00:00 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I'm probably a little more cavalier with my line moves. Like I just like to cause chaos on the screen. Like that's the goal every Monday morning when I can to cause utter chaos. I want everyone to be like what the f*** is going on at Circa. 

00:10 - Johnny (Co-host)
Come on, let's go. You think I'm gonna come on here and put one of the Aussies in the elite tier? I'd vote for Rob of 25,000. 

00:19 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I wouldn't vote for you, I could basically just cheat and get the same bets that they're getting. It's weird because you can also pay your bills at the same place where you bet. I mean, you're a short guy. 

00:33 - Johnny (Co-host)
What? This guy talks a lot of trash. He's talked a lot of trash about me, Rob, a lot of people in the community, but he's refusing to show his face Couting yourself as a pretty good NFL gambler. 

00:42 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I thought you were an idiot. Say testing, testing, I'm a cock. 

00:45 - Johnny (Co-host)
one, two, three four Aussies going head to head with the Aussies. 

00:49 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That's what I grew up for, and I said get him Kirk and they call me a mean spirited name. I don't hang out with him. The Toronto Maple Leafs. I'm already getting a lot of early. This could be the best Circles Off episode that's ever been done. Welcome to Circles Off, episode number 184. Right here, part of the Hammer Betting Network and presented by Pinnacle Sportsbook, I'm Rob Pizzola, back in the saddle. 

01:20 - Johnny (Co-host)
Robbie Marbles. Robbie Marbles Nice to be back. Nobody's called me that in a long time I know he hasn't won any circa, circa millions the philly godfather crew used to call me robbie marbles back in the day we, uh, we got an amazing guest. 

01:34 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
We this, this episode I've been looking forward to for a while finally have been able to make the recording time work, which is great. Um, yeah, I just ran, just ran into. I mean, we don't. I don't know why we're speaking in secrecy. It's going to be on the. You know, it's the title of the episode. Everything is going to be. 

01:52 - Johnny (Co-host)
You got to wait to see who it is. 

01:54 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You got to wait, tune in to see who it is. But no excellent bookmaker, top class, great human being as well. So we're going to dive into a bunch of key concepts on today's show, but before we do speaking of top class bookmakers, that's what Pinnacle Sportsbook is Available to bettors across Canada. Find out what pro bettors have known for decades Pinnacle is where the best bettors play. I've personally been playing at Pinnacle for a long time. They'll always be one of my sportsbooks of choice because it's a great product. They have great limits, great customer service, easy to get money in and out anything you could ask for in a sportsbook. I think they're very fair. So make sure you check them out. Head over to Pinnaclecom. Slash Hammer. To do so Must be 19 plus, not available in the US. And, as always, please play responsibly. 

02:48
Today's guest is one of the most respected names in the sports betting industry, known for his leadership in shaping the modern sportsbook landscape. As the former sportsbook director at Circa, las Vegas, he played a pivotal role in building one of the most better, friendly sportsbooks in the world, setting industry standards for transparency, for fair odds and high limit wagering. He's now the Chief Risk Officer for Mojo. You can follow him on Twitter. At MMPact, matt Metcalf joins us on Circles Off Matt, how are things Good? 

03:20 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
How are you guys doing? 

03:21 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Doing great. I've wanted to have you on for a while, respect you greatly for what you've accomplished in the space and for all the true sharps out there. There's a conversation that circulated a while back about who would you put on your Mount Rushmore of sports betting and candidly, I would put you in there, matt. So this is a pleasure to talk to you today on Circles Off, because I think you've done so much for the space. But there's a lot of people out there who will be watching this for the first time. They don't know anything about you. So if you could just quickly start here with your journey into the sports betting world and what first drew you to this industry. 

04:00 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, first off I want to just thank you for that introduction. It's probably more than kind. Truth be told, I was honestly nervous about coming on this podcast, just because I respect you guys so much and I think you're kind of like the voice for what I consider to be like the right side of the sportsbook industry, just like people doing things the right way. So again, thank you for having me on. What drew me into the sports betting industry probably starts when I was a kid. I was exposed at a pretty early age to gambling, like probably everybody. You know a lot of people who listen to your podcast. 

04:32
I can remember the first time that I was exposed to kind of like betting and it wasn't necessarily sports, but taking a field trip to Thomas Edison's home in Fort Myers, florida. I think it was like his winter home where he did like his his like workshop, where he did all stuff, and there was a kid in the back of the bus who was playing like some formation of like poker with dice, and so basically you had five dice and you would try to roll the best hand. You get two rolls. So if you rolled, you know three, threes and and you know a four and a five. You'd hold the threes and then roll the other two dice to try to break the best hand. I think everybody was kicking in like a dollar per roll and I was just like what is going on back here? Like people are cheering, like everyone's excited, like I worked my way to the back of the bus and I'm like, oh, this looks awesome. I had, like you know, $7 on me or something and I don't even remember. This is amazing. I can make money with like nothing but like my decision-making in my brain. And granted, there wasn't a lot of skill involved and that was mostly luck, but yeah, so I kind of remember that was my first experience with betting. 

05:35
And then I was lucky enough to have a friend that's probably like 13 or so, whose mom, like had a bookie. I have no no idea, like she was probably at the time like in her mid-40s, but she, she had a bookie. She was, she was cuban and she had this cuban. Because I'm south florida, like a lot of, a lot of my friends are hispanic. I don't know, that's not really important story, but anyway, we we met this hispanic, like cuban bookie guy and eventually we were placing so many nfl bets through her that she like gave us his number and we had like an account and we would call up and, you know, say, hey, this is number like 34. Um, can you give us the rundown of the NFL lines? We'd get the NFL lines we lost. We would take our bikes up to the local mall and meet this guy in his Cadillac and pay him off. Um, yeah, we were just like. We were like true degenerates. Um, I can remember we would. 

06:23
We got into calling like Stu Feiner back in the day and I mean they would ask you on the phone back then again. I don't know how this works now, but they would ask you like how much money are you betting? Cause they wanted to pin you to an amount. So they could basically say, okay, if you're betting a thousand a game, then we need to have like $500 of every pick we give you. And we were just like, okay, well, I guess we need to bet more to get the good picks. And we we eventually like I don't even know how we were putting this on somebody's credit card, but anyway, yeah, that was a long story. 

06:53
We were all awful at betting. Beyond that, we used to bet on like super Mario cart. We would do things where, like you would, we play like the heads up matchups? I think, like the heads up matchups, I think like the races, and like every second that you would beat somebody by was like worth some amount of pre-negotiated money. We like had our own craps games, like I don't know, we just like we really we all have like running debts to each other at all times. There's a group of my friends, like seven of us. We had a sheet of paper and we just all be like OK, you know, billy owes me $340. Rob owes me $110. So we'd all be just like transferring debts, like if one of us lost the other one would be like, okay, how much does Rob owe you? Okay, right, take $50 off his debt and transfer. Like it was just, it was out of control, like we needed an intervention. We didn't get one. Yeah, to answer your question, that's how I got into betting and yeah. 

07:41 - Johnny (Co-host)
It seems like he's from our hometown it's the same story as me. 

07:44 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I still rob on an active sheet. 

07:46 - Johnny (Co-host)
We keep, I gotta, we, I don't know our. Do we ever settle up or you just keep gambling? I don't know we didn't settle up. I'm saying art, do we ever settle up? 

07:54 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
like no, I think it just goes on, it just goes on until. 

07:57 - Johnny (Co-host)
Yeah, that's how it is. 

07:58 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
The mario kart story is hilarious because, uh, me and my friends used to do the exact same thing. That's very clever that you guys did it by the amount of time that you won by, because there's a very clear Mario Kart strategy, which is stick behind in the back of the pack and stockpile great weapons and hoard them till the last lap, whether that's a lightning or a blue shell or whatever. So we had to implement a rule where we were playing, each lap that you led would get you a percentage of the pod as well, so it incentivized you to go, uh, a little bit harder in the early laps and not stick back otherwise you start the race and then everyone's just there. 

08:34 - Johnny (Co-host)
Yeah, it's not even. 

08:35 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, yeah I mean it's, uh, it's not. Anyways, that's a good idea, by by by time. 

08:40 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
One, because that way we were looking for all the alt markets we could find. We just wanted, like all the like, different ways to like, have action flowing. 

08:47 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
A hundred percent. But before we got to these actual alt markets, was there a pivot to a winning better before you got into bookmaking? 

08:57 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
No, it's funny, like because I was so bad starting out. That's probably what led me to think about bookmaking. I remember like the first baseball was my sport growing up and I kind of jettisoned that as I got older. But like I would wake up every morning before school, grab my sports section and just like be obsessed with like player stats and I remember thinking, okay, I know so much about baseball, this is the sport that I can be. 

09:19
And back in the day we would bet from the newspaper lines I think was the line he would quote where it was like I don't even know the correct way to like term this, but it would have like two numbers. It would have like you know seven. It was all based on like a nickel type thing. It was like seven and a half and then you got six and a half and so if you bet you know 750, you'd win $5 in the favorite. If you bet $5 on the dog, you'd win like 650. And we'd go through the paper and see the line. 

09:42
I think I at one point lost like 13 straight baseball bets and I was just like this is crazy, like if I know something about baseball and again, not like I knew a ton. But I felt like I knew something you know, and I'm this bad at this Like what must like average people who are just like making random bets be doing? So I think at that point my one friend and I who had the bookie connection all of our friends were into betting. By that point we're like, hey, what about? And we were calling in their bets for them. So we're like what about if we just hold their bets? What about if we just, like you know, take their bets and don't call them in? And at first we're like that seems kind of scary. What if they win? But we're like, hey, they never win, so let's just keep them and let's not tell them, because you know, if we tell them that they're not going to pay us. So at the time we thought there was nothing wrong with that, we're just cutting out the middleman. We did that and I think that kind of opened my eyes to like the potential of a bookmaking and like why that might be a career I could be interested in down the line. 

10:42
When did you actually start to pursue that? Interested in down the line? When did you actually start to pursue that? So I read an article like we did this in school as much as we could Like. If we, if we knew kids in high school, if we knew kids wanted to bet, we just be like, hey, you know, we can take that bet if you're looking to take that, and it was kind of like one off bets. We would take a bet here and there. 

10:59
But I read an article I think it was in like 93 or 94. 

11:03
And it came out around the time of March Madness and it was a three part series by a guy named Tim Layden who was a reporter for Sports Illustrated and it was like it talked about campus gambling and they were basically saying how bad this was, how you know sports betting is preying on, like the youth of our you know our country. 

11:22
But the thing that they did in this article was they laid out like a step for step, like how to to bookmaking and basically, just like anyone who didn't really understand how it works, they just laid it all out so well in the article and gave you so much information that it was like this just sounds incredible, like this sounds like something that I would love to do and like, oh, now I understand, you know about how to run parlay cards and now I understand all these other things, and it kind of just gave me this like primer on bookmaking to the point where once I read that I probably was like 16 at the time or 15. 

11:51
I was just like this is all I want to do. I just like this is like I feel like this is my calling in life, like I want to figure out how to get to a point where I can do this At the same time, you know, I didn't really want to be like somebody like evading the law, so I was just like, is there a way I can do this and not get in trouble? Like can I, you know? And eventually Vegas became the destination to kind of do that on the up and up, which is where I went after school. 

12:14 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Okay, so you get to Vegas. I like to tell the story of Dink being like a big mentor to me. Johnny doesn't tell the story of me being a big mentor to him in the early going, where he used to meet me at the local pub. 

12:27 - Johnny (Co-host)
I mentioned it many times. 

12:28 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Where he used to meet me at the local pub. Who was the mentor for you, Like when you first got involved in the bookmaking industry? Who were the people that you looked up to and showed you the ropes? 

12:37 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
So I paid a lot of attention when I was in college to a sports book called the Imperial Palace, and the reason I paid attention to them is they were known as kind of like the epicenter for prop betting back in the 90s and they would do just this crazy big menu of Super Bowl props and they would actually put it online. So if you went to AOL and you typed in under the keyword odds, it would kick you to the Imperial Palace prop menu at some point, if you clicked on the Super Bowl tab and I would just go through those bets every year and be like amazed, like how do these guys, how these guys able to make numbers on all these different things? Like this is incredible. Like I probably even you know booked my friend's action according to these bets when I was younger, just like printed out the sheet like, hey guys, if you want to bet anything, bet this. So when I graduated school, I basically wrote three letters and I apologize if I've ever told the story before somebody has heard it, but I wrote one to Roxy Roxborough at Las Vegas Sports Consultants. I wrote one to a guy named Jewel Lupo who was the sportsbook director of the Stardust at the time and I wrote one to Jay Cornegay, who was the sportsbook director at the Imperial Palace Roxy had already left LVSC, which I didn't know. He had sold it and a different guy owned it wrote me back and said, hey, we don't hire people unless they have worked in a book Never heard back from Stardust. But Jay Cornegay was nice enough to write me back and basically say, hey, if you're looking for a job once you graduate, come out to Vegas and look me up and we'll see what we can do. So when I graduated college, I threw myself in the car, drove to Vegas. Jay hired me. 

14:07
When I got there and eventually started as a ticket writer, I realized quickly that the guy that I was looking up to from afar, that I didn't know, was this guy named Ed Sammons who was the head odds maker at the Imperial Palace, who went on to be probably like one of my biggest mentors in the business. So that was like one of the main people I looked up to right off the bat, um, as well as a guy named Nick McDonavich who was kind of known as like the big, the just like the action bookie guy started out downtown and Binion's had worked at the Strat for Carl Icahn, taking huge bets and worked at Mandalay Bay, had actually got fired or let go from Mandalay Bay when Charles Barkley like welched on a half a million dollar bet on the O2 Super Bowl with him. And then this guy named Richie Batchelary who had run like Caesars and Palms. Those are like the three guys who I think I really just like idolized for a couple of different reasons. Like Richie was the professor to me of like bookmaking. Nick was kind of like just like the big guy, like nobody, nobody's got a bet that Nick won't take. 

15:05
And then Ed was just like to this day, the best odds maker I've ever met. 

15:09 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Love that story. 

15:10 - Johnny (Co-host)
What's the Charles Barkley story? 

15:11 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, we got we. So if you look it up, you'll, you'll see it. But basically Barkley was a credit player at Mandalay at the time. He went down to the book the morning of the Super Bowl. This is, I think, like Patriots Rams and this is, I think, like Patriots-Rams. 

15:23
So I don't know the exact bet he made, but I know he bet the Patriots. I'm assuming he took the points because I think the payout would have been on the money he bet. The money line would have been a lot more and I think that he only ended up winning like $700,000. He bet half a million or like $550,000 on the Patriots and Nick I don't think, or the people working for Nick never grabbed the marker or never had Charles sign anything. So he had basically made the bet on his word and then, as the day went on, nobody ever kind of like settled the marker or settled the bet and nobody knows whether Barkley was kind of just avoiding it or whether he actually forgot, but anyway the bet won. They never found Barkley before he walked up to the window and cashed the ticket and was like pay me when found barclay before he walked up to the window and cashed, you know, cash the ticket was like pay me. 

16:10
When he had gotten the ticket in his hand, but technically he had, they'd kind of he kind of free, rolled them, yeah who, you know, the bat was going to lose, like the thought was like he probably wasn't going to pay this bet if it lost. So, um, that's the barclay story and I think nick nick bore the brunt of that, uh, of that like victory by charles and I think ended up having to move on from mandalay I'm sure. 

