezzik was posting on that message board and he dropped. 

08:49
And I had I had no idea who, who Steve Fezzik was at the time. I mean, I didn't know anybody in the in the sports betting space at that time and he dropped a link or a post about how they were starting up LVA sports. When he was he signed up to be, I guess his title was the moderator of Anthony Curtis's LVA sports message board. Um, anyone who was paying attention at then at that time realized you know, the moderator was really just a title. I mean, fezzik was there to give out picks. Um, some people may disagree with that but I think a lot of people would agree with me. But nonetheless, I had no idea who anyone was, ventured over to LVA Sports, started learning, started reading, got the Stanford Wong Sharp Sports Betting book I think, if I got the title right. I mean it's been years since I opened it but got that book and really started expanding from the blackjack AP play into sports betting. 

09:55
I'm not a sports betting pro. I don't consider myself a sports betting advantage player. Let's put that out there put that on the table. I've never, I've never claimed to be such. I'm surely a wreck better. But uh, you know that led to lba sports message boards, that led to some other message boards, that led to ion gaming message boards and really you know there were a lot of I mean grooving moving was all over those message boards at that time. Um chaperone was all over those message boards at that time. Um, I think captain jack was on some of those message boards at that time. Um, chaperone was all over those message boards at that time. Um, I think captain jack was on some of those message boards at that time. Perpetual check was all over those message boards at that time and I really just consumed. Basically and by the way, I want to be clear, I never, ever followed any of physics picks on lva sports I never followed anyone's picks on lva sports for some some reason you might, you'd be a billionaire quite in reverse right. 

10:49 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I just we're calling back. We did the standup comedy lessons, calling back to past episode there. 

10:55 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I think perpetual check tracked all of Steve's plays at LVA sports and he posted the posted them on a different message board and it was like negative 140 units across four seasons or something like that. I mean, it was just really, really, it was a bloodbath, but uh, I really just consumed pretty much all the content I could that was posted there by chaperone, perpetual check, grooving and, um, you know, that's at least my opinion, is that's. That's really how you learn this stuff, is you? Just? You just have to consume it from the people who are really, really, really, really good at it, and you can't expect it to be content that's very accessible. I mean, you've got to really, really work to consume this stuff and understand it. That just eventually. 

11:45
You know, I think Groovin jumped on Twitter At least he was the first one I knew who jumped on Twitter maybe around like 2013, 2012, something like that, and then a lot of people just started migrating from these message boards onto Twitter and I did it and I picked a really stupid handle when I signed up because I didn't know what I was doing and it was like you have to pick something. So I picked Sizzling Sports, which is dumb. 

12:07 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
What's the origin? Like why Sizzling Sports? Was it just random, or was there something to that name? 

12:12 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, so I was always Sizzle and so I was trying to figure out a handle. I mean, I wasn't trying to brand anything, it was just like how do I get signed up for this stupid app? And I was just like, okay, well, what led me here was sports betting message sites. Okay, I guess that's why I'm here sizzling sports. So, um, it's, but it's too bad to change it now. Right, now. 

12:34 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Now, that's what you're known as. You can't like once you, once you go with it and you become known as that. It's too hard. It's too hard to rebrand at this point Sizzle. 

12:41 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, and I presume you'd only rebrand if you actually gave a shit about branding. 

12:47 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Right In your journey from like advantage play blackjack to sports betting. Was the goal for you to become like a winning sports better or you know. Gain like you know. Do it as a living, or was that just like a hobby of yours? 

13:03 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, it was always. I always went into it with, like, with a hobby idea, um, I mean, the goal was always to try to try to win money when doing it. But uh, I was never thinking that I was going to transition from practicing law to becoming a full-time sports. Better it was. That was never a thought, never and never will be. 

13:27 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
So what are? 

13:27 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
you doing with betting right now? Um, not much, not much, you know. So COVID hit and it really I mean when I think, when you're, when you're recreational or at least pseudo recreationalreational, trying to pretend like maybe you know what you're doing, you actually rely on things like data and some very, very, very basic modeling maybe I mean really basic stuff, you know. And then COVID hit and March Madness was canceled and we didn't know what's happening with baseball, we didn't know what's happening with football and everything shut down. And you know, I'm not earning a living off of betting sports and I wasn't at that time and I just sort of like got away from it and not coincidentally, right, if you go check my content, you'll see, like at the end of maybe 2020 and bleeding into 21 and thereafter, like the guitar content got a lot greater, um, and that's really kind of like that's I had. 

14:34
I had gone like five years really without playing guitar as crazy as that sounds and a lot of that had to do with moving from Florida to New York and I was in a band a bazillion years ago and I left that and I moved to New York and there was nobody to play music with and this was all pre-plugins and all this stuff that we have now where you can basically do a garage band by yourself in your home, and it just kind of got away. 

15:08
I just got a got away from it. It was almost like musical depression, uh. But covid kind of like reignited that. Because there was no sports, there was, stuff was shut down, like despite what you hear about you know florida from certain people like politicians and stuff like yeah, I mean, the beaches were closed down, that that for a large part of that summer you couldn't do much. All restaurants were more or less just takeout. So I kind of filled that void by getting back into the music and I haven't really transitioned much back into the sports stuff. But it's a much lighter load now than it was before, that's for sure. 

15:46 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I'm interested in. So you know you're a self-proclaimed rec better or casual better I can't remember your exact words, but not doing this professionally. In recent years we've seen a lot of, let's say, new bet types, particularly that are catered towards the rec better right and specifically I'm referring to same game parlays and like live same game parlays and stuff like that. Now you're in a non-regulated state. Have you been able to like capitalize on these new types of bet types, or is this stuff that like still hasn't made its way to you yet? 

16:22 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Well, it's certainly right. So, you know, if Florida, as far as US operators go, I mean I think we just I think we just have one and it's the Seminole Indian tribe and I think they have the monopoly on it. Yeah, hard, hard, rock, right, we don't have DraftKings, we don't have FanDuel, we don't have MGM, we don't have any of that stuff. So not having those apps, sure, I think, naturally means that I'm not exposed to a lot of these new products in the sports betting space. But to be fair, I was never really interested in that stuff in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006. 

17:04
Being just a rec person, I mean I was really just full game sides, full game totals, half times derivatives, stuff like that I never, never got into like, you know, rsw's or anything like that that shouldn't be taken as as me, you know, shitting on them as minus ev things. 

17:22
Or you know, know props or anything like that. I mean, those things can be very profitable from what I can tell, you know, consuming this content from others, but just was never something I really got into. I think it was because it always felt to me like novelty stuff and, having done the Blackjack AP thing right, you know, during that period of time you find yourself in a lot of casinos and you sort of start to get this develop this like when you find yourself in these casinos, you see all these novelty bets and all of these table games and all of this garbage that you know has this just like massive house edge and you just, I think, sort of developed a natural kind of self loathing to anything that even sort of seems or reeks to be like a novelty thing. Right, but again, don't that should not be taken as me, as me saying any. Any bet is a bad bet. There are an insane amount of really really smart people who are really really good at this who can find edges in everything. 

18:15 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, it's interesting to me the way that you classify yourself as a better, because you're kind of like in the in-between phase where you realize that you're a wreck and probably don't have huge edges, but like it still seems like you have some sort of price sensitive, like coming from the blackjack edge and like knowing what it takes to win. It seems to me like you're very cognizant of things to avoid. It's like kind of like a wreck plus maybe, or not quite, but kind of like an in-between Would that be fair to say? 

