00:09 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Welcome to episode 39 of Circles Off. I'm Rob Pizzola, joined by Johnny from Betstamp what's up, guys? And we're going to get right to it and welcome in a guest that we've been looking forward to, our first guest of the year 2022. Anyone who consumes sports betting content has probably come along his stuff at some point or another over the years. I know that's how I found him. He's a senior strategist with Covers now 14 years of NFL bookmaking and betting along the way. Adam Chernoff, welcome to Circles Off. 

00:42 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
The barrel of guests that you guys have is running low, I can tell. 

00:47 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It's not, I'm not going to lie. We'd like to leverage your following in some capacity which has blown up over the course of the last year. Congratulations to you for that, but you're doing good stuff and certainly we want to get the name out there as well. So it's obviously we think highly of you. We wouldn't have you on this podcast either, but it's a it's a little bit of a kill two birds with one stone and leverage the following as well. Adam. 

01:11 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I understand, but I'm I'm glad to talk with you guys too. 

01:15 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
All right, typically with our guests, um, we start with their betting background. Uh, we could probably do hours and hours with you. Um, I know, in the past I've read an article that you put up on the medium which was years ago, it was probably like three or four years ago which I had read. I recall a few things here and there. I purposely didn't go through it again because I didn't want this to be stale, but I believe that you started in the poker space before the sports betting space, correct? 

01:46 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I did and I would. 

01:47
I don't even know if I call it like a start per se, but it was like the hook and you guys will remember it. 

01:54
Well, I'm sure A lot of people that probably I would say started betting from 2000 and like 12 onward won't remember the score as a TV channel. 

02:07
They'll probably remember it as an app, but it was. It was very much a TV channel in Canada for like a handful of years, and so I grew up in a small town in Northern Saskatchewan and moved to Calgary, alberta, so I went from 2,500 people in town to a million plus and we ended up unintentionally in like a very wealthy neighborhood which wasn't our family's background at all, and so it was like a huge switch for me. But I ended up in just a really uncomfortable spot in school, the end of grade six, going into grade seven, and would come home and the cable network that we had at the house changed and so I was exposed to the score tv channel in like 2005, 2006 which was it over in saskatchewan we didn't have it in saskatchewan, but it was channel 30 in alberta on shaw, and so if if you channel like it was, it was the ticker with betting lines, it was just reruns of random poker tournaments and then at night it was like court surfing. 

03:14 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Oh yeah, I love the stream that he remembered, as I remember his channel 44, 44 for me as well, but it was. 

03:20 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It was headline sports prior to being the score. I remember that and I I particularly loved everything Like. I remember all the poker programs. There was a lot of early MMA stuff as well that they were showing because they had the score fighting series. This was right around the time when I started with the score as a company as well, which was late 2009, something like that. But yeah, it was certainly for the sports fan at that time. It was like the premier. 

03:45 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
TV station and the morning highlights were actually, in my opinion, better than the Sportsnet and Sports Center stuff. 

03:52 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Oh, a hundred percent, and like they. And then it got into hardcore sports radio, which, rob, you obviously know very well. But then they started doing the simulcasts. So in the afternoon it was like Richard, Sarah, cam, gabe, the combination. And then they had the betting show before. So that was like the hook for me, because I went from after school playing road hockey or whatever baseball, whatever season it was, with friends that I had in town to being in the city knowing nobody, and so I come home and that was the channel that was on, because that's what everything was on. So they had the poker broadcast and I just naturally got hooked into that at like 12 or 13, which led me into the forum world online, because naturally I wanted to play more and more, and so that was that was the hook for me to get into betting. 

04:39 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Okay, so you started, I guess, playing poker very casually, and then how did that transform into actually getting into sports? 

04:48 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
So the forum that I was on for poker, like one of the first ones I remember, was Rounders Paradise and it was like a staking forum. I don't know how I got there, but it was. I was playing at Paradise Poker and Titan Poker and I'm like it's like free rolls and it's like you hope you win tokens to a sit and go or a couple of bucks Like I was 13, 14. But within the forum there was a chunk at the bottom for sports betting and, naturally, being a huge sports fan playing it growing up, I started going in there and connected the point spreads and the totals to what I was seeing on the score on TV. And then the shows on hardcore sports radio came on and I started listening to those and getting and I was like, okay, there's a world here. 