16:24 - Johnny (Co-host)
So he never welched on the bat he never. 

16:25 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Well, I'm sure if anyone asked charles the response would be like of course I was gonna pay it if I lost, but he did free roll himself, basically he free rolled them. 

16:33 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I guess welch is the wrong word, and I'm not privy to all the details, but just from reading a lot about it and trying to like fry it out of nick, because nick's not a guy who's going to throw anybody on the bus, whether there was that situation or not, like you know, I get the sense that the thought was that it was understood that if that bet did not win, it probably was not going to be paid. 

16:51 - Johnny (Co-host)
So uh, interesting uh happens, I guess, even even in the regulated space in Vegas. Yeah, um, so we had, we had a bunch of questions for you uh, in regards to which I think we'll get to, regards to bookmaking and stuff like that. But, uh, you are one of the, as Rob mentioned, like kind of like a Mount Rushmore style guy in your approach and philosophy to bookmaking. So my question is how does that differ from the standard approach? 

17:20 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
When, when I came up I don't think I differ at all from, like the offshore guys, like the books that I idolized kind of coming up, you know, the pinnacle from like when I got to Vegas from 2004 to 2010, like that, that's kind of like interacting with pinnacle. That was where I got kind of most of my inspiration for how a book should be run. You know, obviously, following books like Chris, books like Grande, these were books that I just like I liked the way they moved lines, I liked the way they took action. They didn't run from anybody Like there's a big kind of like to me. It's kind of like the spirit of the game, like I think I think Rufus Peabody like voiced this like label on it and it resonated with me. It's just like there there's obviously a way you can do things optimally for profits. But there's also like to me, just this inherent like I want to be the best at my occupation, I want to take on everyone I can and like this is how the game I run a fair book because, like I wouldn't do this job if I didn't run a fair. It's not fun for me unless I'm playing the game the right way, like cheating or like cutting people off like I. It wouldn't be fun to me. I wouldn't be the. I wouldn't, I would never have the opportunity to like rise to what I would consider like to be elite if I was just be like you know, if I was jordan. But I was like, oh, I want to play against like the knicks. They're a little tough. I want to play against the suns. They kind of like you know, they're pretty good. They might beat me like I. My only way to like rise to that level is to take on the best every day. 

18:41
Plus, I think there's the added bonus of like you know, when you, when you see the sharpest bets, it's a lot easier to adjust your line accordingly, to feel like you have the maximum amount of information when you're taking the bets yourselves, rather than like trying to look at the screen and be like, oh, chris just went to two after three. I wonder why they did that. Maybe they did that because they had to go back from here Like. I don't want to get in like this mode of like speculation. I'd rather be very upfront, pay for the information and have the best line I can. So I feel comfortable when the guy walks through the window. You know 10 minutes of the game and wants a million dollars on the side. Be like yeah, I'm comfortable where my line is. I can take that bet. 

19:16 - Johnny (Co-host)
So do you have a history? Obviously, of not cutting anybody at your time at Circa, do you think? 

19:26 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
cutting people off is like cheating, so to speak. It's not cheating, it's just. Like you know, I'm accepting of other books models. I just think that they're not. I think they think they're maximizing profits and revenue and stuff when they're. I don't think they are. 

19:37
I think, like Circa has been an example of that, like we've, you know, we've held pretty close, so like right now I think we're above 3% lifetime holding against 90% wise guys. Like we can hold 3% against the sharpest of the sharp and get their information and utilize it to feel more comfortable about being in good positions from all the action we see. So my thought is like it doesn't make sense to to cut this segment of the population off. That a is like helping you deal a better line and feel more comfortable. You know, taking on risk, um, but. But B is just like there's still. You're still earning off them, you're still making money off them. 

20:11
So yeah, I don't, I don't understand the other model. I guess and again, like I'm, I'm not necessarily just trying to write every bet I can to to the sky's no limit but handle there's good. Jay Cornyn used to always tell me there's good handle and bad handle, and I agree to some point. But at the same time, like the goal of bookmaking to me should be to get the limits as high as you're able to, to write within the smallest window possible. So if you can, you know if you can write a baseball game at, you know minus 30 and and you know plus plus 20, plus 25, and you're and you're writing bets that you wouldn't write if you weren't that tight of a split. You're not really doing your job. If you're not maximizing the amount of handle you're getting through at good positions for the book. So that's kind of my whole philosophy Write as much as you can. 

20:58 - Johnny (Co-host)
So I used to believe kind of what you're saying right now and then over the past, I'd say one to two years, I kind of had a little shift in mentality when it comes to the overall business standpoint of things like which is hey, let's say, your fan duel versus circa, versus pinnacle, you need to make the most amount of money possible. Um, for that business Do you think that you could ever make as much, given that when you're writing kind of like the circle model, the pinnacle model, it doesn't really enable you to offer all these different game types and game modes. I guess we'll call them that. Like Circa doesn't offer the, they definitely don't offer any same game parlays, but they certainly aren't even close to offering the level at which FanDuel does, where you can like, price pretty much anything. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam down the road thousand million bam, bam, bam, bam down the road. 

21:48 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
1,000 million combinations. Do you think that then prohibits a sports book from really taking off and growing mainstream? Yeah, I agree with you. My whole thing is I don't want to punish the customer for my lack of technical infrastructure or my ability to write bets, which is why at Circa, like you said, we're limited to the markets that we feel good about. That we can control. But with these bigger books, I do agree with you If they were to kind of take on the circle model or the pinnacle model and write all these bets, they probably wouldn't be able to book the size of the menu they book and they probably would be sacrificing a lot of the recreational play. 

22:16
Obviously they have A lot of my goals moving forward center around creating tech that will allow for some version of automated price discovery to allow the circle model to be applied to more markets and gradually get it to the point where you know we can apply what I perceive to be fair limits towards all these markets, because it comes down to you know you should have to give a fair bet to a wise guy to get their information. I don't. I don't think it's sustainable or really fair, and I know people can make fun of me for saying it's not fair, but to pay somebody you know pennies on the dollar to see what Rob's hockey opinion is on tonight's game, at some point it's not worth it for him to share that information. And so I think the books, if they're going to utilize our information as sharps, they owe it to the players to pay them fairly. And I don't think the players are unreasonable when it comes to that. 

23:12
They're not looking to get a million dollars in every game, but if they have, you know, if they're betting, you know money lines full, full, uh, full side hockey games, like they should think like hey, at the worst I going to get down a dime from your book based on how big you are, or five dimes based on how big you are. So I think I don't know. I consider myself a pretty good judge of like what's appropriate limits and I think we execute that well at Circa. But no, no, to get back with what you said initially, john, you're right, it would be hard for the current state for those books to kind of like maintain the revenue they're making with the limited menu. So I don't disagree. 

23:45 - Johnny (Co-host)
What markets do you think right now can handle the circle model? So obviously all the major markets, straight bets, sides, total money line for sure, probably first half, second half, stuff like that, maybe even quarters, maybe even futures. When it comes down to like props and derivatives, what markets are closest to being able to handle that? 

24:05 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I missed the first half of your question because my computer cut off. 

24:07 - Johnny (Co-host)
But you were saying like what markets are closest to kind of being liquid, exactly? 

24:12 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Okay, yeah, I think that there's an opportunity for NBA, nfl like main type player markets, like quarterback prop markets, nba like star player markets, like points totals and stuff like that. I think those markets could be price discovered better and more aggressively, to the point where, like you know, the bigger books could be booking five dimes, you know, at post on you know, lebron James, lebron James points or something like that. That's a bad example probably, but yeah, I think that there's a lot of room in there and but the books have to want to do that and they have to see the incentive. And I don't know if the bigger books like really see that incentive. I can tell you, when we were booking Superbowl props at Circa for the past few years, we would get up to like 10 dimes on like a big part of the menu and the a big part of the menu and the two-way action we would see for 10 times a pop on these props was incredible and in very tight windows where we're earning on every bet. 

25:10
I was just blown away and I I think the the appetite by players to like place more money on these player props betting is growing by the day. So I just, I just hope that you know the industry doesn't kind of push this down the path of like these deserve to only be $100, $200 bets. I think there are some markets within those that obviously shouldn't be sky high limits, but I think there are some that, as you price discover on game day and feel good about the information you have at your availability, that you could push the limit higher and write action. 

25:44 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I want to dig into price discovery really quickly here, just because this is one of the challenges of actually doing circles off is we mostly catered for a long time to a pure sharp audience, but a lot of our growth has come from more recreationals and casuals who are learning the space, and I don't think that there's really a general knowledge out there from you know 98 to 99% of people in the betting space as to what price discovery really is. I listen to a lot of content. I watch other people talk about content. I see opening lines go out on Sunday in NFL. I hear commentary around well, the sportsbook put it here because they're trying to trap us into betting this and things of that nature. Can you walk us through just a little bit of what price discovery means? 

26:26 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, I think that price discovery is kind of operating in a totally reactive way to the market and the bets you're seeing. 

26:36
I'm probably as far leaning towards just pure price discovery as any bookmaker could be. There are times when I've thought about just hanging every game at pick and, like you know, 45 for an NFL game, just to like, just to like. Take the process as far as I can. I think that it. I think price discovery is really the art of bookmaking and understanding who is the player who's betting with me, what is their motivations in placing this bet, and then how do I respond accordingly. A good example, I guess, of price discovery is when Circa opens the first college football line. We used to open at 11. I think we opened it earlier now Pacific time on Sundays. We're trying to put up a good number, but at the same time we realized that the amount of work it would require to put up a really good number in every game, it's kind of just not worth it. So we all kind of we all kind of do our homework, read up on injuries as much as we can, you know, tweak our ratings and come up with a consensus number, but we're not really like attached to that number, like that much. We're kind of just like this is a good jumping off point. So to give you an example, there'll be certain games where I have a thought. You know, I might think coastal Carolina's quarterback, it's questionable, like I saw him get hurt. I think the injury is pretty bad. I think he's not going to play. You know I made the game seven with him playing. You know, without him maybe I have the other side, like one I I could put up the mid, like the midpoint of that number and just stick up coastal Carolina three. But sometimes I'll take an even more aggressive line just to kind of like figure out information because, like, usually what I find public is thinking similarly, or I shouldn't say public, the sharps usually thinking similar to how we are. So a lot of times I'll press it to one side just to kind of understand what they think the limit on the game is. 

28:27
So in short, price discovery is trying to extract as much information from the market as you can in as few moves as possible. So if I went to three and I took no bets on that game Coastal three you know I haven't learned anything. So I might say, okay, I opened at three. Nobody's doing anything. Let me go to coastal one see if they think that's too low. So I go down to one. They lay one, I go okay, they're laying one. I'm gonna go back to four because I think he's gonna play. 

28:49
So I passed up my opener. But I'm at that point. You know the limits are low. Like you know, we're probably taking on the opener three or 3k to 5k and I intend to take 50k on this game come friday. So I'm not paying a ton for the information relative to like what it's going to cost later in the week. 

29:06
And that's that's what I found personally is the key to price discovery and why a lot of books don't do it is because for it to make sense you have to take a big enough limit down the road. That where the information you paid for on Monday is not like the same cost of information on Saturday. So, like I always kind of use like a 10 to one ratio, I'd be willing to pay you 5k for information on Sunday, knowing that I'm gonna take 50k. But I think it can get out of whack if I was going to take 5k on the open or only take 10k on come the weekend. It would, the information wouldn't be worth it. 

29:37
So at circle we move very aggressively, we use kind of like our information and try to like decipher, like you know. Okay, why is this guy betting this? Is he betting it because it's the middle to this book? Is he betting it because he thinks, like you know, the injury is worse than we thought? But yeah, you're probing, it's a lot of like probing and trying to understand, like you know, where the number should be, what the market thinks, because in reality it doesn't really matter. Like Yep. 

30:04 - Johnny (Co-host)
Totally Question for you all, just because we kind of got into the injury stuff here a little off topic Are you tracking like who, what profiles might have information on specific things? So, for example, like I know multiple people who you know maybe they have information on coastal Carolina because, like they have a couple of buddies there or whatever, and then they're constantly nailing every coastal Carolina injury out and out and in and out. Are you then being like, oh, this guy actually got the last two coastal QB injuries from LA. He had one from last year and he got the one from this year. So he's probably and he's keeps betting coastal here, the guy's probably in. 

30:40 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I'm. I'm making a mental note of anything that I can. We don't have the systems available to us at the books that I've worked at in Las Vegas to really do the actual reporting and computerized tracking and stuff like that, but a lot of that is what I'm working on right now with the company I'm with, mojo. I think that the books will continue to beef up their counter. Intel units and stuff like that is going to be more common. 

31:07
But, yeah, as bookmakers at Circa and I consider our team to be one of the best in the world we're paying attention to everything we can. We know the guys who are going to bet the NBA injuries have the best info. We know the guys who chase the NBA injuries and aren't the first. You know anything that's defining about you as a better. We're trying to either, you know, make a note somewhere physically or just mentally note stuff. So, yeah, like, all of that is valuable. Everything is information. There's not one thing that you could like I could look at bets all day and try to decipher them and it's the seeing of multiple bets and the more bets we see. 

31:49 - Johnny (Co-host)
That's going to allow me to kind of put a read on somebody like, oh yeah, whenever this guy bets, we know, we know he's like the nuts for some bell injuries. So like, make sure you move aggressive, understood. I have one more random question as well. I was always, always interested in like the actual bet sizing, uh total handle between certain sports and games. So would would you be able to potentially map us out like a little chart here? So like, for example, nfl standard 1 pm game or I guess different 10 am for for you guys in vegas, but standard first late game versus, uh, a standard nba game? Like what's the difference in handle? 

32:17 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
we're a bad example, I think, for nba and maybe maybe we're not, but we just don't write a lot of casual recreational NBA money and I was talking about this with somebody last week. It's almost like sad, because when I grew up in the 90s, nba to me was like the best betting sport. Like you knew, you knew the players, like you associated them so, so much with the teams, just like I always think a good betting sport is created when the public just has like inherent, like opinions, when they, when they can look, look at a spread and just they know the team so well. They're the players. They're going to form an opinion out of thin air. When you have sports like NBA, where some of the older guys that maybe lost touch with who all the players are, the players move around a lot, they're sitting all the time for you know, injuries or for rest, it just waters down the product in a way where the general public does not want to interact with it because there's so much uncertainty on their side of the thing. 

33:06
Uncertainty is positive for professional bettors. We we feast on uncertainty, but like casual bettors, they they stay away on from uncertainty, like it like it's just like the worst thing in the world. They want no part of uncertainty. They want to look at the game where they know that oregon is the number one team in the country and they're playing penn State and James Franklin is a loser. Give me Oregon all day. That's an easy bet, like so to answer your question. Like NFL, probably like the worst NBA I mean we're taking. You know, I think our limits are sometimes as low as like 3K or 5K on an NBA side and up to 200K on an NFL side, so that that tells the story, that the limits, the limits, are telling you where the action is. So use that ratio to determine how much we're seeing. 