18:47 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Sure, you know, rec plus. I mean, maybe that makes sense. Coming from the blackjack world and I'm just speaking strictly for myself, not for anybody else but coming from the blackjack AP world, you get very, very, very sensitive to anything that takes away from your edge, because the edge is so tiny in Blackjack AP and it's almost like you get allergic to things that you think minimize the edge, decrease the edge or just have no edge whatsoever and probably cause me, for example, to just become overly sensitive to that type of stuff. So again, I'm not saying that any of these bets are bad bets. From a general perspective, I'm sure there's people who do very well at them, but it's just not something that I was ever drawn to. 

19:40 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
All right, well, we'll get into the reason we had you on Sizzle, which is the gambling Twitter sphere Gatekeeping, I guess you want to call it as Rob introed you, I call it gatekeeping. 

19:53
So, sizzle, I would classify you as more of a Twitter troll in some capacity. A lot of times you've got me on some big laughers. When I've seen some of your tweets basically calling back, calling out some people, jokes, stuff like that have countless times have caught me laughing. So I wanted to basically ask you like why do you do this? What does it bring to you? You know? Is it fun for you Stuff like that? You know, why are you doing this? 

20:23 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Man, that's you know. I saw that on the outline and I appreciate the outline, by the way, that's really great stuff and it's just a real. For me it's a really difficult question to answer. I think it's. The answer is kind of a soup of it's a distraction, right? I mean, I'm a, I practice law full time. Um, I'm a litigator. That means courtrooms, that means judges, that means motions, that means hearings, that means arguments, that means clients. Um, like a lot of things, it's, you know, stressful, grueling work. 

20:59 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
And are you putting the bad guys away or keeping them out? 

21:06 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
No, I'm all civil. I'm all civil. 'm all civil, so I don't do putting some money in people's pockets or taking it out. 

21:08 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
There you go on the way. That's a better, that's very much a better way to put it. Uh, so I look at a big part of the, a big part of the. The gambling stuff is, um is a distraction, you know. I mean it kicks your mind off of more serious, more important things. Um, I got mad spreadsheets. Yo, you know it's, it's just fun. Like that part of it is fun to like input data into a clay travis college football spreadsheet and see like the numbers move to the left every single week. Yeah, it's, it's, it's hilarious, don't know, I think it's a lot of fun, um, but I mean it's really. I guess it's really a selfish, selfish thing. I'm not, I don't do any of this stuff to try to be, to try to like white knight or cape for anything or any, any purpose. This is I don't know. And then certain people, as you have already divined, um, really get under my skin, and so I, you know they draw attention more than others. 

22:10 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Okay, well, let's get right into that. So I can say Clay Travis you know you already mentioned him. If I'm going through your timeline right now, I see a lot of Jason McIntyre stuff. These seem to be your most frequent favorite targets, I'd say, nowadays. What is it about these personalities in particular that frustrate you Sizzle? 

22:33 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
You know, with McIntyre, there's just something about the almost undeserved, self-anointed sense of betting expertise he bestows upon himself, coupled with what I perceived as a victory-lapish sort of tweet when Groovin passed away. Really, I don't know man, it's not personal, obviously I don't know the guy personally. Just it's like it's not personal. Obviously I don't know the guy personally. Um, sure he's a great guy, sure he's a fantastic family man and all that stuff. But this sort of fake betting expertise persona that he portrays, coupled with, kind of the approach he has taken to some things that have happened, I don't know it just personally really gets under my skin, clay bugs the hell out of me. Because he is, I mean, he has a law degree. I'm not sure whether he's ever practiced law. He said he, he said he has. Other people have said he has in the Virgin Islands. For how long. I don't know what he did exactly, I have no idea, but that is real. That stuff really, really really bugs me because, um, I imagine it bothers me for the same reason I could be totally wrong. Bothers me for the same reason that it would bother a real top, high level professional sports better when you have these fake people on the news on TV. Professing to be experts in something that you know, you, as a pro, better might devote 80 hours a week to Right that. That there's a part of Clay, that the whole. 

24:20
I mean, and I had, I had a thread going for a while it's still out there where it's just like every single legal take he has is like completely wrong. I mean it's just he makes statements I it's there's a thread out there, man he's made statements about evidence that are like completely wrong. He makes statements about like what people are arguing in court papers and they're completely wrong. He makes like predictions about the way litigation is going to turn out and it's like the exact opposite every single time. Um, and then it just I don't know. Then he then he's got it, got the stuff where it was, like he had some affiliate links. I know he's. He said he, I think he said he didn't make any money off of losses, right off of customer losses who followed his links. I don't know, we don't know one way or the other, but anytime you have someone who's firing out these affiliate links, who is certainly clearly not a sharp bettor, it's really I mean, I don't know. It's just distasteful to me on a personal level. 

25:23 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Fair enough and I think with myself and Johnny, we get very frustrated when people portray themselves as betting experts that aren't, because when you work hard to make a living off of betting or accrue you know good income off of betting and you see people misrepresenting themselves, that's certainly frustrating. 

25:46
That's certainly frustrating. So I can see that. You know you practicing law. Having someone else giving out opinions on law that might not be qualified to do so or is consistently wrong, I can see that as a as a massive point of frustration. But I'm going to play devil's advocate on the Jason McIntyre thing for for just one second here, because if I was J Mac and I heard you say this right now, in terms terms of misrepresentation someone coming off as portraying themselves as a betting expert that really isn't my immediate rebuttal would be to you, sizzle, as someone who is a self-proclaimed rec, better themselves. Who are you to be able to make that judgment on other bettors in the space? So I understand the Clay Travis side of things, but with the J-Max stuff like, what gives you the authority, or why do you feel you have the authority, to go after other people in the space who may misrepresent themselves as betting experts? 

26:37 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I think I'd say, I think I'd say to McIntyre nobody needs authority to do anything, right? I mean, look, let's put aside, like you know, outright defamation, lies, slander, all that stuff, right, we're obviously not talking about that stuff. And I would respond to him and I would say well, who gave you the authority to label yourself, or allow yourself to be labeled, as a Fox sports betting expert? You know, who gave you the authority to portray yourself as such without any sort of documented long-term record consistent with a self-anointed title of betting expert? Uh, on that point, though, just let me say one thing he was I mean, whether it was him or someone else, he was very clearly labeled as a Fox Sports betting expert, at least up until the point in time when he did Jeff Maas and Rufus's podcast, and he completely word saluted, in a way, with well, who's calling me that? You are, I'm not calling myself that, and I will say that now, at least as of today, because I went and checked he's now being listed as a Fox Sports betting analyst. 

27:59 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Analyst expert. 

28:01 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Well, there is a distinction, for sure, but yeah, I mean, this is the kind of stuff that really frustrates me, generally speaking, in the space as well, and I I think when, when sports betting regulation happened, um, a lot of people who are just bettors became overnight experts in the space, and it's. There's a distinction between understand, like knowing how to bet and how to place a bet and knowing what a money line is and a parlay and a teaser and whatever, versus actually being an expert on betting, which, in my opinion, is way, way more than that. So I have noticed sizzle it's probably not just JMAC, but I think a lot of people have, in at least the last year, really veered away from the whole expert thing and have gone down the analyst path. 

28:50 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, and it's a smart thing to do, right? I think another thing that's important is, you know, let's not pretend like, for example, I'm taking issue with J-Mac performing some sort of like high level quantitative analysis, right, you know he tweets things like um, um, the, the, oh, the more, the the national championship, clemson, alabama game. You know, I got, I got plus six. It's now now moved to plus seven. I'm feeling really great about that. 