05:32
And that took me to cappers lounge, which was a betting forum. Boy, that was 2007 were my first posts, so I'm talking like 1415 years old and I, just from there, with nothing else going on, just spiraled out of control for for my intake of it and trying to consume anything and that led to all sorts of different avenues. But that was really like the start and how I got into betting itself and how I got into betting itself. 

06:02 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
When you say that it spiraled out of control more so that you were just consuming so much at once, or did it actually like? Was it actually like a problem gaming thing for you when you were in your mid-teens? 

06:14 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
That came later, but it started just like full interest and intrigue and everything. But like I went from just casually playing poker and having fun to like staying up till one, two in the morning on SBR looking at Justin Seven and JJ Gold posts and going in like the the offshore bookie chit chat on the RX and like diving into like what is all of this mean and trying to figure it out. And that was really like the start of it. And then from there as I went through high school, got a little bit messy for sure. 

06:50 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, I think what you're describing is pretty much the exact same as me, except you were exposed to it a little bit earlier, like 12, 13, 14 years old, whereas I was started to get exposed to that when I was probably mid teensteens, grade nine, grade 10, but almost the exact same for me, where I, just, like, was an avid sports fan, consumed sports daily, got involved with a lot of forums, started playing poker. Obviously, the Chris Moneymaker World Series of Poker is a huge thing for me. All the sites that you listed for poker were the exact same for me. I still remember the Titan poker win six, six man sitting goes and you win a hundred thousand and I would win five in a row, like all the time, and I was convinced that that software was out to get me. Like, I would get pocket aces, pocket Kings dealt to me very quickly and I would actually fold them sometimes because I'm like, no, this is how I I'm going to lose this 100,000. But I remember those so clearly. 

07:48 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Not only was the software potentially something going on there, but you have to wonder how many people were colluding to get that bonus, where you sit three out of six at a table, you're on MSN or AOL Messenger on the side and whoever's winning you keep pushing to him, because I think I think it was top two advanced, and then if you got so many firsts in a row correct, then you got to the six to unlock it. But I mean, that was just, that was right for everything. But then you would get sports books like bet jamaica or like nine or all of these different companies that like went from poker to like merged into sports and so naturally, within all these forums, companies that like went from poker to like merged into sports and so naturally within all these forums there was like a massive crossover promotion and so you couldn't really do one without the other. But sports betting obviously just was so much closer to my interest. But that was like the time for all of that in those years. 

08:37 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
So you go from that uh to eventually. I always die of laughter Whenever I see the picture of you in that, like the white suit and the gold tie with you, like writing the numbers up on the board, and whatever I I, you can correct me if that's wrong. But if I'm wrong, but I think that was in the Dominican Republic, punta Cana, I think, where that was. But you go from, you know, being a Canadian teenager basically betting on sports, posting in forums, to a complete change in lifestyle betting on sports posting in forums to a complete change in lifestyle. 

09:10 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
How did that come about? So there's yeah. So this is where the story gets kind of messy and disconnected. So things were not going well in the city for me whatsoever and there was absolutely times where I was over my head for betting. I was like deep at the age of 16 and 17 into writing for a website called top 10 cappers and it was like just massive tout site and they had all these people on there, but what I was doing for them was doing the write-ups for the handicappers. Because I was sort of recruited through forums because of the write-ups that I was doing about football and I they sent me a tax form and I was like, well, I can't send this tax form out because I'm 16 and I'm not from the states, and so it just there was. It got really, really messy and that led to me from Calgary without life going my way either, just never fitting in and sort of being out of that spring group. 