33:50 - Johnny (Co-host)
Fair enough. It's funny you say that with the uncertainty because it's true A lot of my friends will say I'll just catch them saying oh well, lamar Jackson's questionable and there's too many injuries up in the air so I'm not betting that game. And for the guys I know on the more professional side are saying Lamar Jackson's questionable Like this, is the actually the game you want to be attacking? 

34:12 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, I mean, listen, my biggest bets of the year come based off of like the Brock Purdy situation a couple of weeks ago was a big one for me where he's not throwing in practice. I'm like that's a quarterback with a throwing injury on the injury report. That's not throwing in practice. I want to bet against him now Like it's priced as he's a hundred percent in the market, whereas I tell that to my friends and they're like, oh, like, why don't you just wait to see and this and that? And it's because I'm competing against other people that that is that concept is is lost on people. They just want to bet five minutes before the game starts. They want to have all the information available to them, but they don't understand that they can't price that better than the other people in market, so it doesn't matter that they have all the information available to them. It's real challenging. 

34:53
You've touched on a lot of things, matt, and I actually have so many questions for you, but I want to. There's one thing that I picked up on that I want to ask you about, which was essentially where an instance where you're proactively creating action just by moving the line. So you gave an example of like yeah, we set a line, nothing's happening. Let's push it in one direction and see what happens when we go from there. Anyone who's watching the screen would think that that's moving based off of some sharp action. I mean, everyone would say that while sharps are betting this side of the game, when in reality the instance you described has nothing to do with sharps betting the game. It's just you guys trying to figure out what the true line should be. That example that you brought up is that a rare circumstance or is that happening more often than people think is happening? 

35:46 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
It's very common for me when I'm booking, I book college football, college basketball I'm trying to think what else? Like boxing, I'm very aggressive and I don't know how common it is for other bookmakers Not as common on our team but I think I've trained some of them to do some of it. A lot of it came from me watching and again, this is weird because I don't play poker at all but I watched poker as the boom came up, like in the early two thousands, and I noticed that all the players who had the most success were just like very aggressive and like blindly aggressive. And I thought about how, like when I used to book, I always felt like the players, like the sharp players, the betters, were kind of just like pushing me around and they were just like bet, bet, I got to move. I got to move, like I didn't like playing defense, like that, and so I was like how can I turn this around where, like I'm, I'm more, like I'm a bigger piece of of, like getting the information, I have more control over when I get the information, when I see it. 

36:41
So I was lucky enough, like when I first started out, imperial Palace, let me work a shift by myself and I would go out on the line and I had the computer where I could move the lines. But they didn't have the Don Best at the time. It was like the LVSC screen next to the computer where you move the lines. That was back in the office but I was like how can I ramp myself up as fast as possible? So I would go out there. I booked baseball in the morning to the sharps and it was just you know, this is before the app, so it was just wise. After wise, I come into the window and I would pretty much book it blind where I would just like say, okay, this guy, I think he works for this syndicate, they're pretty good, but I know they only like went at this rate, whereas like this guy's involved with you know billy walters or something like I respect the hell out of his place, um, and I just move stuff and just be moving around all morning just booking kind of to the action. I'd go in every 15 minutes or so check the screen and see if there was any injuries that popped over or anything. 

37:36
But I think by like immersing myself in that process I formed a lot of like different, just different tactics than maybe other people, and I kind of kept that up as I got to Westgate and I would do the same thing and I liked the aggression, I liked having to read the market without a lot of context and so it made me feel comfortable making these aggressive moves and really probing the market. I I don't again, I don't want to take credit for this approach, but I've sat next to like guys who've done it for a long time, like I sat next to Nick McDonavich after I hired him and he looked at me like I was like insane, like he just like was like what the what the hell are you doing? Like he had no concept of what I was doing and I don't know I'd have to ask him. But I think after working next to me for a year or so he kind of understood more. 

38:19
But I'm of the belief that you're not learning anything with a line, a stagnant line on the screen, and what most bookmakers do is they accept that that stagnant line is not moving. They're like, okay, that's the truth, that's the line, because nobody's betting me, that's the line. But the thing they're not taking into account is the limit right now is $5,000. The sharpest players in the market have no incentive to interact with a 5K limit. It's not worth their time. They wouldn't get out of bed to like bet 5k. It's like laughable to them, it's like the equivalent of you know, like a random better betting 5 cents. 

38:53
So you have to incentivize these players to play and if you're aggressive and you move around enough and you show them a number that they think might not ever show again, they'll interact with it and I know how to interpret, you know that bet to where I was in relation to the market and what to do with that information and I can utilize it in a way that makes sense. I think that happening at Circus Sports, we move a lot on air, the best book rakes in the world. They're constantly trying to position themselves in a way that makes sense, whether it's to the market or for their own kind of opinion or the action they've seen. So it it's a big part. I would say more of my moves are on air than they are in response to bets, by far. Really, I don't know if that blows anybody's minds or anything, but yeah. 

39:33 - Johnny (Co-host)
Are you watching just like a regular odd screen all day when you're moving, or you have your own internal tech? 

39:39 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
So the great thing about we're watching an odd screen but I was going to say the great part about working in a book like Circa is, I tell my guys, like you don't have just world-class bookmaker. He would always just be like, you know, when in doubt, book to the money you're seeing, like to try to sit there and to speculate on what's, what's real, what's not. It's kind of a fool's errand sometimes. So, like when in doubt, book to the money. You see, I I think the worst habit in the world that young bookmakers have is they. They take the bet, they look at the screen, they go back, they move the number. Like, if it was up to me and I didn't do this at Circo, but I was tempted too many times I would shut their odd screen off and I would say until you're able to take that bet, move the number. Then look at the odd screen, then come back and maybe make a move in reaction to that. Like you shouldn't be booking because, like, if everybody is doing it the wrong way're all looking and saying like, okay, I wrote minus three, the market's painted three, okay, I'm gonna leave it at three. 

40:48
Like, the better, the betters understand the game theory behind this. They're making bets that you would be tempted not to move, like I can remember. Back in the day, like you know, billy would come in and play stuff at night not billy personally, but his guys would come in and play stuff at night knowing that the overnight bookmakers were weak and they would be likely to leave a game that was in line. So if they laid three at the Westgate at midnight and the whole world was paying at three, the overnight guy would probably just be like you know what, I'll just leave it. You know it's not different out there. Then you come back in the morning and that money is still there from the night before, but Billy pops again at minus three and then you're at three and a half. And you got to figure it out, yeah it's very interesting stuff. 

41:26 - Johnny (Co-host)
I that you say you, you moved on air more than looking at the screen. I think, like you, we've seen multiple scenarios. Like I mean, I do stare at it on screen. You know a lot of times when I, when I try to, you know, make bets and stuff like that, we have our, our own little thing. And I see a lot of times where you'll just notice, like other, like bookmakers, just moving the number because somebody moved it right. So they'll see, they'll see penny moved it, they might see chris, they might see circa move it, and then, as soon as those three have moved it, you just know that within the next like 10 seconds to one minute, all the other books are going to move it. Regardless of that, what danger does that have to those books? 

42:04 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
the, the danger to the other books, kind of just copying the screen. 

42:06 - Johnny (Co-host)
You're saying what danger does a book that's just copying have? 

42:11 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
They never truly understand the motivation, I guess, or the actual bets that we're seeing. So a lot of times there's an effort in the market to kind of keep a number at a certain spot or to move a number somewhere. And when you're a book like Circa and you have influence over the market to kind of keep a number at a certain spot or to move a number somewhere, and you know, when you're a book like Circa and you have influence over the market, we'll get bets from big syndicates on the non-preferred side. And so I would always kind of look at this and say when the screen moves it's because somebody wants the screen to move. And so not always the case Like sometimes there's a large contention of people playing stuff and eventually the screen blows up. 

42:46
But I think a lot of times there will be coordinated moves where you know somebody is betting at Pinnacle, chris, circa, the books they know have influence making large wagers and then trying to get the line to move from three to three and a half so they can take the three and a half out at quieter outs, they can take the three and a halfs out at quieter outs. 

43:06
So I think when you're copying and you're not seeing those bets come in and you're not understanding who the players are making those bets. You have potential to just constantly be chasing your tail and putting yourself in these spots where you're taking bets from, you're going to the number and not taking the initial bet that was the head fake bet and then you get bet back with the real bet and, like Circo's taken both bets. So we're okay, we bet. And like Circo's taken both bets, so we're okay, we're, we're, we've met it out even on that position. But the the copying books have just taken, you know, the side that they were trying to get you to go to so they could grab it. So I think that's where like situations like that can be bad for copying books. 

43:35 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Do you ever sit back and just watch these other books copy and have have a good laugh about it, like like you might move on air or something, uh, and then you just see the entire screen move. Just like personal question here like how do you react to that as a as a a bookmaker? 

43:53 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
yeah, there was a time where I would always like so. Westgate for a long time had a lot of books that would copy them and I would. I'm friendly with, uh, the guy I mentioned before, ed sammons, who now works at the westgate, and I would always text him and I would call up. For one time for an amount of time I used to call Caesars his sister book because there was a time when whenever Westgate would move, caesars would move, and so it was kind of funny to watch that. When I would see it at Circa, people doing that, you know, I tend to like press it as far as I could and see like, okay, is this book going to move. 

44:20
Every time I move and I'm probably a little more cavalier with my line moves. Like I just like to cause chaos on the screen, like that's the goal every Monday morning when I can to cause utter chaos. I want everyone to be like what the fuck is going on at Circa? What, wait, wait, they took a huh. Like I want to go from. 

44:36
So a lot of instances like let's, I'll give you an example, let's go back to that Coastal Carolina example. Let's say I was at like coastal four. Nobody's bet me, I go up to five Nobody bets me. I go to six. Somebody takes a six. I'm just like all right, that person's smart, they wouldn't take this unless it's real. Go into three. I go to three Nobody bets it. 

44:54
I'm like, all right, well, let's see how far I can push it. Down to two Nobody bets it. Go me on monday, tuesday. It's like that's 90 of what I'm doing. I'm just trying to confuse everybody. I'm trying to make them make bets they don't want to make, like I'm basically trying to bully the market, like I'm just trying to like and it had it to a full purpose. 

45:12
My other thought was like this is worth it, also from a branding standpoint. Like people are just going to think that circa's like just different from everybody because we don't give a about what pinnacle or or Chris are doing Like I tried to crap on Pinnacle and Chris at every opportunity. I just tried to like and I love those books and I respect them the way where I felt like we could get reputation and we could be perceived as one of the big boys by pretty much not caring what those books were at. So if I believed, it's not like I was going just to go, but kind of sometimes. I basically was just trying to be aggressive at all points to earn a reputation but also to probe the market, so it was a twofold approach. 

45:49 - Johnny (Co-host)
How many people would you say so? Let's say people not betting their own opinion, so screen readers, arbors, stuff like that. How many of those people can actually turn a profit at Circa? 

46:01 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
How many people who aren't arbing and aren't screen? 

46:03 - Johnny (Co-host)
reading, no, who are Arbers or screen readers. So not guys who are like originating, trying to take like the early college numbers, nothing like that, just like pure Arbers who are looking at everywhere and being like, okay, I see markets painted three Circa's at four. I'm going to take the plus four, like those kind of guys that you've profiled. How many of those can actually beat Circa? 

46:25 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
A ton of those guys can beat us. Yeah, I think, like to me it feels a little more random whether they beat us or don't, kind of like it varies probably how they do against us from month to month, year to year, but those guys should be able to beat us Like we're aggressive with line moves and we expose ourselves early in the week, I think, against our more mature lines. We expose ourselves early in the week, I think, against our like, against our more mature lines, like our, our, our lines as of, you know, friday, saturday, for like NFL, I think that we're, we're probably, we're probably better against them than that. But the unique, the the interesting thing to watch, though, the more of a reputation you get for having a sharp number, the less you can get people to kind of interact with it when you go off market. So there'll be instances where I just get pissed. 

47:03
I'm like I go to two and the market's like, you know, three and a half. I'm like nobody's betting me and it's like they're scared. They're like, oh wait, if circa's at that, then there must be something to that. So even the arbors will stay away a lot of times, like thinking that you know, hey, you know, and I think I think we've converted a lot of arbors also to like actual players or hold positions because they trust our line and so so a lot of the guys used to play back wrong sides at us or I say wrong in quotes, but play back other sides with us kind of would stop and hold positions that looked favorable according to the circle line, much like people used to do with the pinnacle line. So yeah, I think those guys are all you know. It's kind of random and noisy whether they turn profits, but there's a substantial amount of ones who turn profits, probably against us. 

47:48 - Johnny (Co-host)
When you say wrong side, you mean, I guess, the side that closes with, I guess, worse than the closing line. Is that what you consider? 

47:50 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
the wrong side. Yeah, and I say wrong side like there's a preferred side every game and obviously the number dictates the side and what's preferred. But I call the wrong side. Sometimes, when the market is actively trying to hold a number in place, we'll get guys who will bet us. I think, like on a college basketball or college football total, I've seen guys take up to eight or nine pops at us just to hold a number in in place, like they just want the number there and the market's going, you know, against them, but they know if they can hold circa at 138, um, that that number will continue to be a play in all the other books they have access to, and so it's kind of fun to watch. 

48:26
It's like in the beginning I used to have more of like ego when I started at Circa and I would. I would want to kind of go head to head against those groups and be like no, I know, I know, this is not the side you want, like I'm gonna, I'm gonna show you, and I know some of the betters who are trying to move the markets around get frustrated because they're like hey, if I make a bet, I'm paying you to move the number, and so that's a discussion I've had with some of the betters, where they're like no, no, I bet a limit bet. You're supposed to move the number. I'm like well, I'm not moving the number because I don't believe your bet. They're like well, then you should take more. And so it's kind of like an interesting that is true. 

48:58 - Johnny (Co-host)
Yeah, what is an average position? You don't have to say amounts, but when you're at Circa, let's say you're trading a game you know, bills-rams, for example when all is said and done, typically what would Circa be holding on to, like a net position on something with good clv, do you have? A guaranteed winner with free rolling one side, like how does it kind of go? 

49:23 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
we build positions on a game by game basis and you know we're of the belief that the again, the more you, the more you kind of write to a game, the better your position kind of gets. The the big takes over at some point. So you know, ideally you would hope your position would be to where you know you win to a two to one ratio on the side that you think is the side you've seen the more sharp action on. So you know you win half a million on a game or you lose 300,000 or something if the other side comes in. So that's kind of like, that's kind of like what we're kind of like shooting for. I think when you see, when you see these games, but like there'll be certain games we don't have decisions on, we're not forcing decisions necessarily. When you just kind of write the action and you position yourself correctly, you end up kind of building those decisions kind of like the way they should be. And then as you escalate limits and you know other play comes in, they kind of naturally occur. So I don't know it's a fine line the occur. So I don't know it's a fine line that the good bookmaker kind of knows how to start early in the week to accumulate a position and then when to kind of like treat this game as like something that's maybe a better. 

50:26
You know, there's certain games that spring up where you're like this is a really an opportunity. We we've done well a week with how we kind of position ourselves. We have the opportunity to be in a really good position and create a really like plus cd scenario for us. We're gonna just like hold all of it. But there's other times where you know you look at a game and you're like losing a million dollars in this game is like it's out of line for what an appropriate decision would be. 