29:26
Come on public money. You know, on bama, I mean, yeah, he, he's tweeting things like I think it was someone on bet online was like promote, promote. Maybe it was dave mason at the time he was promoting some sort of like novelty bet, like something absurd, right, like, like what it wasn't? What color is the gatorade, but something like that. And you know jmac earnestly responds like wow, you know house limits and you're like dude, you, this is this like it's not even ignorant is too kind of a word, right to to respond to that stuff. So you know, I guess that's another thing I would respond to. Someone like jmac is like I would say dude, come, come on, man, I'm not sitting in my mom's basement calling out some sort of model that you spent eight months putting together, dude, you're chest-thumping massive amounts of sharp money coming in against you. 

30:19 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
All you got to do is read the Stanford Wong book once to know how stupid that is Right Fair enough yeah, certainly a lot of people who give out bad advice to do is read, like the stanford one long book once to know how stupid that is. Right, fair, fair enough. Yeah, certainly a lot of people who give out bad advice. Um, in certain aspects, okay. In addition to that, though, let's talk about you know, the whole seville community, which is a, you know, right now has expanded. So you, the names you mentioned, are more, in my opinion, that the og kind of guys. Right, rob, what would you say? 

30:45 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Well, yeah, like Groovin, who Sizzle mentioned earlier. 

30:48
If people don't know, his Twitter profile was Groovin Mahoovin and he was viewed as like probably the gatekeeper for sharp sports betting Twitter. 

31:01
It was like Groovin was the guy for a long time and he was not scared to call people out whether that was RJ Bell, philly Godfather, even you know, jason McIntyre people who were like self-proclaimed sports betting experts and he rubbed a lot of people the wrong way who didn't want to hear what he had to say, but he was the, he was the guy and there was like a community that was, I, I would say, built around him as the central figure. You can correct me if I'm wrong, sizzle, but that's, that's my perspective from the outside looking in. But seaville for short, my understanding is it stands for contrarianville and it's just a group of of bettors who collectively share a lot of the same, I guess, insights or feelings on the space that you do, sizzle. So I'm just curious, like, how this formed essentially? How did you get connected with all these other people in this space and embraced as part of this, you know, larger social media betting group? 

32:07 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, I mean the answer to that is is Groovin' Mahoobin? He was so okay, and I know I know you probably didn't mean to refer to him as like sort of like a leader of Seville, right? I mean I know that's not what you meant, but you know he was. I mean, groovin' certainly was the mostville, right? I mean I know that's not what you meant, but you know he was. I mean, gruven certainly was the most vocal, right. I mean he was. 

32:30
You couldn't be anywhere near this stuff without getting some of Gruven's opinions right, you know, 99.9% of which were well, very well grounded opinions, whether you didn't, whether you liked the packaging or you didn't. And I'm trying. I think what happened was I joined Twitter, wait, okay. So there was LBA Sports, and my memory's a little bit foggy on this, but there was. So LVA sports started. Grubin was there, perpetual Check was there, chaperone was there, a bunch of other people were there. Lva sports did like this massive culling of like all the really sharp people who were posting there, and I always get the circumstances mixed up and Grubin always used to correct me because I just couldn't remember when it happened, but I believe it was when Fezzik challenged Dreamer. Do you remember Dreamer? 

33:36 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I do. 

33:37 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Okay, dreamer was kind of like a Computer Bob, right, like you want to talk about like record keeping and really keeping people honest. Like those two guys were the guys and you know for what it's worth, computer Bob is like the only person I'd ever certainly trust to like escrow money with if there were ever a playground challenge that I was a part of which is never going to happen, but I think there was. Fezzik did a challenge. He said I bet I'm going to hit 55% or something in the NFL this year, right On full game sides and totals. And then, like Dreamer tracked him and he hit like 48% or something really, really bad. And everybody I think what happened? Everyone at LA Sports went off. 

34:16
And then there was like this massive calling of like that's it, we're kicking out everybody who's basically critical. I didn't get kicked out because I didn't really post much at that point. I was just there, I was just there to read. So then at some point there was another message board going on where all of these people kind of migrated to and I was part of that board going on where all of these people kind of migrated to and and I was part of that and I I think I still had time left on my lba sports subscription, so I just gave like grooving my login information. I was like here you go, I mean just so you can keep reading all the stuff over there, right? Um, and, by the way, before that happened, there was a really funny story I told it on a different podcast where actually grooving called me out on this other message board for something very stupid I posted at LVA sports, which was probably very deserved. So that was actually my really first interaction with him. 

35:06
Um, but I think that was a lot of people's first interactions with Groovin, sure was. And so then I. So I guess I kind of E-connected with Groovin that way. Uh, then migrated over to Twitter, 2014-ish or so, and then Groovin put me in a chat box with a number of other folks, and many of whom I'm, I, you know, I still communicate with today, and that was sort of how I I. That was my end, my end, so to speak, which is a little bit of weird way to describe it, because I wasn't exactly looking for an in right into this community. I wasn't trying to like become part of a click or anything like that. Um, you know, it's just like a notification. 

35:49
One day it was like boom you know grooving mahou and added you to whatever you know seville chat box that wasn't the name of it, but you know what I'm saying. Right, and it just kind of took off from there. Really, the relationships kind of developed more in the one-on-one chat box setting than it did kind of in the open social media world. 

36:10 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Right Now. What is that group dynamic like? Like, is it used as collaboration with other bettors? I mean, is it just posting like oh you know, j-mac said something stupid today. Let's go roast him on Twitter. Like, what does that Seville dynamic look like? 

36:31 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
So, and just to be clear, it's not right. It's I don't this thing, I'm talking about this, this very small subset of people, I don't. I don't think it's representative of quote unquote Seville Right. 

36:47 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
But I'm going to, I'm going to cut you off really quickly, sizzle, just because Sure, what, what, what do we? What is? What is Seville as a whole from from your perspective? From your point of view? 

36:59 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I'm not really sure. So I'm not really sure and I won't pretend to be sort of the authority on what Seville is or isn't, but my own personal understanding of it is just a bunch of misanthropes who hate dishonest people. It's a broad brush, I know, and I'm sure if you asked 10 people who considered themselves part of Seville or otherwise, you'd probably get 10 different answers. 

37:32 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Fair enough. I think that's a good. I mean, based off of my viewpoint of what Seville is. I think that that's a very good definition. 

37:43 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, I don't even know how it started. I have no idea how it started or where it started. No clue. 

37:48 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I mean I can lend you my experience. But I joined Twitter I don't know, I think maybe 2010, like very, very, very early infancy of Twitter, and I used to post pics pretty regularly. I was a rec better who probably thought I was more than a rec better or a winning rec better at that time that wasn't. And then all of a sudden maybe it was around 2013, 2014, in that I just had a bunch of people who were regularly coming after me on Twitter and I guess maybe it was because they viewed me as misrepresenting myself. Potentially I was doing some you know radio hits with Smoke and Dave Cokin at the time as well, which was probably pretty frowned upon by you know the people like Norm Gambles, if you remember that name. 

38:34
But over the years, you know, the dynamic for me very much shifted. 

38:42
I had like a personal relationship with Groovin that I guess like I don't really want to get into the details of it, but for the first couple of years that I was, I noticed him on Twitter. 