10:01
I dropped out of high school after grade 10. I didn't do the grade 11 year because it just it wasn't working and I was focusing on betting. And at the end of grade 11. It came to the spring and I was like, okay, there's, there's like two paths here. Like I keep going down this route, I know things aren't going to be great, or I can go back and get grade 12, and so I convinced my mom and dad, as well as my grandma, that I could move back to where I grew up in Saskatchewan, do grade 11 and 12 in the same year and then graduate with my friends. It was like sort of the last chance and so I did that, luckily scraped by, and I got sort of the mercy pass from some of the teachers, but where the sort of connection to the Caribbean comes from, my graduating class was like 16 people and I was the one guy who had the audacity to travel. And it's like when you're in a town like that anyone that's grown up in a small town listing knows that like you live there forever, maybe you go to like the nearest city, and for everyone else it's proven out true. Everyone either went back to the farm or they now live in Regina or Saskatoon. 

11:11
So I was the one guy that was going to travel and I had a place booked in Antigua and it wasn't betting intended, it was just like the cheapest place I could find on VRBO and I booked it, and last second, like a week before grad, it got canceled, and so nobody believed that I was going to travel to begin with. But I had to prove them wrong, because I was the one guy that said I was going to do it, and so from that point it was a mad scramble to find a place to book, and the cheapest place that I could find happened to be in Bavaro, which is in the Dominican Republic, which is right next to Punta Cana, but it's actually the whole area. Punta Cana is the little village in the town, and so I ended up there shortly after graduation. In my head, if you asked me what I was doing it was betting, but in reality it was just like traveling to prove that I could actually travel, and the last 13 years to get where I am is just complete luck. 

12:09 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Okay, so now you end up somehow running a bookmaking operation, correct? 

12:15 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
So yeah, so I left just before the season started that year and I didn't know that betting had the extent that it did there. But it got to December and, like I was on, I was out of money, plain and simple it was. So I had like a few weeks left at most and it was like, okay, like I'm going back home. This is going to be embarrassing, cause like I was the guy that was going to do it and I ended up. It was just complete, the right place at the right time. 

12:46
There was a guy in the bar that I went to frequently who just so happened, refurbished and resold slot machines out of Davie, florida, to different casinos in the Dominican, in Panama, in Trinidad, and he had an interest in sports betting because people were talking about it at the time. 

13:06
And so at the bar he asked me what I did. I said I bet on sports, which was true, but I obviously didn't do it well and I just completely BS my way into a job with him in Port of Spain, trinidad and Tobago, and that's that's the simplest way to put it. He was from Wales, nice outgoing guy, who's you put me in a lot of great positions. But like it was at a bar and he's like I don't know who this kid is, but like why not? And so he sent me to Port of Spain, trinidad, which when I heard it, I was like I don't want to go to the Middle East, like I was convinced Trinidad was. I had no idea, like zero clue of where Port of Spain was, where Trinidad was, and he sent me there on a whim that, like maybe he can do something with betting. And so I ended up in in Port of Spain, trinidad, at age 18, in early December of 2010. I was a bookmaker. 

14:03 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Do you ever consider what your life might have been had you not ran into that guy at the bar 100%. 

14:12 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I would have the temptation to get involved with any of the drug business there as a young white guy from Canada just roaming around. It was everywhere every single day, and at that point in my life the only thing I cared about was money, and the only thing I cared about was like being something that was different to the people that I grew up with back in Saskatchewan, and so it's like I don't know how I would have ultimately dodged that. There would have just been too much temptation to get involved with it and it would have not ended up well. But even back, like in Canada, like I was just lost looking for money, like that was the only thing that mattered. So like there's when you're in that spot at that age in that part of the world that you don't hear good stories about things that happen, so like I don't know what would have transpired, but it would have ended up in a rough spot somewhere so what were you doing? 

15:03 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
When you say you're a bookmaker, what specifically were you doing then? 