50:46
I'm gonna kind of drift back and sell off a little of this like it's all about like kind of like figuring out what an appropriate decision looks like for each game. And the appropriate decision is based on kind of like your bankroll, like you know who your, who your boss is, how much money you kind of are playing with as your fictional bankroll, I guess, and like the uncertainty around the game and kind of the position you think you're in. So it it's really like a cultural thing, like it comes from the guys at the top as to how you accumulate positions and what's what's an acceptable loss and what's you know what's what's an unacceptable loss? I guess just like how much is too much? So I feel like I threw a lot at you there. 

51:22 - Johnny (Co-host)
No, no, I understand completely and honestly. You answered it right at the start, which was like you said, you were either going to win $500 or lose $300. So, yeah, we're booking plus money at a good size, for example, and you're just going for EV there, because a lot of other books might say we want to make it so that we either break even or win 10k, and that might be something where it's like, okay, you can do that as well if you really want to is like, just make sure your position can't lose you that much at circa. Did you ever have scenarios where you'd have like a I mean, what would be the longest stretch you think it'd be possible to lose, given given what you guys are booking? Like, could you have a losing month, for example? 

52:00 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, for sure. 

52:02 - Johnny (Co-host)
Could you have a losing quarter? 

52:05 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
That would be hard to do, I think. I think having a losing year would be like impossible. So there you go yeah, like I said, it all depends on kind of like your book and the sport, like we could have losing, like we could have losing. We definitely have losing months, losing quarters, losing years in sports. Like that happens, like sports we don't see enough action in and you know but but yeah, it's possible wait. 

52:22 - Johnny (Co-host)
So you're saying with with I was talking just sports so you could have a losing quarter in sports at circa. 

52:27 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
It's possible a losing quarter would be highly unlikely to me, okay we would have to run incredibly bad, but I'm saying like for for a particular sport yeah, yeah, sorry that makes sense? 

52:38 - Johnny (Co-host)
yeah, of course a little more well, particular sports losing quarter is honestly not that many games, even just for like nfl, for example like it could just be a particular sport if you're offering nasa 80 games or something like that. It could even be even less you know, right, there's a race a week, two ufc cards exactly tough to exactly go. Uh, I want I want to. 

52:55 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I want to dig into some actual real life examples here here that kind of maybe overlap with some of the hypotheticals we've been talking about, but this gets talked about. I obviously do a lot of betting content related to the NFL which people can find on Forward Progress on YouTube, but there's been a couple things that have happened consistently this year, pretty much every week in terms of line moves that have puzzled a lot of people. So the New York Jets seem to attract game day money every single week in the NFL. Didn't happen this past week. 

53:30 - Johnny (Co-host)
Is this a current real life example? Real life example. 

53:33 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
So we had like five, six weeks in a row where the Jets are attracting game day money. You get the Sharps are on the Jets. They lose in very embarrassing fashion. Cincinnati Bengals totals game day in bet to the unders Pretty consistently. This year. Those games are flying over the total. We're dealing with small sample sizes here, but I'm curious when you guys are evaluating this. Obviously, for the money to move the line, to move this much on game day, there's a substantial amount of money and it's probably from a group that's widely respected. Do you guys ever internally ask yourselves whether or not this group might just be wrong on one specific team or event and maybe we should just not move here and entice more action things? Can you describe what goes into that? Because a lot of people get very confused about these game day moves that they don't understand, especially when that move consistently loses over time, and ask themselves like why is this happening? 

54:35 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
well, there's there's a part of this too that a lot of the groups we see obviously the bets are being placed with people who we call movers, I guess, and so you don't always know, because it changes a lot, like who's moving for who, and sometimes you'll have movers who move from multiple groups. But when we see something like this, you know, we see, we see every week, like, let's say, they bet the jets at post every week. You know we're going to, we're going to pay them the respect, probably because the limits are high and it makes sense, and we're like, all right, we'll respect the bet. But over time there can't help but be some kind of like internal discussion on our team with like you know here that here they go with the jets again, right, and there's there's amount of like. You respect it less and less, as you see it, and it doesn't appear to be sharp in your opinion. And the more like, the more knowledge you have of that specific sport, the more we're going to push back on it. So like, if I'm booking college football and I understand why they're betting something and I and I personally don't think that's a sharp angle to be betting it I'm more likely to push back and be like that's garbage. 

55:38
It's hard for me to speak about NFL specifically because I don't have as much area expertise in that, but I would imagine it's similar where if our head NFL guy is booking something, sees it every week and just is like I get why you're betting this, but like there's no value to be had here, they're going to push back and we'll probably always, always give them some kind of move because, like you know, at 100 dimes or 200 dimes a pop, you kind of got to respect it. You can't just kind of like spit in their face because they're gonna they're probably gonna bet you again. So you have to ask yourself, like you know, am I okay with not moving this and taking another pop for 200 000? And if the answer is no, then you obviously have to move it. Um, which which kind of brings me to a point like I always tell my guys like when you make your initial move on any bet, you need to think about the number you're going to and what you would do with a bet like at that number. Also, you need to be one move ahead of things, yeah, because otherwise you're just going to keep exposing yourself. 

56:29
So like if somebody takes seven and you go to seven dog 15. And they pop you again seven, dog 15. Like, are you okay with that? Like, and if you're not, you need to make a stronger move. And like, if you haven't thought two bets ahead on every move you're making, then you're probably not that good a bookmaker. Because, like, it's kind of the same. I compare it to like when you're playing in the field of baseball and you know they always taught you as a kid like, think about where you would go with the ball before it's hit to you. This is like the same thing in bookmaking you have to be one step ahead to like have any chance against these groups, because these groups are like, they're sharp and they'll bet you. They'll bet you when they know you might make a soft move with intent to hit you again. So, yeah, love that Do you? 

57:10 - Johnny (Co-host)
are you ever cognizant of moving into a position, an arbitrage position, with two questions, actually moving into an arb with the bet that was just placed? So, for example, if someone hits you, I'll use a money line even easier, minus 10 aside. Someone hits you, minus one, 10. Now you're moving back and they can get the other side now at plus 15 is. Are you cognizant of trying to avoid doing that? 

57:33 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, you're cognizant, like you don't want to expose yourself to an arb with one move normally, but there are times when you throw that out the window. Like I always like to teach people how to book on, like some of these niche sports like NASCAR, because if you paid attention to that kind of rule and so when we're booking at Circa, we call it like a max move. A max move is basically as far as you can move without scalping yourself. So like if the line was minus 10 both ways, you know, and you were booking let's say you're booking to a 20 cent line, you could go, you know, minus 29 plus 09 and technically not be scalping yourself in that minus 110 bet If you're not including maybe taxes, maybe taxes make it. So it's a scalp, but we call that a max move and I would get, I would get sometimes frustrated at our guys because they'd they'd book a sport like NASCAR and they would still be making max moves and there's a certain level of like you know, these numbers just came up. 

58:24
They could be 100 cents off, they could be 150 cents off and you're making like an 18 cent move, make a stronger move, make a 30 cent move, like when I first started betting NASCAR in Las Vegas, I would go around to these casinos and I would lay minus 110, minus 120, minus 130, minus 140. I would lay it all the way up to like $1.80 on these bets and most of these ones I would be laying that on. I probably had it like maybe like 240, 250, but maybe even lower. The matchup wasn't available anywhere else, it was a one-off matchup and I would just average it out to like minus minus 140. And I was just like, like these guys get mad at me for betting it repeatedly and as I got smarter, I didn't, I didn't ram it down their throat as much as I as I did when I was younger. 

59:05
But at the same time, like, what are you doing? Like you're gonna move 10 cents, like from somebody you respect and then complain that they bet it too many times. Like you're not a robot, you have the ability to move it 60 cents if you want. Like, if you're sitting there worried about getting you know middled and scalped on the on these type bets, like you're, you just don't understand what's happening. Like you, you need to respond accordingly to the market that you're booking. So you know, nfl obviously a much different beast when you take a money line bet, it would be rare that you would scalp yourself on that bet. But like smaller sports maybe like golf matchups or NASCAR matchups or other stuff like that you need to be as aggressive as you can, and arbing is the last thing on my mind when I'm taking sharp action on props or things like that. I just don't care, I want to find the right number. 

59:46 - Johnny (Co-host)
So another question in regards to line moves there how cognizant of you are you of moving a line into an arb with, let's say, a pinnacle? 

01:00:05 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
What would it take for you to move into arb with pinnacle on a major market? You're more cognizant of it. I think we see enough bets at Circa that we don't have to be that cognizant of it because we have enough influence and market influence that they're going to respect our move and probably move out of our arb with us. So in the beginning when we first started booking at Circa, it was funny. It was kind of like a. It was kind of just like a standoff between us and some of the bigger books where they didn't want to give us the respect and again, I'm probably like they probably didn't even like notice us, but I'm creating this like narrative in my head where they didn't want to give us the time of day or the respect to like even acknowledge our move. So like we'd open the first college football line at 11, you know Chris pops up and they would just be. You know I felt like they were opening different from us just to like show that we don't care about the circle line. 

01:00:46
And so I think you're market-making books are always cognizant of each other but at the same time like the market is going to iron out pretty quick and I think that you know, usually it happens for lower limits early in the week, so it's not that big a deal. It's a bigger deal, like you said, maybe, like on a Saturday or Sunday when the game's flowing and I would be less likely to go to a scalp. You know, on a Sunday morning to Pinnacle when they're taking $200,000. And I'm taking $200,000. Like I don't need to force that bet. 

01:01:10 - Johnny (Co-host)
Like, if you did that, how quick does it take for you to get popped on that bet? 

01:01:15 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I mean it's, it's if the liquidity is there. It's pretty instantaneous. Like, like I said before, like people will stay away early in the week because they think we might know something um the day of the game. If there's a lot of liquidity there's, there's. There's guys who just have enough money in their account to, like, hit those you know, immediately. 

01:01:33 - Johnny (Co-host)
So and then bang bang might even be taking both sides and making a couple grand, or might be actually just planning to add into a position. Yeah, fascinating stuff. Yep, we have. 

01:01:41 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Okay, we have a lot more topics I really quickly want to get into one more circa thing because it's very timely and it happened this past weekend in the nfl. Um circa took a three million dollar bet on the eagles money line against the carolina panthers. I think it was roughly in the range of minus 700. 

01:02:02 - Johnny (Co-host)
What was the scenario there? So did the guy have a bad price or did he? I didn't even end up following it. Did he end up with a good closing price or a bad closing price? It? 

01:02:05 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
looks like he laid. I'm assuming it was market. 

01:02:07 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, it was pretty much market. Yeah, laid minus 700 ish. Yeah, on this bet, I had a bunch of people reach out to me by the way on this and it's like well, don't they have posted limits at circa? Like how is this guy able to get down this much? Um, can you walk me through that? And also, I did notice this was marketed into oblivion, by the way as well derek stevens is tweeting about it circa account. Is there ever, uh, like an overlap between trading and marketing as well, where you guys might be like, ah, we don't really to take this, but there's actually a marketing benefit to this. So if you could answer that, it's a, I guess, a twofold question. 

01:02:44 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, I guess, to answer the second part of it, like marketing and myself were very probably like I liked our marketing team but I was just very at odds kind of like with them for various things like that I like. 

01:02:56
One of my core beliefs is like not not talking about any bet that I've taken um from a customer and so, again, I'm not criticizing anything that is done, but I I just don't like that and I've been kind of outspoken on Twitter about that at some points. But I understand it. I mean it gets, it, gets pressed and it's cool to know, like, what books are taking what action. So I not like trying to I don't know second guess that decision. But, um, yeah, our marketing team will come to us a lot of times with like hey, do you want to take this mattress mac bet? You know it'd be good publicity for us and I don't know, I just make the decisions based on, based on, like, where I sit and what risks that I think is appropriate for derrick stevens, um, or whoever I'm working for at the time. I think that's the bet again, to give a bit a bad bookmaker a good bookmaker kind of like comparison here. I think there's a lot of bookmakers who decide what is appropriate risk based on their own personal kind of thresholds and opinions on, like relating to their bankroll, relating to their experience, and the job of a bookmaker who's working for somebody is to understand the head man, to understand, or woman, and understand, like, what their goals are, what their objectives are with running a sports book? What appropriate risk is to them? I should be able to answer, without talking to my boss, what's the biggest bet he would take on this particular game at any time. Not to say I won't run it by him, but I should understand who he is and what we're playing with enough to make that call. 

01:04:22
And I think these bookies, when you go in and it's been my experience in my whole career, especially in Las Vegas you go in and they're looking at this bet like they're giving it to you out of their own pocket, like they're booking out of the cash out of their wallet. And it's crazy. Like you work for a billion dollar casino and you're not taking my thousand dollar bet because you think that's a big bet. The guy who runs the casino, like like again Derek Stevens running Circa, like he's not even going to like care about a $10,000 bet, a $20,000 bet, like I mean you have to take bets that are in line with the objectives and like his personal kind of philosophy and who he is. 

01:04:53
So I think that gets lost on a lot of operators and I think they personalize things and I think that that's why you see operators not wanting to take bets because I'm kind of going off on a tangent here but they don't want to take the bet because A they feel like it's basically an admission that they had a bad line on the board. They fear the betters in a way where they think the betters are winning 80% of their bets and they are just naturally conservative. They're not people with a history of betting. They don't understand you know the motivations and what, how betters are betting and why they bet and and you know I think most professional betters are a lot I I don't want to say I'm not saying they're degenerates, but they're a lot more gambly than operators give them credit for. 

01:05:34
And there's a lot of motivations that are different on different sports and different bets. Like UFC to me is one of the best booking sports in the world because it's so popular. You get a lot of groups who may not necessarily have a huge edge, but they want to participate because they like watching the fights. They just want to bet the fights and you know we're beating them and I know they might not be losing to everybody but if anything they're scraping out a really small profit but they just want to be involved and I think that's the case for some markets. But then again that group might turn around and have the sharpest college football stuff in the world. So you have to understand what their particular bets mean in each market and that all comes again down to profiling. 

01:06:08
I totally ran with your question in another direction. 

01:06:11 - Johnny (Co-host)
If the bet was flipped, obviously I understand this would be a bigger bet size and base amount, but let's say it was $400,000 to win 3 mil. 

01:06:22 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Do you think Circa would have taken that? Still, I can't. I'll answer it from when I was there $400,000 to win 3 million on that game On the. 

01:06:31 - Johnny (Co-host)
Panthers, panthers plus whatever. $700,000, let's say for $400,000. 

01:06:36 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
They wouldn't have taken it. Limits at that time, by the way, were 20K. That's where posted limits were at that time. 

01:06:42 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Somebody tries to bet me 20K on the Panthers money line early in the week, I'm just like I don't know Again. I'm judging that by my sharp, spidey sense instinct of being scared. When someone's trying to bet a horrendous team as like a dog, early in the week on a money line, it basically means they take the prices off, um, playing like in kind of like the non-point spread market. But no, I wouldn't have taken that bet I you know, if it was a. It again, it depends who it is like. So so my number one thing that I always say, I would say like I'm literally trying to take every bet I can and I'll work with you as much as I can, and a lot of the determinants whether I take that bet like a, obviously who you are and how the market responds to your bet. But like, can I work with that bet? Like, are you going to take five to one in that game and then at closing time it's gonna be minus 450 on the favorite and I'm just out of position, I can't sell it. So I'll take a big bet like I'll extend to people who are sharp and are proven winners with me if, if they come in. 