38:51
He would go after me really regularly, but then he kind of started to DM me on the side and say hey, like just if you don't realize, you know why I'm saying these things. This is why and I actually probably learned the most I ever learned from Groovin but while that was happening, on the side there was other members of like Seville, quote unquote that would regularly, you know, rip me on Twitter and it was really hard for me to decipher like just this whole community and what it was all about. But it just felt to me like there was a lot of extreme personalities, a lot of bipolar-ness I mean it's the best way I could put it and I could never really understand the motivation or whatever. But when you dial it back and say, oh, these are people that just don't like other people misrepresenting themselves, it makes a lot more sense to me as a whole. 

39:44 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
That's how I've always viewed it. Again, I'm only speaking for myself, I'm not speaking for anyone else, or I can't tell you what anyone else's view on the dynamic is, but that's just kind of how I've always viewed it and, um, I mean, yeah, sure, I'm a little bit of a misanthrope, I mean, you know, but I think I think I think as we just get older, I think we just naturally become more misanthropic, because as you get older, you tend to, I think, shrink the orbit of people around you and you realize that less is more. And you know, as you get older, you actually, you, actually, you know life gets busier, life gets more complicated and you just don't have time, I find, for a lot of extraneous stuff. So maybe being a being having the personality traits of a misanthrope amplify all that maybe. But that generally seems to be a common theme of what's going on Do you connect with? 

40:42 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
sorry, sizzle. Do you connect with any of these people outside of the internet? Have you met any of the Seville members in person before? 

40:51 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yes plenty. So the answers to your questions are yes and yes. So the answer to your questions are yes and yes, and I find that a very common theme is that every single person that I meet is much, much different than his or her Twitter persona or ex persona or social media persona. Every single person that I've met has been a kind, generous, helpful, comedic, enjoyable person to be around, and I mean that I mean every single one of them that I've met, and that includes Groovin. I only had the pleasure of meeting him once that I've met, and that includes grooving. I only had the pleasure of meeting him once. He was the nicest, funniest, you know, kindest person in the room. 

41:46 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I mean just as much as any one of these other people, but generosity, rob's fighting back some tears here. 

41:50 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I mean, I had a lot of private conversations with grooving, probably talked to him about stuff that, and for those that don't know, grooving passed five years agovin probably talked to him about stuff that. And for those that don't know, groovin passed five years ago. Rest in peace to him. Perpetual check passed away last year as well. You know people that are missing from the community but yeah, like I I'm. 

42:10
I was just kind of in a, you know, johnny, johnny saw me but like just kind of reflecting on what you were saying and I don't understand sizzle. Like what I've always struggled to understand is how the real life persona of these, a lot of these people, is so different from the internet persona, Like, and when I, when I said bipolar earlier, this is kind of like what I meant by saying that, not that they're at that, they're actually bipolar. But you meet these people in real life and they're so normal and they're like almost apologetic. It's like, rob, you know I said some things about you before, but I actually think what you're doing is great for the community and whatever. And I'm like, well, why don't you just say that to me when you're at your keyboard rather than you know everything being so negative and I've really struggled sizzle to to figure that out and like why that might be the case, because I've had a lot of the same similar experiences that you've you've had and I've just never been able to piece it together Really. 

43:09 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I just think, with the, with the music stuff aside, I just think, I just think it's more fun to be mean on the internet than it is to be nice on the internet. Mean is an aggressive term. I probably mean it's more fun to be sarcastic and short and maybe nasty than it is to be nice on the internet. 

43:32 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Certainly garners more views, that's for sure. 

43:34 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, it definitely garners more views, like Johnny said. 

43:37 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Definitely garners more views, that's for sure. Yeah, it definitely garners more views. Like johnny said, definitely garners more views. Uh, siz couple. Uh. One more question actually before we get into the final questions here is uh, so listen, I I consider you a pretty sharp guy whether or not you're a sharp better specifically or not, but obviously you've been practicing law for a while. Very well spoken, I can very clearly tell that we've chatted before on DMs. What I want to ask you is listen, you're not focusing on betting specifically right now, but if you were to focus on betting, what angles or markets would you attack right now? 

44:08 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
So I still think and again, this is just me talking, I'm happy to be told I'm wrong by people who are way smarter than me at this stuff I still think that the NBA playoffs are a very beatable market. Okay, and by beatable I mean you win money. I don't mean I don't mean massive edges, I don't mean hitting 60%. I mean I think it's very it's. I think it's very, very beatable year over year, at least in in current times. 

44:42 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Why is that? 

44:43 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Um, I, I think it's just because you got. Well, that's a tough. I mean, look, that's probably a better question for, maybe, a bookmaker, um, or a better question for someone who has 100 accounts and is watching, watching things on screen 24, seven. I just, but I just, I just think that the, the markets, it's a perfect mix of the markets being big enough but the information not being as widely known, if that makes sense, and you know you have, you also have. You have things like, certainly in in the first rounds, right, you've got four games a day and they're sometimes overlapping, and some of them aren't starting until 1030 at night, eastern time. And so you know, I think some things can get missed, some things can get overlooked. At least that's my opinion and my experience. Make no, no mistake, there's a lot of people out there who are way smarter at betting the nba than I'll ever be, but that's just kind of my opinion, I think. 

45:45
I think I still think regular season college football is beatable. Um, I mean, we all know regular season college football totals have been soft for a long time, right, that's not, you know, that's not light bulbs going on to say that, or you know, like the ocean's parting. But I, you know, I think that a lot of the derivatives in college football, a lot of the first half sides, the first half totals, are especially beatable. So you know I like those markets. It helps when you enjoy, you know, watching college football. 

46:22
I don't watch a single minute of regular season NBA unless I'm actually going to a game. But you know you can still like. So that's a little bit. The NBA stuff is a little bit different from the college football stuff. You know, I used to be I used to be heavy into baseball but COVID kind of just killed my interest in that and the reality was I didn't really like watching baseball all that much at the time anyway. And you know, that's sort of look, that's sort of telling on yourself a little bit, right. Like, if you love watching the games you certainly are not a sharp. You sharp sports better if you sweat the games, right, that's sort of a sign of a wreck, right? 

46:59 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
um, yes yes, and no, yes and no, I sweat the game sizzle. I I occasionally will sweat the games, so I I gotta step in. It is more of a recreational trait, it's a recreational trait. 

47:13 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But I know tons of like. Listen, I'll be honest. The majority of people I know who win money betting the vast vast majority 95 will still watch their bets. They're not going to be addicts that are like sweating their smallest bets but when they've got a bigger position like they're turning the game on or at the minute I'm checking the scores. 

47:36 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
That doesn't, don't you think watching a game? Watching a game is different from quote-unquote sweating a game? 

47:41 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
yeah, that's true like no. No, they're sweating it. 

47:43 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I'll be clear they're sweating okay I'm not at the point where, if I lose a bet, I'm gonna like put my fist through a wall, but that's the fun of betting man. 

47:50 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
That's part of the fun. The whole fun that we get to do in terms of betting is also the fact that you get to watch a game and it doesn't go your way. Now, if you're the kind of guy who, like every time you get a loss, you're like down in the dumps and like struggling to wake up the next morning, yeah that's. I don't know many pros that are like that, johnny. 

48:10
You see these pictures behind me here yeah including this one in the corner as if I didn't watch that fight. These are the fun of betting. 

48:19 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
This is the exact opposite of fun. This is the exact zero, zero. Going into extra innings when you have under eight and a half and then a guy hitting a walk-off grand slam Not fun. Fail, mary, where referees that like are replacement refs just making up calls on the spot. That's the opposite of fun, for me. 

48:38 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Hey, can I ask you something? Yes, Did you have Kansas City or Green Bay? I genuinely couldn't tell from your tweets. 

48:44 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Kansas City or Green Bay on Sunday Night Football. Yeah, we had the over in the game, okay. So we needed points Did you win? We won the over. You won the over, okay. 

48:58 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Good, good win. 

48:59 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You couldn't tell, though I genuinely couldn't tell if he had Casey or Green Bay from the sweep, Because it's important for me to remain impartial, too, when I tweet. 

49:03 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
No, it's not Usually, you can tell. 

49:04 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Well sure. 

49:07 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I can only think of off the top of my head. I can only think of one game where I had a large position for me okay, not for others, but for me that I actually genuinely enjoyed watching, and it was the Oklahoma-Kansas college basketball game where the Buddy Heald Oklahoma team that went into overtime. Maybe it was more than one overtime, I don't remember. I think this was like 2016, maybe 2017. It was the first one of the season and it was the game at Kansas. 

49:43
I believe Kansas was like a six point favorite and I was on Oklahoma and even though there was I'm trying, I really am remembering this off the top of my head, so some details may be wrong, but I remember there was an Oklahoma player who wasn't a star on the team who I think missed a free throw that could have put Oklahoma ahead at the end of regulation and instead it went to overtime. And they still want to covering, but I that's like the only time I can remember but having, you know, a meaningful position on a game and like, like, really truly enjoying watching the game as a sports fan. So you know, tick that box off. 

50:20 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It's another box ticked off under the the rec better category well, I, I think this one is just like to each their own. Honestly, like there's, there's going to be some people who who love to quote unquote sweat the game and like put money down, watch every single play and like live on the edge of their seat. For For me, oftentimes with the exception of NFL, and it's because I do a lot of NFL content but when I'm betting hockey games I don't even watch the games because I don't even check the scores to live. 

50:48 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
If you have a big position, game goes to OT. You're not putting that on. 

50:51 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I try to put my phone away for that night if I have a really big position, not even check my phone, because I know partners like will message me and be like, oh, tough loss or like, oh, like cash it or what. I just don't want to see that, you don't even want to see that, I didn't want to see. 

51:04 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But I think it's a to each their own, like you, know, if I have a bet on the raptors like I'll toss the game on. Why would I not toss the game on? Sure I mean that's but. I also do enjoy like genuinely watching sports. Um, just, I don't. I don't enjoy like wasting your night sitting around watching the game, but to have it on the background, I I think it's nice. Yeah, do you? 

51:25 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
do you watch a lot of sports, sis? 

51:26 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
yeah, I mean I'm. I'm more or less what johnny said is I've always always have something on, always have something. I mean if you'll never hear it, because I'm always, you know, mixing through plugins and stuff like that. But if you pull just straight the audio off of the camera when I'm doing a guitar vid, like, you'll hear whistles in the background, right, you'll hear. You know, first down, or you know, incomplete You'll, it'll inevitably always be a sports broadcast. 

51:53 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
There you go. Sizzle, give us your plus EV move of the week. 

51:58 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Plus EV move of the week. Plus ev move of the week. Yeah, don't follow sizzle's betting advice. All right, negative ev move of the week of the week um negative ev move of the week could be anything in life. 

52:10 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It doesn't have to be anything in life yeah, it could be like don't, don't park your car, uh, on the street. Actually, you know what I'm going to give out one of mine. All right, go for it. I got a good one. I just I. 

52:21
This one's been on my mind for a while. All right, if you're visiting somebody else's house, okay, and you drove there to a buddy's house grandparents, parents, whatever it might be You're visiting somebody else's house and you're leaving at the end of the night, okay, never park on the driveway. Ever, ever in history. Don't park on the driveway, because chances are, if you're parking on the driveway, you might park in behind somebody's car. If it's a four car driveway or or greater, or at a minimum you're blocking one of the garage spots, all right, you're basically negative, free rolling yourself. Park your car on the street. 

52:58
And again, I'm talking for more like suburbs. If, if there's a driveway and the alternative is you have to pay for parking somewhere, then this is void. But I'm talking suburbs where you can just park freely on the side of the road. Park on the road. That way, if somebody has to leave that house for whatever reason, you don't have to go outside and move your car. If you park on the driveway, negative free roll. You may have to move your car, might be one in 10, but why do you got to be that guy? And also, you know you go over a friend's house. They have a whatever somebody else over, a cousin over, and they're like all right, I'm heading out, they come out, they have to walk back in. Oh, who's got the car? I got to move my car. Oh, can somebody move. 

53:38
You just not only inconvenience yourself, you just inconvenience that guy. Never park on the driveway, Always on the road if you can, if you're planning to leave that night and if it's free. 

53:48 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That's a good one. I'll actually throw out a minus EV as well. That also has to do with the driveway. Siz, you would have no idea what I'm Actually. You know what you said. You lived in New York for a little bit, so maybe you would understand this. We got our first snowfall recently in toronto here. Do not drive over the snow on your driveway ever, because once you do that, you've laid down for the winter. 

54:12 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
You know. You know I've been done for the winter. 

54:13 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You've laid down these tracks that are just going to be impossible to ever. And if you're a perfectionist, when you shovel the driveway like I am you want to get every last bit of snow. You're going to be chipping away at those tire tracks for the entirety of the winter. 

54:27 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
So those things are going to be there until May. 

54:29 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Exactly. 

54:30 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
And heaven forbid, you get an ice, an ice storm a day after you just drove over. Now that's actually permanently on there for the winter, you're just done for, so don't do that, so sizzle. 

54:46 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
This, don't do that. So sizzle, this is what we give up, like, give us an equivalent to that, okay, all right. Well, so all right. So my minus EV of the week, and not really of just the week of of whatever is engaging. Okay, engaging on social media, I, you know, I'll tie it to a real world thing. It's engaging with opposing counsel who's writing you silly nasty emails. Um, with opposing counsel who's writing you silly nasty emails. The minus EV move is always, always to engage. I mean, sometimes you have to, sometimes like, for example, in my world, I have to. You know, I have written countless emails that simply just say denied, without further comment, just so that the word denied is there. So I've CYA'd myself in case any of this stuff ever winds up in front of a judge. But anything beyond that it's. I think the rule applies professionally, I think the rule applies on social media. You know, just engaging is the minus ev. We say, dne, do not engage, yeah, and I think you'll find yourself a happier person for that. 

55:39 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
This is great advice because, like when matt zalbert messages you on Twitter talking about how he's Mr Over Under best totals, better of all time, and he's got like a sample size of 30 and cut out an entire season because they changed the rules, when you respond to that it's a horrible move because that guy is going to spend his next 72 hours just repeatedly coming back. Don't engage. You heard it from says great advice can I ask you guys a question? 

56:07 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
yes, okay, so I'll keep it quick. I asked and I asked. I asked jeff and rufus the same question prior, prior to oh, I had jeff and rufus, jeff and jeff, ma and rufus on the other pod body correct rufus p body. 

56:21 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Yeah, that's right. 

56:22 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Okay, yeah, that other podcast, that other podcast, all right, but I asked them the same question that I want to ask you guys too, because I'm genuinely curious. Prior to the repeal of paspa, rj bell was everywhere. Right, stephen a smith um radio. I mean this show, that show, cbs sports, I mean he was, the guy was just everywhere. To me at least, it seems like the dude has disappeared and pregame has disappeared. I mean this show, that show, cbs Sports. I mean, the guy was just everywhere. To me at least, it seems like the dude has disappeared and pregame has disappeared from the promotional part of the ecosystem. I doubt anything is going wrong with pregame. I mean, I'm sure they're still doing business and making money. Is this just a function now of, instead of just one, pregame? Now we have hundred and other people are sucking up the oxygen and they just don't get the attention they used to get that's certainly possible. 