01:07:35
I said this to somebody the other day. 

01:07:36
If you come in, ask for a conversation with me and think enough to like come in and talk to me man to man and don't like lie to me and just tell me like hey, we're trying to get down X amount on every game, like we play NFL, we play this, like you know. 

01:07:48
Don't pretend you're an idiot, because people do that to me all the time and I'm like you, I'll try to help you get down. My biggest accomplishment would be able to fill your whole position, not move the market and kind of book to it, because you're pretty good at it. So, yeah, I make decisions based on can I work with the action, not like is this a sharp guy? Like if Billy Walters or whoever I keep using his name kind of understood as the sharp, better. But if he comes in and you know talks to me about getting extended limits and it makes sense for me, and he and he tells me the market's not going to go crazy and you know I can work with 100 dimes on on tuesday like I'll strike a deal if it makes sense for me and I can make money and we can both make money. 

01:08:29 - Johnny (Co-host)
Like yeah all right, fascinating stuff. I feel like if you bet the dog early in the week, well, there's so much more that could happen before the game starts, like, for example, like they could be betting that. And then let's say jalen hurts is right. I would immediately be concerned. 

01:08:45 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You'd be concerned like wait what. You'd be like what? 

01:08:47 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
happened? What happened yeah? 

01:08:49 - Johnny (Co-host)
meanwhile, if you're laying like minus 700, it's like okay, who? Who's gonna be out for carolina? That would even like make this line move that much like. Nobody, exactly, they don't. It doesn't matter. Yeah, I'm with you, I'm with you. 

01:09:00 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Uh, johnny, johnny's prepared a bunch of hypotheticals. He's a, he's big into the hypothetical world. 

01:09:05 - Johnny (Co-host)
This isn't my best, this is my best work, but I figured we can play like a little game because you are uh listen a top bookmaker. The game was supposed to kind of be like would you limit this better or not? But we know you're not limit you, you don't want to limit anybody, you want to just make sure you're taking on all comers, and that's like part of the model. So I guess what it would kind of be we have to shift this is do you think, based on the information of what I'm about to give you, do you think this better will win long term, betting into you at this exact amount? Fair enough, let me know if you have any other questions as we go, but it should be pretty intuitive after the first. 

01:09:41 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, let's try, let's try. 

01:09:42 - Johnny (Co-host)
Okay, this is whatever I give you is all the information you have. Okay, so I know you might be like, oh, I would look into this, this, this, you're just going blind on this. Okay, nfl a, he's just betting guys to score a touchdown. Yes, okay, he's betting a hundred dollar bet size, but he's got a thus far this season he's got a 10% ROI and total he's up $2,400. Do you think he beats you long-term? 

01:10:17 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Based on what you've told me, no. 

01:10:19 - Johnny (Co-host)
So, based on that, just that, you're saying you would continue to book that player on anything. 

01:10:25 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, the number one thing that would hit my head first is the size of the bets. And granted, prop markets are a little unique because there are originators who play smaller and win. But what you're telling me is like $100, just kind of random anytime touchdown bets, and at some point he's been betting all season. I think that I don't know his bank, like his bankroll. He would just be more aggressive, I would think, in like the sizing of his bets. So the bet amount is probably what would trigger me to be fine with any of his action. I don't think. 

01:10:59 - Johnny (Co-host)
But it's not. Would you be fine with his action? So obviously he's not going to take you for a huge amount, but it's more like would this player win or not? 

01:11:04 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, sorry, the bet amount is what would lead me to believe that he probably will not long-term win. Just because I think he'd be betting more is my thought for that one. So I don't think that long term he has an edge and would win based on what you're telling me. 

01:11:20 - Johnny (Co-host)
Okay next, yeah no, no, I like the rationale that. I like the rationale. Okay, next one up uh, so this better. He bets at uh, at circa sports. He has no other bets in the account outside of. He only max pops you for nfl right at post. So all his bets are coming in within 10 minutes of post. Typically he's just betting circa and like he's betting a market price. It's not like he's only betting the games at circa. He's been like, let's say, five, six games a week, 100k max pop, if you have higher. He's taking the max at all times. He's getting no clv this year. Uh, he's up 1.1 mil with you based. 

01:12:04 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Based on what I've seen, he's he's probably a winner. Um, the only other scenario where he wouldn't be a winner with us. So he's definitely a winner. The question is whether he's a winner with us or not. He could be playing back some of his positions late and therefore he's definitely a winner. The question is whether he's a winner with us or not. He could be playing back some of his positions late and therefore he could be a loser with us, but I have to respect him because he is a winner and I'm pretty sure he's a winner if he's betting like that. So, either way, whether he's winning with us or not is immaterial, because if I gave him more, he would bet more and he'd probably just pile on where he had edges at the end or something, and so, yeah, he's a winning player long-term. 

01:12:40 - Johnny (Co-host)
So you would, you'd book him, obviously, cause you don't turn away anyone, but you do think he'd win with you long-term. 

01:12:49 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
It's easier for me to say he's a winner long-term than to say he's going to win with me long-term, but he has the ability to win with me long-term if he felt like it. Okay. If you want to word it that way. 

01:12:58 - Johnny (Co-host)
Interesting. Yes, no. No, I understand there's a lot of guys like that. 

01:13:06 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
There's a lot of guys like that who basically control how much they win with us because they just want to not get out of control. So, yeah, I think the best players are very well aware of whether they are going to win with Circus Sports or not. 

01:13:18 - Johnny (Co-host)
Okay, next one up. So this player is playing at FanDuel. He's playing small amounts, but he's taking only the bonus bets and then a couple off-market prices. So he's only taking the bonus bets and the off-market prices. Typically he's betting anywhere between like he'll even bet $5 if it'll take it on a specific one, or some of his bets will be up to like five hundred dollars. All right, that's all the information you have. You think that player wins long term? 

01:13:49 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
yeah, okay, it's obvious he's just he's looking for bonuses and playing you kind of when you're, when you're off, and just trying to kind of hit, hit the numbers where he's got the best ev, and yeah, I, I would think that he, that he beats us long term. 

01:14:01 - Johnny (Co-host)
Yes do you think that player will ever be someone that will lose at sports betting to the books, or do you think they'll only ever make good bets? 

01:14:09 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
it's really funny. So we'd have these guys who my my thought is they were probably working with somebody else when they were betting and they'd bet with us for a year or two and they'd be super sharp stuff. And then one day they just start playing like parlays, or they just start playing like you know and not that parlays means you can't be sharp, but they play parlays at market numbers that we, for lower amounts, we knew they weren't sharp. So we would always. We would always kid Chris Bennett, chris Bennett. We'd be like Chris, you broke that guy. He was a sharp and you broke him. He couldn't win through you. So you, just you flipped him. He's a square now Like you got him. So we always thought that was funny. But yeah, I like. I think that guy is probably disciplined enough to beat most books long-term with how he's wagering. 

01:14:51 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That's basically producer Jacob over here that you're describing. Is that producer Jacob? 

01:14:55 - Johnny (Co-host)
Jacob's moves, I think. So Next up so you can sub out the sport if you don't really have experience with this. But I had it as betting KBO. So the overseas baseball, let's say they're max betting. Whatever you post, getting good CLV, so getting anywhere between like a 5% and a 10% CLV, but they're down this year and last year. So a two-year sample they're down 15% ROI. So this guy's clearly originating. He's betting early week, mac's betting you and he's getting CLV but he's down. He's not a winner. 

01:15:29 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
What time do those games start? Like Pacific time, like they're like 2 in the morning, or is that like the start time? 

01:15:35 - Johnny (Co-host)
I didn't build that into the question. That's all the info you have. Is this? No, I'm kidding. 

01:15:39 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Okay, I think they start like two, yeah, so again, there was a time when I was betting, like the NASCAR truck series, and the whole market was based on my opinion, and I'm sure Rob's had experience with stuff like this where, like you know, you have a price like two bucks and you you start laying a dollar 30, a dollar 40, and then you stop, but there's so much reaction to your action, to your bets, that you look, you look a half hour later and the price is $3. And you just have enormous amounts of CLV but like there's nobody else with an opinion really deploying capital at it like that. So have to ask yourself, like you know, am I sharp on this? Are my numbers good, or is this just like a self-fulfilling prophecy of, like, what I'm betting and my influence in the market? 

01:16:26
Um, so this sounds kind of like something where this guy is like I don't know. He's either a degenerate and he's just like betting into a market that's really jumpy and it's, like you know, moving around a lot based on his opinions, or he's just like betting into a market that's really jumpy and is, like you know, moving around a lot based on his opinions, or he's a sharp guy making bets and he's just like running bad or he's like you know he lost his edge. Maybe, if we're talking about, all he plays is KBO and this is what he's betting. This is the toughest one you've given me. I'm basically asking myself like is he a degenerate with money who has influence, like I don't know, this could be 50-50. I'm going to say that this guy is going to my gut, wants to say he's not going to beat me long term, but this is the shakiest one. I can't give a good answer here. 

01:17:15 - Johnny (Co-host)
Okay, interesting. 

01:17:16 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
This one's shaky, this one's shaky. 

01:17:22 - Johnny (Co-host)
How are we liking this game? Should I keep going here? I saw you write a couple more there, so well, I had him on. I just had him on my phone, so I'm just writing the notes for him, okay, so this one, that one. 

01:17:27 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I wanted more information. You need more information, okay this one. 

01:17:30 - Johnny (Co-host)
This one is honestly my favorite. This is my favorite one here. Okay, so this guy, he, um, he, he's not necessarily like a square in the account, but you, you look, and he's not necessarily a square in the account, but you look and he's just been placing a couple rec bets here. He might bet on a UFC fight, he might bet on a Golden Knights game. He's a local guy, probably a local Vegas guy. He's betting at Circa. Every Monday morning he comes in person over the counter and he max bets a bunch of NFL futures. He's clearly building a portfolio and seemingly he's getting like not necessarily off market prices, but when he's betting like that's typically moving later in the week and like you're like oh, this guy's actually been getting some good positions and he's up on you lifetime on NFL futures. He's up 110K but he's dunked back like 50K on other stuff. Do you think this guy wins long term? 

01:18:23 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Just to clarify he's betting futures and the futures are moving. Or he's betting futures and the teams he's playing are seeing, like support on the game by game, like weekly he's betting all futures involved with NFL. 

01:18:34 - Johnny (Co-host)
He's betting even like coach of the year, player of the year. He's betting on other books. He's betting he like coach of the year, player of the year. He's betting on other books. He's betting like to win the division, to win the thing, to win the championship, all this stuff Like he's betting season win totals earlier, anything you've got. He's coming in. He's preseason. He's got a big portfolio and every week he's coming and adding to those positions and what I mean is he's betting market numbers at the time but those are typically moving in his favor. You know, near the end of the week right, um, have I talked to this guy? 

01:19:05 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
have I like been able to meet him? Can I ask questions about like the interaction he? 

01:19:09 - Johnny (Co-host)
he, uh, he, just he comes in, he. He has no backpack and he comes in with just cash in his pocket duffuffle bag for the 5k no, no, duffle bag no backpack. He's coming in. Usually he's just wearing like jeans. 

01:19:21 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Does he have a southern accent? Does he have a southern accent? No? 

01:19:23 - Johnny (Co-host)
he's a Vegas local and he's usually just wearing like jeans and a t-shirt, like nothing major, no belt. 

01:19:29 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Okay. Well, the first rule is never, never, extend limits to a guy with a southern accent. That's just like the kiss of death why is? 

01:19:36
that. Oh, because it's just, it's been proven over the years, like anytime I've ever said anything I've ever kind of like in a way that I was a little bit uncomfortable with the guy had a southern accent. I I'm just like that was probably not optimal so that that could be. That could be up for the negative ev move of the of the show extending, extending to guys with southern accents if they have a blazer on run, if he has a blazer and a Southern accent, oh my God. 

01:19:58 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
What if they wear a mask into the sportsbook and pretend that they're drunk? Do you extend higher limits in those instances? 

01:20:06 - Johnny (Co-host)
Wear a mask. Wear a COVID mask and a Brady jersey. Like a COVID mask. 

01:20:09 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yes, yes, no a COVID mask you don't want to extend to. Covid mask is dangerous. Dangerous. They're hiding. The injuries are hiding. Okay, how about this? 

01:20:21 - Johnny (Co-host)
one Guy bets MLB overnight. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Yeah, your guy's a winner. Okay, this guy comes in he's betting app only at Circa MLB overnights. Okay, he's been betting it for like three seasons. He's max betting it on overnights but I think it's like 2,000 limit, maybe 1,000 limit, and he's up right now. He's up 50k lifetime over three years. But when you run reports and you look like he's not getting clv on the closing prices, like the next day when the game starts. 

01:20:47 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
That seems, that seems impossible for baseball, because baseball is like the one sport where, like overnight clv, is it just like inevitable if you have any knowledge, I feel like. But I think he's, I think he's a winner, but he couldn't win if he was betting the day of the game. Like that guy would have no shot if he had to bet like within four hours of like post, I feel like. But he can probably win on overnights because I feel like, especially early in the season, I feel like anybody who pays someone attention for probably beat baseball overnights okay okay, I have two more for you, and then we'll uh close up this game. 

01:21:14 - Johnny (Co-host)
So, uh, this person is betting, uh, at circa. He's only betting, like the in-play version that you guys have, um, and he's winning. You have no other information other than that this guy's he's beating us up on in-play um, yeah, he's a winner. 

01:21:30 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I don't need a lot of information on that, so you think circa is beatable on live the way we're doing lines right now. 

01:21:38
I I think we were beatable, at least when I was there. And again, it's probably because we're kind of like markets or like crowdsourcing our line a little more than we would like love. I think the first couple of years we were booking live, we were using Deck Prism and I felt really confident with those lines and I felt like we I didn't think we were very beatable outside of like maybe like past posting us. But I think the way we're doing it now we're probably a little more susceptible. But that said, like sharps don't play, we haven't seen a lot of sharp action in our in-game markets. We just haven't experienced a lot of that, it seems. I'm not sure whether it's just like a general lack of liquidity that's going to cause them not to pay attention to those markets or I'm not really sure the reason. But yeah, we've, we've. We've not really had that issue with in game. 

01:22:25 - Johnny (Co-host)
Okay, and then last one for you. So this guy was uh, he had a draft Kings. He's been betting at draft Kings app. Um, he is betting massive from the start. He's betting minimum 50K bet size on anything and he's just jamming pretty much anything Like. It's all random, all sports, a lot of parlays, sometimes straight, sometimes parlays Guy went down a million dollars. He's like a super VIP now and this year he's up. He's betting mostly parlays, but he's hit a couple of them. And now he's up $5 million on his DraftKings account and he's still firing. Is this guy a winner long-term? 