57:10 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I know rj listens to this podcast, so he might actually have a comment and be able to respond to that at some point. Uh, I I honestly don't know. The. I've definitely noticed it. They're still producing. Content is pre-game. They still do like the dream podcast with Fezzik and Scott Seidenberg and whatever Like that. Content is still out there. He's just not as vocal and as active in the space. 

57:33 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
They're just not being forced down our throats, I think, as consumers of the content, like it was at least pre-passbook. 

57:40 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I can kind of tell you what I think is. So pre-games obviously like an affiliate slash. A content site gives out picks. There's many more of those now, as you alluded to, and that obviously has cut into the market share. 

57:54
But the main reason, I think, is pre-game was kind of you know, they were in the media because there was no other companies that were offering up like massive money to do this stuff. And then after the regulation, there's so many companies now that are paying big bucks to all these media companies so there's really no reason why they would want to have, like a pregame segment on ESPN, unless pregame was going to be paying them a lot of money, which would it be worth it? So I think and again, think and again. It's not 100, but it really just has to do with the fact that there's so many more companies in the space. All these books are like shilling out money for content stuff like that, like there's just more money going around that we don't necessarily get that content jammed down our throat because it's smaller and you're going to get just other content. 

58:39
But you, we still do get content jammed in our throat. 

58:42 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
So you think there are other vendors, so we'll call them vendors. There's other vendors who are actually stepping in and paying for the rights to be public facing and pregame. Probably, maybe for business reasons or otherwise, just isn't willing to shell out that money for that exposure. 

59:00 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
More or less yes, Not exactly in those words, Like when you say paying for the rights. There's different ways of doing it. Obviously, it's a lot of times partnerships, a lot of times different structured deals. But yes, for the most part. 

59:11 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Stuff's always, I mean from a business and legal perspective. That stuff is just always so interesting to me. So is the idea of can anyone ever be held liable for selling losing sports picks? But that could be a discussion for another day. 

59:25 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Well, can anybody ever be held liable for selling losing like stock stonk picks? 

59:32 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Good question. I you know I don't. I don't know about that, just because I mean I'm not really aware of people. I know they're out there. I'm not really aware of people other than know they're out there. I'm not really aware of people other than who's that guy? Mad Dog Kramer. Yeah. 

59:45
Who's, like you know, out there shilling picks for whatever reason, but you know the stock selling folks have these and secure. We'll call them securities. Right, cause it's not just stocks. Right, you can have stocks, you can have bonds, you can have a lot of different things fall under the umbrella of security. Stonks, basically Stonks. 

01:00:03 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
The shrap. You know stonk portfolio guys. 

01:00:07 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
You actually have, like, at least you know, here in the US, I mean, you actually have federal and governmental agencies that regulate this stuff, right, so there are guardrails. I know a lot of people who sell picks like to make that analogy. Well, it's just like I'm telling you what to invest in, and I mean my personal take is it's a very, very imperfect analogy for people who sell sports picks, and so I've always always in my own mind at least really really thought about all these interesting scenarios where scenarios and legal theories under which someone could be held civilly liable not criminally, I'm not getting into criminal stuff but civilly liable for selling losing sports picks or selling picks for which they know have no value. 

01:01:03 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It's always been an interesting question that's going to be nearly impossible to prove. Yes, the secondary, but I mean the first one. So you're saying essentially, someone launching a suit against somebody who they purchased their picks and then lost money off those picks. 

01:01:14 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Okay, so you know I disagree a little bit with you, johnny. I think actually it would be very easy to prove okay that they thought that they had no value, not that they thought that they knew or should have known. 

01:01:28 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Ah, okay. 

01:01:29 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
So I don't know the legal jargon here. That's what I'm trying, actually not to use the legal jargon. Believe it or not? Um, I find it. I think it would be very easy to to all right If you sell a car that doesn't start right, like you're liable, right? You can't just sell a car that doesn't start right, because if you're selling a car, you either should check before you sell it that it starts and runs or you should be charged with that knowledge. 

01:01:59 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Or you can sell it with the car that doesn't start and just say like this is a car that doesn't start. 

01:02:03 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Okay, right, you give a disclaimer and obviously you get less money for the car. Yeah, all right. None of these pick sellers have a disclaimer that says every single one of our touts has a long-term losing record. Okay, so, so take the disclaimer out of the equation. None of them do that. All right, I think it would be very easy to allege that they they knew or should have known that none of their touts win long term and and and that because they knew or should have known that they're knowingly selling something that has no value, meaning there's no reasonable expectation as a seller that this package of picks is going to win None Zero. What if they sell it as entertainment? See, I don't think that. I personally don't think that's good enough. Okay. 

01:02:57 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Because that's fair enough. I'm sorry to cut you off, ciz, but let's say I'm the opposing lawyer and I'm defending the tout service right? 

01:03:07
Sure, I can literally just pull. I mean, most of these tout services don't even have like long-term records of their own handicappers. You can't find them or anything. They could honestly just make numbers up out of thin air and be like well, we have this large sample of all of our handicappers, are getting 3% closing line value over 2000 plays and, yes, maybe they've lost, but in the long run we believe that these picks are going to win because they're obtaining closing line value. 

01:03:34 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
And okay, but that, only that only works, I think, rob, if, as the defendant defendant you can also prove that everyone buying the package has access to the lines, which is never the case, right? Um, well, never is not the right word, I mean it's, it's, it's a very it's, it's at best 50, 50 whether someone who subscribes to a pick service can get a stale line. That it's how it gives out. Yeah, right, right. 

01:04:01 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Yeah, but that's the same with anything related to basically any article. Ever for any investment, even like a recommendation to buy like a home or a condo, except. 

01:04:12 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Johnny, except at least here in the U S we have laws that say, if you're going to do that, you have to have records and you have to make these disclosures available publicly and to your clients. 

01:04:23 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But, what you just have to have a thing that says this is not financial advice. No no, no, no, no, no, no. 

01:04:30 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
You have to have performance records, oh interesting, like how you, how you, how you have done versus the S&P 500 over the last five years. So what? 

01:04:36 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
if they had performance records that were negative and they sold the product Well, you could have access to the negative performance records. Would that be something that's Then I? 

01:04:46 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
think yes, then I think you'd have no claim, but then again they'd also have no customers. Of course yes, but I always wondered about that. Because I can tell you right now, I could sit here right now and with the rest of my day I could come up with a well-pleaded complaint alleging fraud against the theoretical pick seller for knowingly selling picks that they know have no value. And the real magic of these lawsuits and in my opinion it's one of the reasons why the pregame versus Gawker media lawsuit didn't go forward is discovery right. At least in the American system. There are almost no bounds on the discovery process in a civil lawsuit and the discovery process is basically the information gathering lawsuit or the information gathering phase of the case, where you are allowed essentially to go to a business and say give me every single possible record relating to the allegations in the complaint. And when you do that with a pick selling service, there's no possible way in response to your document demands, you are going to get a binder of historical picks from any single tout. It's just not going to happen. And then you can argue to a judge or a jury that they had no factual basis for believing that they were selling something of value. Just because you think you're a winner is not enough. You have to actually have a factual basis to do it. That's how you win these types of fraud cases, you know, with a fact finder, whether it be a judge or a jury. 