01:23:04 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
He's not because DraftKings is still taking his action, most likely unless he's really good at hiding it, I guess. I mean he could be like. But I will say that it's become substantially harder in the past two years to kind of like profile people off small samples, because the groups are more sophisticated and kind of understand how the bookmakers think, and so there's been a lot of times where we feel safe extending play to certain players. And then you know the market just kind of and it's not immediate but like over time they're kind of just putting us in positions where we're not comfortable. What's happened a lot of the time is I'll agree to take on extended liability from somebody, and then I'll get to the point where I think their action is so sharp that I'm like why am I not just making this the limit? The limit's 20,000, and I'm giving them 50 and their stuff seems to be the sharpest stuff I'm seeing. All right, I'm just going to move the limit to 50K Because, like most of the time it devolves to that. And so I think myself and Chris Bennett kind of were both on the same page with this Moving forward. I think you'll see, at least with my involvement, I will probably push for like a standard, standard, standard limit at the next book I work at. 

01:24:13
It's just too much work to like try to extend and try to profile. And I and again I think I'm doing it with pure intentions, I think I'm doing it for the right reasons, like I want to help everybody get down but at the same time it's it's just become, it's just become too tough because there's so many different markets and play is so sophisticated and, like you know, in the old days I felt like it was easy to profile. You're just like all right, this guy bet dog and unders, he's probably sharp. This guy's got favorites and overs, he's probably square. Like it's not like that anymore. 

01:24:38
Like these guys know what they're doing, they can hide their play. They, they, you know they might only play the sharp sides that are that happen to coincide with favorites and overs with you, just to kind of throw you off the scent. And the biggest groups have got really good at that and they just they know how to like kind of not coming in and having the discussion face to face with me the less, the less likely I am to extend these days. So if you really want extended limits, you kind of just come talk to me and like try to be up and on the up and up with us and we'll do our best, you know yeah what's something that someone could do that would make you say you know what f this guy he's out Like. 

01:25:22 - Johnny (Co-host)
I don't want to. 

01:25:23 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I would actually cut him off so when I was young, I like thought my job was to be like the soup nazi. When I worked at the west gate, there would be like lines in the morning and we only had one writer and I would get really mad if people like started yelling like hey, open up another window, what the fuck is it? Like I would I've thrown people out before just because I thought they were obnoxious. And then, as I had time to reflect on that after I quit the Westgate, I was like that was really immature and I was just like looking for a fight and I did not need to like handle it like that. So I went back into Circa thinking as long as somebody isn't like abusing the writer, like saying something just like out of line, cursing them out or if you know if they break their word to me. 

01:26:07
So we had instances where I would call somebody and be like hey, we're doing our best. We have 30 halftimes on the board at once. It's obvious that you're just waiting for like the one game that we like didn't shut in time to take a shot Like. I understand that it's my responsibility. I'm not trying to punish you for that, but like that's all you're betting and the reason we're leaving an openness is we want to get as many people in as possible, even if you got in like 30 seconds late, whatever. But you're making it like you know we're two minutes into the game and we missed one, okay, and you have like 12 bets in your account and every one is one that we missed. 

01:26:35
On a Saturday, like I. I want to ask you, man, the man like we're trying to do right here by you, I have to ask you like, please, do not like make a concerted effort just to hit that and that's it. And if somebody said, okay, I'll do that, and then they did it again, I would, I would. I think we've there's two people that I was like we're gonna ask you not to play her anymore because you pretty much like lied to me and said that you know you would. 

01:26:57
I I'd rather the guy be like fuck you, get out of here I'm gonna keep doing it and like I'd rather him say that. But the point, the point you like tell me, yeah, like having a discussion, and you say you give me your word. Like I don't like people lying to me, like that just like rubs me the wrong way. Um, but that's only happened like one or two times, and I think the second time might have been the same guy as the first. So there's like technically been one guy that I asked not to play anymore and we closed this account. That's the only guy I've ever closed. 

01:27:22 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Still tweets about it to this day. That's the guy. 

01:27:26 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I don't think that was the guy, though, because I wasn't there when that happened. I think PointSex was a different guy. 

01:27:31 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Oh, you knew exactly what I was talking about. 

01:27:32 - Johnny (Co-host)
You'd rather him just tell you no F you, I'm going to still do it. 

01:27:36 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I would agree with you, though I personally, would rather somebody be up front with me, even if it's something I don't want to hear, rather than lie to my face. 

01:27:44 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Right, and I'll give you a hallmark of the Circus Sports communication that I established was we were going to call every single player and have a face-to-face discussion with them, or at least on the phone, and talk to them and give them some heads up as to what we're experiencing, that we don't like, and give them an opportunity. Like I stressed this so much with our team when I, when I, when we started give the player the benefit of the doubt at every instance, the only way to build a business like you can't wait for them proactively to be nice to you, and las vegas sports bettors in particular had such a history of being abused by operators and, just like you know, crapped on and like treated like they weren't welcome. So expect these guys to be a little gun shy when it comes to, like you know, thinking you have their best interest in mind. And so we won these people, like we won these bettors over, I think, one by one, with the fact that we actually cared, that we called and I was like, hey, I know you might do this at other books, but our system can't block it out. Can you not parlay, you know, I don't know, first half game to first half or to full game. Full game or something like that, just stuff like that. And everybody was enormously receptive. You know, for the, for the most part, 99% of people were just like no, that makes total sense. Thank you for calling me. 

01:28:50
There's a history of books just like passive, aggressively shutting down accounts, like trying to teach lessons, trying to say, okay, I'm going to show this guy. And when we took over Circa, we had to work that out from a lot of our guys who had just been trained under people who were like it's like scarcity mindset, where they're just like these guys are out to fuck me and they're going to screw me over and I'm going to get them first. And like you can't run a business it doesn't matter what business it is, you can't run any business with that attitude. If you don't love your betters and love your customers in any business in, you're going to fail. And so I thought that was like one of the worst parts and the most toxic parts about Las Vegas sports books was they all had this, this like entitlement of, like we don't have to take your bet, you're lucky, we're doing you a favor by taking your bets. 

01:29:29
And like, every time I walked into a book. I had a massive chip on my shoulder when I bet in Las Vegas because I felt that from every single guy. So I just wanted to be like all right, you don't like, you don't respect me and you think you can take a $10 bet from me and, you know, on something like I'm going to ram this down your throat every chance I get, I'm going to kiosk jam the hell out of you. And so I understand that feeling that other bettors have and why they're, why they have that Like it's only natural, when somebody like you know abuses you for so long, to be like fuck you, like no, I don't want to like play by your rules, like yep, totally agree so we've been on for quite a while. 

01:30:01 - Johnny (Co-host)
I wanted to ask one one question and I know we we did want to ask you about what you're kind of working on now, because it's kind of been in the dark for a lot of people who might've followed you at Circa and stuff like that. But before we do, if you were a sports better which I know you were, you know a time ago, right now, what's the one area where you think it's like most vulnerable for these books, given your background? Where would you start to try to like attack these guys If you want to make the most amount of money? 

01:30:27 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
from everything I'm reading, it seems like same game parlay really has a lot of opportunity. Um, you know, and that's not firsthand by my experience, but I'm working for a company right now that's kind of segues into it. The company I'm working for is called Mojo and we're basically we're a B2B provider right now for sports books who are looking to kind of enhance their prop menu and price discover a little more aggressively. So the thing that we're doing that other books or, excuse me, other providers aren't is we are relying, yes, on our SIMs and our models and our world-class data scientists, but we're also creating a quant team to basically build algorithmic reactive functions that will interpret bet flow, interpret market information and make optimal moves throughout an entire prop menu. So understanding correlations between different props and understanding what this bet in this passing yards market means to all the wide receiver props, all the tight end props Like my goal is not to like make pricing so it's more efficient, so that sharp players can't play. 

01:31:29
It's to give the books away to take bigger bets and, again, not all of them are going to do this with this, but I think they can market make to a higher degree and cater the pricing more to their clientele than to just be handed a price by like a data science team and say we think Mahomes Passguard should be 260. Good luck the rest of the way. Like, to us that's going to be just a jumping off point where we come up with that model price and then we basically say, okay, but now what is the market doing, what is the bet flow doing, and how do we connect all this information that we're seeing and like kind of disperse it back through our model? Because at scale, the real power of bookmaking is I have access, if I'm taking the bets, to the greatest bettors in the world, to the greatest models in the world. I can kind of like see at scale, at mass, like all of these bets and make a really good decision, whereas, like one sharp group sitting, you know, in Las Vegas, they might only have access to their models and their opinion, but I can have access to all of that. So that's the real edge that I think the bookmaker has if he's taking bets. 

01:32:24
So we wanna give that edge to, like, the people in the prop markets in a way where they can afford to be more aggressive, they can have fair payouts, they don't have to be so defensive. But yeah, I think the prop markets are where the future is. I think everybody, um, everybody loves engaging with like, especially in the nba, nfl, like with these players on a week-to-week basis. It's just exciting, it brings in the younger generation and like I don't want to, I don't think it has to go the route of like these are only for entertainment. Um, I think they can be entertainment for the casual better. But I also think some of these markets, like you asked earlier, I think they can be price discovered to a point where there's real liquidity in some of these prop pools. 

01:32:58 - Johnny (Co-host)
So, yeah, that's really interesting, but how would you even price discover that Like, because there's basically infinite combinations when it comes to what you can do in like just one NFL SGP. 

01:33:10 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
So our whole theory is that you can kind of we're tweaking our model constantly, so we can kind of like a and b are our different props that comprise the, the singing parlay, and be like okay, we know there's a lot of liquidity in mahomes passing touchdowns. We know there's a lot of liquidity in travis, kelsey anytime touchdown. We've seen enough bets that we feel confident about that pricing. Maybe we have some uncertainty around Kelsey receiving yards. We can kind of like triangulate not to get too complicated here, because I'm not the person to talk like complicated stuff we can kind of triangulate the price for Kelsey receiving yards by knowing that we've properly price discovered those other two markets like pretty well, and we're pretty certain in those prices, and then kind of hone backwards in on like what the kelsey um uh receiving yards prop should be. So that's kind of like the basis of our hypothesis is that we this, we price discover the most liquid markets and then back out prices and as you go along, okay, now we've backed out the kelsey receiving yards prop. Now we kind of feel like we know all three of these props. So when those markets are played along with another mark where we have uncertainty, we can kind of back out that fourth market. So yeah, that's kind of like the thought behind it. 

01:34:23
We have really talented guys with a lot of like like financial markets backgrounds, like a lot of like. We have a Goldman Sachs quant who's, like you know, doing a lot of work for us and most of the guys have finance market experience. So my goal was to go to work with people with a high level understanding of these other, more mature markets and maybe I could blend some of my sports book knowledge with what they've done in bigger markets and we could come up with ways to price uncertainty in a way that books can take bigger bets. That's not to say that other books won't, that's not to say other books want to take the bigger bets, but for me, I'm building a product that I know will be useful at the next sports book that I run and will allow me to take bigger bets. So that's kind of like my like motivation and being involved with this project. 

01:35:06 - Johnny (Co-host)
I wish you guys the best of success with that. It would be a crazy tool to have like on your on your end as a bookmaker, to be able to price, discover individuals. It just seems like it seems like a crazy hard problem to solve, right, because most of the time, even if you're doing exactly what you said, like basically taking one leg and be like okay, travis kelsey, this leg is currently mispriced, like it's not that that leg's mispriced, it's that it's a mispriced in conjunction it's mispriced in conjunction with, like, only one thing of the of the other thousand things you can put it with. 

01:35:35
So if you know, for example, that I don't even know what perfect example I can give in regards to Kelsey receptions, but you might know that Kelsey is going to get targeted if they have the backup QB in, so you might put Mahomes to get under alt 10 plus pass attempts, hoping for an injury and then hoping that the backup will come in, and then put that with Kelseysey alt over eight and a half and it's like some crazy payout and you're like wow, this is like ridiculous. So it's not that the individual legs are mispriced, because I don't think most of them are well, there's lots of random scenarios. 

01:36:11 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It's like uh, you know, a certain running back will get into the game if his team is trailing, whereas he's not going to get in the game if the team's like. It's all these little nuances that by following specific teams and games, you start to pick up on these little, these little types of trends. 

01:36:26 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I guess, basically so my, my hope is that from a, from a like a broader view, that over time we can pick up on the tendencies of sharp players and what they tend to do with injury information, how they tend to exploit our systems Like this is all going to come in, come down to like us being able to like, process large amounts of, like data and just kind of reverse engineer the sharp players tendencies and hopefully program things in a way where we're alerted when we see patterns. So I think the real work of our project is going to start once we go live and have that flow, cause you know, I agree with you, there's there's going to be the way there is now, there's going to be massive holes and blind spots and all these things. But I think, the same way, the betters are kind of ramping up like tech, technology wise. I think the books are going to do that too, and so to some degree, my one buddy jokes he's like this is basically like turning, gonna turn into like a war between computers and, like you know, the better sides are going to be like probing for weakness and we're going to be like running counter intel and trying to like. You know it's. 

01:37:29
So it's kind of inevitable to some degree, but I I do think the the, the weapon that we have is we'll have access to every bet that we see come across and we're going to learn from it. That's what bookmakers do manually. That's why I do it at Circa. Every bet that I see, I file away either in a Google Doc or in my head and try to remember what I saw. But that's not efficient. The only way to properly do this and do it at scale is to really drill down in the data and have some sort of automation involved. So again, I don't know that this is possible, but I know it's possible to run the book that I'm like dreaming about in my head. 

01:38:07
And again, I don't think it should be. This isn't going to be, like in my mind, a death sentence for sharp bettors. I think, if anything, it should be like a liquidity driver in a way that, like can beef up the liquidity in a lot of these markets, in a way that a lot of the pros who need a certain amount of liquidity to come into a market are going to be incentivized to enter, and that's just like. I want to go wherever there's liquidity and wherever people want to be, I want to drive liquidity in that market. I don't care if it's, you know, darts or like badminton or KBO or whatever it is. I like it's, it's immaterial to me, whatever. Whatever the people want to bet, and wherever there's liquidity that's where the bookmakers should want to go. 

01:38:46 - Johnny (Co-host)
So what? What is your vision for the ideal book? Whatever you can share. 

01:38:52 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I don't know. I mean Circa had a lot of a lot of pieces of that. I mean I think that, like I'm in love with the retail sports betting experience which probably makes me a dinosaur Like I love the interaction and people coming into a room and just feeling kind of like the diversity of players in that room. Like I compare like the old Stardust and like the old Las Vegas Hilton, now the Westgate. Like these rooms just had an energy about them where there was all kinds of betters, there was money in the air, like I'm always going to be addicted to that. So I think anything I do will be born out of like building a brand around, like a retail experience. But that's not to say that I won't concentrate and try to have the best kind of like app experience or the best tech experience available. So, like in my, in my mind, I'm just like I like to build brands. I feel like I did a decent job building the Circa brand. 

01:39:40
Um, just by the way, that, like people, I'll tell you like one of my, one of my greatest accomplishments, I felt like with Circa, or the thing that brings me the most joy, I felt like we tried to do the right thing by our players at all times, and there will be situations maybe maybe like with what you were talking about, rob, with this um. 

01:39:56
Situations maybe maybe like with what you were talking about, rob, with this um, you know, limiting or kicking out a player for past postings where people on Twitter would defend us against a plate sucks, and I'm like this is fucking crazy. I'm like they're defending a sports book against kicking somebody out. I'm like that's the biggest compliment I could ever be paid in my life. It means that, like I accomplished, or we accomplished, everything that we wanted to, and more like that. That blew my mind and I was just like okay, like that's, that's awesome, like I love the fact that there, but like I have an issue with like I have an issue with that I threw one guy out. I like I think it's bullshit. I has ingrained himself in the gambling Twitter culture and he's very abrasive. 