01:06:17
The disclaimer is an interesting point and you brought it up right, because all of these sites do have a. This is for informational purposes only, so on and so forth. Again, you know, here in the US, the state laws are hit or miss on the validity of those types of disclaimers, like, for example, a lot of states' laws say that these types of disclaimers in a contract have to be in 14-point font and all bold. Right? This pick-selling disclaimer language is you need a microphone glass, right? They're as small as Clay Travis's edge in college football, right? Or Jason McIntyre's edge in the NFL, who, by the way, is down 36 units since 2019. All right, I digress, and I just always find it interesting whether those? I personally don't think. If I were the defense lawyer defending a pick service in a civil case, the last thing I would do is put all of my eggs in the basket of. I have a very, very small print disclaimer on the bottom of my homepage, right? I? 

01:07:12 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
understand. 

01:07:14
It's very fascinating. 

01:07:15
I mean, I remember back in the day probably the turning point of getting like Seville on my side or at least not thinking I was a complete joke for a while was when I started tracking the records from all the Philly Godfather handicappers and posting like a monthly update and then, like this is, and just like going through the plays that are given out on their service what's posted to the. 

01:07:45
It's a catastrophic like. It's just a disaster of records. A disaster Because sometimes they'll tweet like a free play out of a Twitter account on a horse race and it's a tri triactor and it wins and that goes into the record keeping log as like a plus 24 unit win, but when it loses it's not there. Like there's just so many ways Sizzle that if I was representing or working for like the tout side of things and arguing you that I can just get away, I think, with making it seem like we are at like the average person cannot decipher Like the winners from the. It's just so hard in this space to prove what you would want to try to prove. 

01:08:36 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, I hear that and you know. My personal counter to that is you know you win these cases based on documents. Yeah, and he's got documentation. The side that doesn't have documents is, more often than not, the underdog in these lawsuits. In these types of business fraud lawsuits they really are, because you know it's. You get to argue to a judge or a jury. You know, judge, you've heard this testimony. They're professionals, they've been doing this for 20 years. They, they have these many accounts, they have CLV. They tell you all this stuff, judge, but yet they come in here without a single record of historical performance, not one year, not three year, not five year, judge, you cannot believe a word that they say it's all self-serving. I mean, that's what we do. Those are the arguments. 

01:09:22 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
They do have the records, though. They're just falsified. 

01:09:24 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
There's going to be records that show up in that courtroom and that no one has ever seen before. 

01:09:33 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Believe me, there will be records that are showing up there and then the other fun part of that becomes all right. Let me in discovery. I also want all of the personal betting records of the touts right and I want to cross-reference that with the picks that you gave out. And it would be a very powerful argument again, in my opinion, to go in front of a jury and say tout X sold 1,000 plays as part of this package. They lost overall. Let's see if tout X actually bet his or her plays that they sold. Oh, look they. 

01:10:04 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
They bet 50 you know that sort of thing. Or they met them at a different number and then a different number, or they bet them for five dollars. 

01:10:11 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Who's even gonna? 

01:10:11 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
understand all this, this is the chat the inherent challenges rob's like. 

01:10:15 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I'm gonna just tell them that I have clv who, who, buddy. You can't even get the average better to understand what that is. 

01:10:20 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You can't get get the average better to understand what that is. You can't get 99% of the population to understand. 

01:10:24 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, you know and that's a good point, johnny, because you know, part of what we always have to consider is you know, I have this fantastic legal argument and I've written this incredible brief and this memorandum. Okay, now I've got to go argue it to you know. 

01:10:37 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Eight average people, yeah, or even smart people that just don't know anything about sports. 

01:10:44 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
It's really hard no, that's right notice. I didn't say eight dumb people, I just said eight average people. Yeah, the eight, eight random people actually. Yeah, fair enough, you know, eight average people have no idea, would have no idea what any of this stuff means. 

01:10:54 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Could you ask for, um, all of the like, a history of the emails of their plays as part of discovery? Absolutely, because then you could very easily say well, these are actually all the plays that were ever sent out and you could come up with an actual record. If they were to show up. With a different record, you can then find which plays don't match up and be able to put in a pretty good argument. I would think absolutely all of that? 

01:11:21 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
do you include leans? Do think Absolutely. Do you include liens? 

01:11:23 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Do you include liens? Do you include the free plays? But yeah, that's an easy way to determine If you're able to ask for every email that ever went out to a client, you could easily put together a lot and the company would have that and they should be tracking that themselves as well. 

01:11:42 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I think you're getting somewhere If you won this lawsuit and the company would have that and they should be tracking that themselves as well. I have to ask this If you won this lawsuit against a tote, hypothetically it would be a civil suit, so you'd only win money. What are we talking about here? You get your subscription back. Yeah, so I would certainly allege as damages the subscription fees which are going to be de minimis in the grand scheme of things, Right, Because you know I wouldn't even cover a portion of your legal fee. 

01:12:09 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
No, you're right, You're right. So I would ask for subscription fees and I would ask for, I would ask to be made whole in the amount of all of my gambling losses. 

01:12:20 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
For in lifetime. 

01:12:21 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Well that I lost on the subscription yeah, on those places the place that you bet so now you gotta put your record in this is tight, this is tight. 

01:12:30 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I listen, I don't know what you could prove in court. I've never. I've never actually been there, but uh seems interesting enough. 

01:12:35 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I mean, if people get, and then you get class action lawsuits. You know who to reach out to on twitter. 

01:12:39 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Yeah, yeah, that's right, and it gets more interesting when you get into the various state fraud laws, like, for example, here in Florida we have something called the Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. Ok, if you could slide any of these claims underneath the umbrella of that, then you'd have a right to also seek your attorney's fees from the tout service, because those statutes give you the right to recover your fees as well. 

01:13:03
Basically, need that to break even on this whole uh venture I mean the challenge is, you need somebody like um, I mean I don't want. So. I know bruce willis's health is bad right now, but he was like rumored to be a really like huge sports better, right? I don't know if you ever heard that I don't, bruce willis. 

01:13:21 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I never, I honestly never heard that before, but I, I can see it, I can see okay, well, let's use a fictional person. 

01:13:26 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
You would need someone like um chris shareless from heat to be your client. I mean, you need someone who lost, you know, multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars to to make the lawsuit worth it. A couple of years ago, I was approached by a guy who was interested in suing draft kings for his losses. Wasn't clear, because we didn't get that far, because I was kind of like the claim is not going to go anywhere, but it had to do with and I might mangle this because it was a while ago, so forgive me, but it had to do with I think that that that um, where draft kings was releasing player usage data to a select group of, like high-end DFS folks. Is this ringing a bell? 

01:14:07 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It is yeah, yeah. 

01:14:08 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
And so I think he you know he was the potential client was really upset by that, and he came in and he wanted to like formulate some sort of claim against DraftKings DraftKings based on DraftKings giving advanced usage value to you know, the high rollers and I was just like, yeah, that one, I'm a pretty good attorney, I think, but I I don't really have much for you on that one, and you know cause we weren't talking about six figures of damages either. So it's just that one wasn't worth it. 

01:14:35 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Well, I might have a client for you, because there is someone out there Um, they go by at tr underscore tracker on twitter that I came across maybe like four or five months ago, who had been tweeting that they had been purchasing wager talk picks like the entire staff's selection for years and lost like hundreds of thousands of dollars backing those picks. And now he's just basically out like he he still is gets the picks because he's paid for them and he like posts them and tracks them publicly now as well but I'm gonna give my opinion here. 

01:15:10 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I don't think this should be a suit. You bought those wager talk picks. 

01:15:14 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You fucking deal with that now, buddy I get it, that's, but that it is what it is. But, johnny, so many of these people cannot, I mean, look at the marketing that's done around some of these sites and think about how you still bought those wager talk picks that you then got, okay. 