01:40:43 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
but like real, I will say Well, relative to like other brands out there in the recreational sportsbook space, you're not seeing like their customer service managers engaging in a real capacity. 

01:40:54 - Johnny (Co-host)
But their customer service managers are not even. They're like bots and stuff. Well, that's exactly what. 

01:41:01 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I mean so there's an element of realness and it really creates like I have no incentive to support Circa personally me right, I don't bet through Circa personally. Obviously there's movers and stuff like Matt talked about earlier, but I feel like it's a brand that I'm proud to support just because of Jeff, honestly, and him like being ingrained in the gambling Twitter. 

01:41:33 - Johnny (Co-host)
Did you hire? 

01:41:34 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Jeff. 

01:41:35 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Yeah, so Jeff was the person that I felt was the only person in the world who could execute our vision on customer service. I met Jeff in 2000, probably like 12. He was a ticket writer at Palace Station Casino in Las Vegas and I would go in to make bets on just like whatever sports I was betting at the time, and he would always greet me like you know, hi, mr Metcalf, and have sheets ready for me and, like I was just like this kid's phenomenal. He's like a throwback to like the 1950s. I'm just like, if I ever have a book, I will hire this kid. I tried to get him a job at Westgate but he would never call them. I was just every time I go in I'd be like, jeff, call, call Westgate and I'm going got the job in 2018. 

01:42:21
I think Jeff was either the first or second person I went to and I was basically like I want to task you with like building like the most elite customer service sportsbook like in the world, and I think me and Jeff like I think we just like went back and forth and inspired each other, like taking each other to the next level of like what customer service looks like, and I I really like got obsessed with customer service when I when I um was betting because it was so bad at the books, and like I started, I started watching a lot of Gary Vaynerchuk content and the thing that he helped me with was I had always been kind of in favor of customer service, but I never really like had like my ideals crystallized the way he did and he was so much about just like you know, doing the right thing by the customer whenever you can like the right thing is the right thing that just I don't know. It just gave me like a template for like this is what I believe and I'm going to keep stepping in this direction and I'm not going to just have it be like an accessory to what we do. I'm going to make it like the main thing. And so Jeff came in and like, honestly, like when I used to work the line in Las Vegas, I thought I was like the best customer service person in Vegas history. I thought it was amazing. 

01:43:24
But like, compared to Jeff Benson, I was just like you know, I was a role player and he was like LeBron, like it was just he took things and like the ideas that we had and just executed them to a point where, like nobody else in the world could. He's like the reason Circus Sports is successful. Like I don't want to diminish myself and Chris Bennett, but like we wouldn't be where we were without Jeff Benson's dedication and his true understanding that, like you know, when you're interacting with customers, you're setting an expectation for the brand and for how you're treated. Like the reason people interact with a brand is consistency. They come in, they expect a certain experience and it's executed every time. They're not exceptions. And when something goes wrong, the staff is quick to be like hey, we fucked up, how do we make this right? And they really care about that. And Jeff is just like. He does that every day. When we screw up, he's the first to admit it. He's on the phone. He's telling you like, hey, this is what happened. 

01:44:23 - Johnny (Co-host)
He's honest he's direct, like all the things that it takes to have a customer service brand like Jeff just exemplifies those. 

01:44:26
So yeah, I've only had positive experiences and honestly take this as an endorsement, I guess, from Rob and I. When I go to Vegas now like, I stay at Circa like no questions asked. It's great service, good property, best for sports betting by a mile, like, like, if you're betting sports in Vegas, there's none of the other sports books like in terms of viewing experience, even come like remotely close. It's crazy. At this point, matt, we'll get into plus EV, minus EV, but I just thought of this right now. This is a question that keeps coming up. I've still seen it on Twitter a bit. There's no better guy to ask this question to than you. We had it in the past where people were saying for like a Q&A, they asked us which is the quote unquote right side to be on. So it's one betting syndicate with a $50 million bankroll is on side A and side B is five separate individual sharp guys with a $1 million bankroll each. That's all the information you have. Which is the quote unquote right side? 

01:45:28 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
The dollar amounts don't mean a whole lot, like I mean they do and they don't Obviously like the bigger, more successful group is like the more they bet. That's kind of like it kind of matters. But there's always like a running power ranking in our head of like kind of who trumps who and who are our best players? Like, honestly, there's like five guys who bet at Circa during the time I was there, where I'm not like I'm scared of them, but like when they played I was just like I paid attention and so seeing a couple of those guys line up on one side, I'm going to pay probably more attention to that, no matter what size their bets are in relation to, maybe, the guy who is just betting the max and everything. There's a lot of guys who bet max bets who I don't consider that sharp, like $200,000 on an NFL game, whatever. It's not always like everything's relative and it's not always an indicator of who's the sharpest. So we've actually found that and maybe we're wrong in this, but I might be giving away market dynamics a little, but it seems like the bigger bets that we see, the max bets, those are more trying to position the market in a certain way and a lot of times our sharpest players are betting 25%, 40%, 45% of the limit in a way where it feels very coordinated. In a way where it feels like very coordinated, feels like that there's, you know, a motivation to take advantage of perceived kind of reputations in the market based on dollar amount and that most books just jump to a conclusion of because this guy's betting the max and because I know who this guy is. This is the side and I don't think it's that clear cut. 

01:47:09
I think, as you get later in the week, I think kind of like later in the week, I think kind of like CLV becomes like wishy-washy. Whether it means that much. I think it's. I think it means something. Obviously I'm not disrespecting CLV and obviously it's a driver of you know whether you're a long-term winner. But I just think, like, starting on Thursday, the dynamics of the market change a lot more and the guys who are kind of like the big cats from Monday to Wednesday they kind of dip out and they've gotten their value and then you kind of start to see like and I'm sure Rob could probably speak to that as well Like, as it gets later in the week, you see other players emerge and bigger guys emerge, who you think you're and again, I don't know your bet sizing and stuff, rob, but who you think you're better at but may bet bigger than you and control the market more than you. You know, and that's how it feels to me. Yeah. 

01:47:50 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
So Interesting. Yeah, so we've had this question come up before and I answered it the opposite of you and that was just because I have worked with a pretty large group and I would just be one of several originators within that group themselves. So they're basically doing the same kind of the same act that a bookmaker would do, but they would use their own internal originators to kind of determine what they would want to go out on. So my feeling was always like well, this group has several originators already and they're balancing those opinions to bet their opinion. I guess you know, with a lot of the hypotheticals, there really are a lot of nuances and actual specifics that you need to get down on. I'm certain there's people that bet more than me, that I consider myself to be sharper than them, and there's probably people that bet less than me who are sharper than me, and that's. You know, that's just the reality of sports betting. But that was an interesting answer. 

01:48:49 - Johnny (Co-host)
Very interesting. So we'll move on now to. I know you've listened to a couple of the shows, but our plus EV, minus EV move of the week, matt, we'll start with you. What do you got? 

01:48:59 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
This part really stressed me out. I like because I know you guys do this and I'm like terrible at stuff like this. So I have two. I'm going to go with the one that I recommend to people more often slightly. If you're not getting like a good deep tissue massage as a professional sports better or a bookmaker, or like a really good strong massage, at least like at the most once every two weeks, like I do one once a week. 

01:49:20
If you're not getting that, you're just like you're costing yourself years in your life, like you have to get a massage and if you're not somebody who likes to. So when I started getting massage, I was somebody who, like I don't wanna be touched, I don't want some stranger touching me. And then I found this like 75 year old Asian woman who's like the strongest person I've ever met in my life and she is like I don't know. She's incredible. She like walks on me. She like, oh yeah, I like I think I've shed a tear during the massage. I've like cried, like it's not not out of like emotion, out of pure pain, and it's not not out of like emotion, out of pure pain, um, and it's like I I feel I feel as good as I've ever felt in my life and going to her for like six years, and it's just like it pays dividends. 

01:49:58
I'm so thankful I found her Like it's incredible. So I recommend a massage to anybody, even if they're like I don't like being touched, I don't like that, I don't think I'll like it. Like, just try it once, once, look for a recommendation because you need to get a good one like and I think the harder the better, I think, but some people don't like hard massage. 

01:50:12 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
But anyway, yeah, that's, that's my plus, eva I I echo that I don't do massage therapy particularly but I do physio every week on on like some ailments and stuff like that. I get some dry needling done and relieve some pain point. Honestly it it feels amazing like I gotta one ASAP. 

01:50:29
Sometimes I skip a week and you feel it. I mean, listen, I'm, I'm, you know, my late thirties. I shouldn't, I shouldn't feel like this, but the reality is I do and it's. It's really good advice and like, look at my posture, look at me sitting in this chair over the course of this interview. 

01:50:42 - Johnny (Co-host)
It's a disaster. It's a day I, I, I got to get one ASAP. 

01:50:46 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
It's been said yes, I'm going to get one, probably this week, Johnny, if you come to Vegas, I will give you my lady. I will like you know what I'll buy you your first massage. 

01:50:55 - Johnny (Co-host)
Wow, thank you so much, man. 

01:50:57 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
That's a great move, I appreciate that you got to drive to Green Valley, though it's in Green Valley. 

01:51:01 - Johnny (Co-host)
That's fine. When I'm in Vegas next, I'll text you and we'll hook it up. So this is the Asian lady you're saying that stands on the oh, okay, yeah, I'll definitely try that out, for sure. 

01:51:10 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
She won't stand on you the first time, like she's not going to stand on you the first time, so he isn't the last massage I went to. 

01:51:15 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
This is several months ago. But I was there and you know I'm filling out the form, I'm drawing out where the pain is. I'm just like stops for like a minute and um, you know, you're face down. I'm like I don't know what's going on here. Then all of a sudden I just hear like this rattling kind of sound. I'm like what the fuck is going on? A minute later, feet directly in my back, this girl was walking on me and then, when I was done the the massage afterwards, I realized that there's like a rack on the roof, on the ceiling, where they like hook themselves up to to hold on to. But it was very unusual that she wouldn't have told me going in that like hey, by the way, mid massage, I'm gonna get up and stand on your back. It was amazing, it was the best massage ever. I could never think that that would work, but it really, really worked. 

01:52:13 - Johnny (Co-host)
All right, that's a very good one, rob. You got your plus CV. 

01:52:16 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yes, so I'm going to combine all mine into one, and this is like a lesson that I try to teach a lot of people. So bettors have to react to new information as it becomes available. That's something that's important, right? You might have a strong opinion on a game early in the week, but then stuff changes and you change your opinion. I'm going to do that now because previously on the Circles Off episode, I talked about Black Friday shopping Boxing Day if you're in Canada, which is December 26th, and all these people who are like waiting in line at stores to get deals, when you could just shop online and you could easily get all the stuff you need from the comfort of your own home. Well, this past black friday was a fucking disaster. Online okay, sites are are down. I'm waiting in best buy in like a queue to shop. The site took like like 40 minutes to be able to shop the site. 

01:53:10 - Johnny (Co-host)
It's a virtual line. 

01:53:10 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
And I'm like you know what, Fuck this? I have a best buy like 10 minutes from me. I'm going to the store and I got there and there was nobody there. The trend has reversed. The trend is now reversed where nobody's going to the stores anymore. They're just shopping online, and because of that I want to retract. 

01:53:29 - Johnny (Co-host)
His plus EV is now a minus EV. 

01:53:31 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
A previous plus EV and say, on these big sales days now so many people actually don't want to get up and go shopping anymore, they want to shop online. You actually have to get out and go to the stores now. You should go to the stores. I went to the brick, bought a couple of couches. Best Buy bought a new like coffee maker TVs all this stuff for your, for your new place. 

01:53:52
Everything got it done in like half an hour. I would have still been waiting in the queue online, so, uh, that's going to be my reacting to new information. 

01:54:01 - Johnny (Co-host)
That's a good one. This week, that is a good one. Uh, all right, I have mine. Uh, this is so it's. 

01:54:08
Don't be late, slash. Know when to be late, because it's okay to be late in certain scenarios, and what I mean by that is number one is you don't want to be late. So if you're, if you're meeting with someone, whatever, like, just go a bit early, it's better to waste five, 10 minutes. Then be the guy who's like showing up, like oh, I came late. Never go late to a meeting, something important, you're online. If it's like a meeting with somebody and you're like, let's say, me and Matt were like, hey, you want to do a Zoom call, we'll catch up next week. Sure, just get there on the exact time. There's really no excuse, especially online stuff, right. 

01:54:43
But the second part is know when to be late. So, for example, like I had a barber that I used to go to and every time I'd go there consistently, I'd have to wait like 15 minutes for him to finish up the next guy's cut. He was always behind schedule 10, 15 minutes. So then I realized, like you're wasting your time, I'm just going to go 20 minutes late to my own and then I'd go there and then he would be finishing up that guy's and maybe he'd have to wait for two minutes and it would work out. So in those scenarios, know when to be late after a couple, but for the most part, just don't be late. It's actually disrespectful of people's time when you yourself don't come on time, and especially if it's online, it's just pretty unacceptable to not be there on time. I agree with you, Johnny. 

01:55:26 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
can I ask you a follow-up question? 

01:55:28 - Johnny (Co-host)
Absolutely. 

01:55:28 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Okay, so this is kind of showing my like my what do you call it? Like social anxiety disorder a little. But so with the Zoom meetings, if I'm signing on to like a meeting with like a bunch of people I don't know and I'm not like super excited about like making small talk before the meeting starts, I started pressing till like on the world clock, where it's like 11 minutes or it's like 11 minutes and it's like 57 seconds, and then I'm still on on the minute but I'm giving myself a greater likelihood of not being there before the meeting organizer has started. Oh, do you think that's? 

01:56:03 - Johnny (Co-host)
acceptable. This would fall into the know when to be late. I think you nailed it Know when to be late. 

01:56:08 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
You know you're in that scenario you said not for online stuff, so like no, no, no, no, no no. Is that crazy? 

01:56:13 - Johnny (Co-host)
No, I'm saying, I'm saying don't be late, unless it's one of those scenarios where you're like okay, this, this is a scenario where I actually should be late, in which case you're late on purpose. And if you're late on purpose, that's fine. But most people like they, just they're like oh, yeah, I have a a full if you, by the way. So if you, if I tell Rob, hey, rob, you free for a call today and he's like yeah, I'm free around five, then yeah, I can text him at five, oh five, and be like hey, you good for a call right now. 

01:56:39 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
We said around five we're going to. 

01:56:41 - Johnny (Co-host)
We're just like oh yeah, I, uh, I have a meeting at five. They're like getting grabbing their computer at like five. 

01:56:54 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Oh three, Like it's just I think those are the super social anxiety people, cause they don't, they're fearing the situation. I'm saying, I think that I'm giving them the benefit. 

01:57:02 - Johnny (Co-host)
So fair enough. Another one is like if you technically like, whoever is like a higher status than the other guy should be coming a bit later. But I also don't believe in that. What I mean by that is, if I'm asking you hey, I want to ask you some questions, can you help me out with this? 

01:57:23 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You better be there on time. 

01:57:25 - Johnny (Co-host)
You better be on time. If you're like, hey, can you give me a job, I'm looking for a job, can you give me an interview? Obviously, I'm looking for a job. Can you give me an interview? Like, obviously those scenarios zero latency, like you have to be there early, yes, but it is what it is. So, yeah, don't be late or know when to be late, because there's definitely a little bit of mixed messaging, but I understand what you're saying. I get it Don't be late by accident. How about that? Okay, there's my plus TV. 

01:57:46 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That's the best way to frame it. Sometimes it's unavoidable. You ever joined a Zoom call and then your Zoom decides to do an update while you're joining the call You're like, ah fuck, this thing's going to take four minutes to update. 

01:57:57 - Johnny (Co-host)
I'm going to look like a complete asshole when I join. That has happened, but no too many people are like oh yeah, sorry, I was having internet connections Like you weren't, because you're on the internet all day. There's no way. 

01:58:14 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Anyways, all right, matt, you got a negative EV. This one was so hard again, I like here's my negative EV. 

01:58:18 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
You put a lot of pressure on yourself, Matt. 

01:58:20 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Don't worry, it's gonna be okay. 

01:58:21
So here's my negative EV stance, before I'll preface it, something that I think is negative. Ev is so subjective that like I could say like I don't know taking an Uber to the airport, a million different things, and somebody could find some value in that. So I don't want to like speak for, so I found one that I'm like I just don't see any EV in it. Like negative EV all the time to me is like just committing crimes, I think like serious crimes. Like the downside of going to jail is so bad like drinking and driving, like again, I'm not getting preachy here, but like like your downside is like your upside is you get home, which you would have any other way. You chose to get there. Your downside is like you go to jail for 30 years. Like in what world am I risking? Like people always think like oh, you're, you're, you've been a professional better. You must love risk and I'm like I fucking hate risk you just understand risk, you don't love risk. 

01:59:12 - Johnny (Co-host)
You just understand. Yeah, I'm not. 

01:59:13 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I'm not looking for like catastrophic outcomes um at all, like I'm trying to eliminate catastrophic outcomes, so my negative EV is like committing serious crimes that could result in jail time all right. 

01:59:24 - Johnny (Co-host)
No, I agree with that, I'll take it a step further. 

01:59:26
I'm like the biggest proponent against drinking and driving. I've never done it in my life, I never will. I I've seen so many people do it and like it's just, it's, it's the ultimate negative free roll. Like it's back in the day I understand how it was, like kind of you could kind of justify it. It's like how can I I can't even really get a ride home Like what am I going to do? But like in today's day, you don't even need to plan ahead. You could literally just get an Uber at any instant, like not even that expensive. Go home and then get an Uber the next day back to get your car If that's what you have to do. 

01:59:59
It's not just. It's so unacceptable right now to drink and drive. And, like Matt said, the risk is if you do harm someone while you're, while you're drinking and driving, like forget about this. How about this? If you're drinking and driving, you get into an accident with someone, 100% not your fault. Other guy hit you something like that, completely not your fault, but you have alcohol in your system, you're fucked, you're toast. Why would you want to risk that? It's an ultimate negative free rule. 

02:00:23 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
You've ruined people's lives, not to get too preachy here. Ruin people's lives, you ruin your own life. It's just like I don't even. 

02:00:28 - Johnny (Co-host)
Yeah, crazy no, I like it I'm in, I like I'm in, I'm all in on that I'm all in on not committing crimes. I'm I'm all in on I'm, I'm in, I'm in on not going to jail good good one. Uh, good one matt. Uh, that would be that going to jail negative I think it's a very bad ev. 

02:00:43 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I think pretty. You only have so many years to live why would? 

02:00:46 - Johnny (Co-host)
you want to be behind bars matt's like this before he gave he's like I don't know if some people will disagree with this one, but, uh, no, no, this was the one he said that nobody could disagree with. 

02:00:54 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, oh sorry, imagine, I bet you, there's someone out there that would disagree. 

02:00:58 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
They're like ah, you know what it's like struggling. They're like jail's great, like you go to jail and you get a free meal that's what I was gonna say. 

02:01:03 - Johnny (Co-host)
In the winter it's cold, you know technically, though, there would be scenarios where someone's like, okay, I'm literally like toast, I'm down in the dumps, like if I rob this thing and I get it, then I'm like rich and if I lose I'm going to jail, but like my life's so shit anyways. Like I mean, maybe you could there might be, there's some scenarios, there might be a scenario where, like you could understand it. But yeah, I definitely agree with that one. Rob, anything negative, evie, no. 

02:01:27 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I've combined them all into one. I feel as much pressure now. Ever since you guys mocked me for putting frozen grapes into my drink, I've been really turned off by this segment. 

02:01:34 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Oh wait, Rob, Rob, I did that. Okay, I did it. And then my girlfriend she was like I don't know about these grapes, so she bought like rocks to put in her wine. 

02:01:45 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, stones. 

02:01:56 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
The whiskey stones. I was all about the grapes. I thought that was cool. Hey, thank you thank you. 

02:01:58 - Johnny (Co-host)
I really appreciate that I got so much flack for that idea. My mom, I tried it. I shouldn't say all about it, I tried it. Okay, my mom's a listener to this podcast. She got, I went over once and she's like look, I made these frozen grapes for you, for us to put in the drinks. 

02:02:08
Um, so my, my negative EV would be, um, just using like any stock toothpaste that's around, because I think, like, brushing your teeth is like super important and it could be enjoyable if you have a toothpaste you like. So you gotta go, you gotta get that, you gotta try out a bunch of toothpaste and be like yo, oh, this is the one, this is my toothpaste, I love this toothpaste. I, I love this brand, love this flavor, this is it. Buy a bunch of those and stock them and then when you go to brush your teeth, it's like a little bit of joy. That happens. There is now. You're like, oh, I, I like this toothpaste, this is an enjoyable experience. And there you go, and if your toothpaste is bad, you don't want to brush your teeth. You're not going to brush your teeth. Little wins. That's what this segment's all about Compounding little wins. 

02:02:56 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
What's the worst toothpaste you've? 

02:02:58 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
used. I've had a bubble gum flavored. I can't stand anything. Bubble gum flavored toothpaste. It makes me want to actually yak while I'm brushing my teeth. 

02:03:06 - Johnny (Co-host)
I used to work for a company that owned Crest and a guy that we now know was like the manager for Crest, and so I did get a lot of free samples and some of them that were like non-production, and boy was there some ultra terrible ones in that. So I can't even compare, because there's stuff that didn't even make it to the shelves. That's how bad it was. Like we're talking like-. 

02:03:29 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
You're like the guinea pig for like experimental oh buddy, we're talking like cucumber mint. 

02:03:33 - Johnny (Co-host)
We're talking like the worst flavor. They just bunch of flavors. 

02:03:36 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I would probably watch your. Did they watch your reaction as you used them to like? 

02:03:39 - Johnny (Co-host)
No, no, no, I wasn't in the test or anything, like he would just have extras and we were broke. But like we're like just first job out of school, we're like I'll take anything free, like you're gonna. Obviously you make friends with all the guys. Like, okay, this, this guy like works in like shampoo, so he obviously has samples for that. Like I'll just get all my shampoo for free from him. And then you make like connects and stuff. That should be your plus ev move is what making connections? 

02:04:03
within the company samples yeah, no, yeah, you get free samples. Like well, I wasn't gonna be going, like I just moved out. I'm like trying to save money, Like if you give me a shampoo, like I'm not throwing that out because I don't like that other shampoo. 

02:04:16 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
When Johnny visits Circa he brings his own bottle and he pumps the shampoo from the shower into the bottle, takes it home with him. 

02:04:22 - Johnny (Co-host)
No, now I don't. You also got to think about it this way, like if you get find the thing you like, like that one toothpaste or that one shampoo or whatever, it brings you a little bit of joy. You only use that thing once a day, but when you go, look at it like oh, that's a cool toothpaste, and you almost forget about it. And then the next morning you wake up like, oh, it's a cool toothpaste you only brush your teeth once a day twice, morning and night uh, I was just. 

02:04:43 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I was just following up, sorry, no you, you forget about. 

02:04:46 - Johnny (Co-host)
In the morning I I actually brush my teeth like it's red. There's no random schedule. I brush them when I wake up, when I go to bed and then probably like at least another one time during the day if I'm if I'm home. 

02:04:55 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Not not to turn this into like a oral hygiene segment or whatever, but I recently started using a water pick as well. Oh, you did it. I bought it and I didn't set it up yet. Yeah, there's so many things times I eat over the court and, because I work from home, most of the time I'm eating my meals at home, so it's really easy. I just go up to the washroom and I hate flossing, like the act of flossing, and I have like a permanent retainer on the bottom as well. 

02:05:17
So like I can't really floss nicely the Waterpik. Listen, I'm not in the business of like advocating for products that don't pay me. We talked about this before, but Waterpiks are pretty solid. 

02:05:27 - Johnny (Co-host)
I did see that. I got that at Costco. Colgate Max Fresh is your one. Oh man, that's your brand. Colgate Max Fresh is a banger. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, interesting, I can't even, I'm not even going to say I'm pumping another brand, but we're in on the get a good thing that you like, get a good. Yeah, good thing that you like. If you have a good like, there's no reason to use a shit pillow. Go out shop, try a bunch of pillows, get a good pillow. 

02:05:51 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Relax the back. I got a good one for relax the back. It's like they like. Fit you. Like the way you're like trying on a shoe. They like fit you for a pillow. It's pretty good. 

02:06:01 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I think we have to add a weekly lifestyle podcast. 

02:06:04 - Johnny (Co-host)
Weekly lifestyle. Most of the pillows just like a mattress. They will if you get it from those like high-end pillow shops. They obviously come with a guarantee so it's like there's no. Also, again, risk-free to try this out. You don't like that pillow, send it back at a new one. Eventually you find one you like. 

02:06:16 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Keep it there you go I recently got new pillows again, so I'm moving. I bought new pillows. I'm with you on all these things. We've never agreed more than today's episode we've never agreed. 

02:06:26 - Johnny (Co-host)
All right, matt, uh was a long. We end all our episodes with the same question Looking back five years, just a measly five years. If you could talk to the previous version of yourself, what's one piece of advice that you would give to him? 

02:06:41 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Five years is tough. I might go a little further back and just say like I don't know, maybe press some of my edges a little better. I think that like I was a little risk averse when I, when I started betting and I had edges and all edges kind of dry up or to some degree, so I probably could have been more aggressive in some of my um, some of my betting stuff. But I will say I've learned the lesson from a bookmaking standpoint, and I kind of mentioned before a little earlier, but you have these kind of situations as a bookmaker, um, I don't know, they just stick out. You feel like you know you have a good position and the way the public is betting, like and and again. I know there was some disagreement on this fight, but I I put the tyson paul fight kind of in there. Um, I, I think that it was it. It just it struck me as one of those instances where, and again, I I'm going to quote what did you have? 

02:07:33 - Johnny (Co-host)
Sorry, like for the clarification? 

02:07:35 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
Well, I would have booked that fight pretty hard towards Paul. I think that and again, it's a mini handicap. But like these events are kind of like I know people are going to get on me for comparing that to Mayweather-McGregor because I know it's not the same thing but you get, especially in boxing and those events, you get opportunities where the price is out of line to begin with because, like, the favorite should be much bigger and there's a natural weighing down of the line because the public's on the dog and as a sports book you need to kind of feel emboldened, to kind of like and you want to be consistent with how you do it from a big event to big event. But you need to be consistent with how you do it from a big event to big event. But you need to be emboldened to kind of like, put yourself in a position to kind of have a big windfall. Another one that sticks out to me is I think I don't know if that was a couple years ago or when Michigan played Alabama and you know, from seeing the action there was a pretty good sentiment from the betters that I saw that the Michigan was the right side in that game. Or I say right again, right side, but the Michigan was attracting a lot of sharp money and my number supported it. 

02:08:33
And usually it's opportunities where I have a strong kind of handicap on something and the market supports me and says we think that you were correct in your assessment. And then there's a tendency for, like the one side, to attract a lot of public money in a way where you can accumulate a really good position and not have to like step out of line to do it. Um, those are not positions where the sports book should, in my mind, be selling off. You should be kind of just like holding your edge and be okay with kind of as big as the decision gets. And again, like I don't know if Paul Tyson is fair to be lumped in there I thought it should be but like I don't want to, like you know, monday morning, quarterback it. 

02:09:09
But, um, you get like you get four or five, six of those events per year as a bookmaker. You need to have enough confidence in your experience to to kind of isolate those events. And you know, when I said I have some gamble in me like that, that's kind of what I mean. I'm, I'm, I'm okay Having big decisions on events that I view is like, you know, very, very, um, just very like um plus CV for for my book. So, um, going back in time, I think if I understood all of that and if I was a little more I don't know if I had more, it's easy to say if I had more experience when I was younger. You know, obviously you do a hundred things differently, but, um, I would have pressed my edge a little more in certain situations and and yeah, so that's my answer. 

02:09:51 - Johnny (Co-host)
I answer. I'm with you on that. Jake paul fight uh over tyson. There the thing was, with a lot of these events like that, it's just like it's a new promotion, it's a new company. You don't really know how that's going to play out, as we saw with uh. Where's my uh? 

02:10:00
it's not here right now no, no, no the logan paul one, we took it off and, yeah, there was a low the logan paul versus dylan danis fight. Um, just an absolute travesty of what happened to us in that fight. So there you go. Like you never know I don't know if you watched that one but basically it was just such a bad production that, like, legitimately, the clock was just wrong and the fight lasted like an additional 30 seconds. And then, like people stormed the ring and then they just called it like a disqualification. And then, like people stormed the ring and then they just called it like a disqualification and, um, I, I did I did lose a good amount of money on the fight to go to decision and, uh, logan paul, the win by decision, and it's like like who's gonna overturn that? Like who even cares? Like they just don't nothing, it doesn't matter. So you never know what these events like could just be a spectacle. 

02:10:47 - Matt Metcalf (Guest)
I didn't get to the part that I was going to reference of of your guys matthew trinhaley episode. 

02:10:51
Um, that I thought was like it was a great point and I and I never thought about the way he said it which was when you're betting these like high variance events where, like it's a big event, there's a lot of recreational money in the market and you know that, no matter what happens, that the price is going to be drastically different after you witness the event. 

02:11:07
So, like you, you know, after Tyson, paul fights, you know that either you know Tyson's going to be favored or Paul's going to be a huge favorite, most likely. And so, with those high variance outcomes he just said it so like, so perfect in a way that it like crystallized it in my head and I'd always kind of like bet events like that because I felt like they were good bets, because you watched them. You're like, matter what, I'm probably gonna have a thousand cents of value on one of these sides, and him bringing up that point was just like awesome to hear and think about in that way and yeah, so that was, that was great value that I got from listening to that pod, just in terms of like my future, my future bets, and feeling emboldened to like step in and play those events more than I probably maybe had in the past. 

02:11:46 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
So we'll link that matt trendhill episode in the description below for anyone who wants to check that out. It's one of the older ones, matt. Uh. Appreciate you joining us today. All the best, with everything at mojo, and whenever you decide to get back into bookmaking, I'm sure it'll be a successful operation. It was great to be able to pick your brain today. For anyone out there who enjoyed the interview, make sure you smash that like button down below. Make sure you're subbed here on circles off for more great interviews going forward. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Peace out everyone. Thank you, thanks guys.