01:15:31 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But if you're gonna stake real money, you're still the one placing the bets. It gotta be responsible. It can't just like deflect oh, not my fault, no you no, no, I agree with you. 

01:15:39 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
At the end of the day, it's the responsibility of the of the pick buyer to do their due diligence. 

01:15:45 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
The problem and still their their liability. If they place the bet, they know there's a chance they could lose. Because even if there were winning picks like even if, even if you sold your picks which were like I think these are going to win, I have a historical record of winning like there's still a chance you lose on. And especially there's a chance you lose any given bet. So how could there be liability? You still got to make your own call as a better like, be responsible. 

01:16:07 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I'm kind of with you, but I do have to say that it's very hard for the average person not even the average person like 98% of people to actually do proper due diligence in the space. So then they lose their money. 

01:16:22
Maybe you have to learn the hard way I did. I bought picks when I was young. I also bought picks, I mean, and I lost and I thought I was researching these people. I'm like, oh wow, fuck, this guy is like 10 and two last 12 plays yeah, I'm going to buy this guy's pick. I had no idea about sample size anything. So, yeah, I'm the idiot. I'm the idiot. I learned a valuable lesson that way. But it's impossible in this space to do due diligence on people. It's so hard and the average person knows nothing about sport. They think they know everything but they actually have no clue. They believe in hot streaks and cold streaks and like the handicapper's doing something different, to go nine and one in his last 10 picks Working a little harder. He's working a little, wakes up a little bit earlier every day If there's a full moon or not. 

01:17:07 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I think Johnny makes a good point. I mean, there is a level of personal responsibility attached to the transaction. Right, yeah, you know, cigarette smokers somehow still win tobacco cases. But it's really really hard. Because there's a level of personal responsibility, you still bought the cigarettes, you. Because there's a level of personal responsibility, you still bought the cigarettes, you still smoke them. Again, another imperfect analogy. I get it. But then, Rob, you make a good point about well, what if the plaintiff takes the stand and testifies. Well, the decision I made to buy the picks relied on this false historical data that the tout service was giving me. That's false. 

01:17:41 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
That's like a false advertising case. 

01:17:43 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Fine, yeah, that would be fine, but not only that like affiliate deals exist with touts too, where they will go to like a big website, and I'm not. I don't want to like, I'm just going to throw out random names here, but I'm not suggesting that like. Covers is a very big website in the space. I don't know what covers business model is or whatever. Theoretically, a tout could go to covers and say hey, listen, let us advertise on your website and for every single sign up or pick sale that we get, we'll split. You know, we'll split the revenue 50-50. And that exists in the space. 

01:18:14
You look at the biggest touts out there. They're not only on their own websites, they're advertising on other websites as well. So now all of a sudden say I want to. You know, search a tout on Google, find out his track record. You know what other websites I'm getting on? Page one is all other websites that are promoting this guy as being a winning tout. Like it's really, really hard to do due diligence. Like it's very, very difficult for a casual better to navigate the space. 

01:18:41 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
And the harder. The harder a tout service makes for the customer, the stronger the customer's case gets in my opinion. But you know, and this is part of you know, part of being an attorney is you do have to see both sides, but I think Johnny's right. I mean, the hardest thing for the plaintiff that I have to overcome is the personal responsibility aspect of it. 

01:19:00 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
You know you inputted your credit card number, man, you bought them yeah, and, by the way, I'm not even talking from a legal perspective because, like, whether there is a case or not that would be for you to to, like you know, have a opinion on. I'm saying like just morally, like I don't I don't. 

01:19:14
You have a choice in everything, you but purchase yeah, I don't think that they should have to pay for that. That seems a little ridiculous, especially given the fact that you still bought the thing and placed all the bets. Like you have to know, like just it's like at the end of the day, though, like you got people win a case against whatever fast food chain for the coffee being too hot and I'm not, it's like like I guess that case wins, but for me it's like I don't think that they should have gotten money from like. You gotta know, you have to have some sort of common sense in life to realize that, yeah, but you're betting it was a different story, though the sub the that that coffee was ridiculously hot like which one there was the the hot coffee case I think it was mcdonald's, like that was an absurd, like insanely hot coffee like if I've ever been brewed. 

01:19:55
If I eat a baconator every day for a year, yes, I can't be going after wendy's and being like I gained 28 pounds. That can't be a thing. 

01:20:04 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That's all I'm saying you have to take if I'm robbing another guy's house and I slip on the ice on his front porch when I'm leaving the door and I crack my head open like I should not be able to sue that guy because I was robbing the house. But this is the world we live in, man. 

01:20:15 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It's the world we live in. Yes, he, because you, if you robbed a guy's house, you got trapped in his basement and you couldn't get out because he didn't have the correct size egress windows in the basement. Yeah, I know. 

01:20:26 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
I know. 

01:20:27 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But it is what it is, so I got to make sure. 

01:20:29 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
So if I ever handle one of these cases on the plaintiff's side, I have to make sure someone like Johnny is not on my jury. 

01:20:34 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yes, that's what I've learned here today. 

01:20:43 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Jury selection would be very important for you on this one, very important. No listen, I'm definitely people gotta get, get the win, the civil suits where it's applicable, and I know there's a lot of scenarios. But I'm, yeah, I'm more of a like, hey, like the people. The average person has to still take some responsibility for their actions. 

01:20:53 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
They can't just don't don't take that the wrong way, johnny. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not shitting on your point. I think it's a very, very valid point and it's something that, yeah, the plaintiff would have to have a real, real, real strong strategy for dealing with. 

01:21:05 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Yeah, of course we ask all of our guests the same question to end the show. If you could go back five years, just a measly five years seems like no time at all. What advice would you give to your previous self? 

01:21:20 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
When was the Atlanta, new England Superland super bowl? 

01:21:24 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
oh god, that was probably five years ago, yeah all right, all right. 

01:21:28 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Uh, new england minus three and a half no, I'm just kidding minus three and a half oh, they did come over they scored the touch huh 34 28 wasn't that 2016? 

01:21:38 - Zack Phillips (Other)
uh, I don't remember what year, no no, no definitely not. 

01:21:41 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, my, my basement was unfinished. I had not put all the Bitcoin into my basement. 

01:21:44 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I'm pretty sure I was in first year university 2017. 2017, yeah. Sorry so it wasn't that we just missed it. 

01:21:50 - Cizzling Sports (Guest)
Now, you know, I would tell my this is going to sound entirely not misanthropic and so probably not good for the podcast, but I would, personally myself, I would tell myself, spend more time on music. Okay, that's, that's just me, I think. Generally speaking, I would say to people like you got to find something that you're really passionate about and devote as much time to that as you possibly can. Don't change your whole life for it. 

01:22:18
I mean, you're not walking out on a wife or kids or family for some silly guitar videos, obviously. But if you find something that you're really, really passionate about, put as much time and effort into it as you can, because when you're on your deathbed like, for example, I will not say on my deathbed, I wish I made less, less drunken guitar videos. So I, you know that's, that's the advice I'd give myself five years ago, 10 years ago, 20 years ago thank you very much. 

01:22:46 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
That's applicable to, I think, anybody in some facet. Um sizzle, thanks for joining the program. This has been actually. You can find him on twitter at sizzling sports. Uh, if you so, please, if you have any cases, I presume maybe his dms are open, maybe not. Um, this has been episode 31 of circles off here on the hammer betting network. If you haven't done it yet, please absolutely obliterate that subscribe button. Obliterate that like button. We appreciate you all. We'll see y'all next week. Outro Music.