15:07 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
So I, when I heard it, I was like casino slot machines. I was like in my head I was like Vegas lights, whatever, and I showed it. So the flight went from the Dominican to Panama and then to Trinidad and we get off the plane and it's like a 45 minute drive from the airport and we get to the casino and he drops me off and it is. It's no joke. It's like a rundown multi floor motel and on the second floor, above a Burger King, there was this sign that said Palms Members Club. And so what people might not know about Trinidad is casinos. There's a couple companies that have them, but then there's all of these different members clubs, which is essentially, if you register as a member, whatever goes on behind the doors is generally acceptable, but if you're not a member, you're not allowed to go in. So it's like this barrier to entry to like sort of put your name on a line to say like okay, I'm gamble, and so you go in. And there was like it's this tiny room with like weird crevices. There was clearly just like a bunch of motel rooms with the walls knocked out and then like extra space behind it, and so there's like 60 to 80 slot machines. There's a couple of bars and then there's four tables, two blackjack tables, a roulette table, and then run 32, which is a local card game, and like there's no setup for sports betting or anything. And it was literally like, okay, what do you need? And to me the only thing that came to mind was that scene in good fellas where they're erasing the chalkboard after he places the bet and everyone's running to the phone. And so I was like, wow, let's start by doing a couple of whiteboards, because I thought whiteboards were cheaper than tvs, like led boards were never, ever came in my mind, but it was. It was whiteboards and we'll just take bets. And so we ended up going to like the, like a in Canada, it's like the Michaels, but there it was just like the local craft store. We got whiteboards and markers and masking tape and I just taped off sections on the board and that's the picture you're laughing about was like I was like all right, and I just wrote in with erasable marker the lines for the game and then we were taking bets. We had tri-sheet paper printed off. So it was like a white sheet, a yellow sheet and a pink sheet. You give the better the white sheet, you put the yellow one in the cash and the pink one goes for the record and like, that was it. 

17:38
And so people would come in and there were a couple of TVs and there was the bar, and I would just go around to the tables and be like do you want to bet on something? And people would just know was the majority of the answers. But there, occasionally, someone would be like, yeah, I want to bet on that. And like basketball was popular, cricket was popular. I had no idea what I was doing. I was just copying websites online and writing the odds and then taking bets and just basically being paid to be there. It wasn't being paid much, but I got to eat for free, I got the drink for free, which was most important, and that's what it was for like three and a half months. 

18:12 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Did you turn any profit for the club? 

18:16 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Yeah, but it was meaningless relative to anything else. Like there was people are playing slot machines for, like you know, penny slots in vegas that are like one cent times all the reels and lines. You're actually betting 80 cents a dollar, 60, whatever. These were like people, working class people betting literally a penny a spin trying to get something. And like the table game limits were tiny, like it there's. It was a rough place and so like there just wasn't the money for people to bet anything meaningful on sports. So you would go at like the end of the day and it was like a few hundred bucks and you'd be like, wow, this was something. But like I didn't know, like I was 18 in Trinidad, like I just I was like this is cool as hell, but it was. It was at the as irrelevant as it was in the grand scheme of things. Like just even like the really basic lessons that I learned there kind of set me up for my next job, which was actually legitimate all right, so let's get into it then the next. 

19:17 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
The next job, I guess yeah, I mean. 

19:20 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
So, like after three and a half months, like of drinking and watching sports and betting irrelevant money on everything in Trinidad. Um, I went back to the Dominican cause I was like this is not like it. Just it became unsafe in a way, like being looking as I was in that type of place, walking around like it. Just it wasn't a good thing. So I went back to the Dominican and it was a couple months off, but the same gentleman who put me in the spot in in Port of Spain called and he's like I know a guy in the Bahamas who has a sports book. He's looking for workers. Was that something you're interested in? And like, again, I'm just, I'm looking for money or anything that I can do to just avoid going home. So I, I accept, I'm like where can we meet? Can we call? He's like no, he'll bring you to nassau in the bahamas. And I'm like, great, I've never been there, let's go. And so it's. It was literally a phone call. He's like we'll buy you the ticket, we'll get you at the airport. And like that was the first time in all of this where I was like, okay, this might actually not end up well, because I didn't know if I upset the, the gentleman that put me in the spot, or like what was going on. I was like this is kind of weird, driving through like the streets of Nassau and we pull up at a women's clothing store and he's like, ok, let's go in. And at that point I was like, oh, I got you feel a little weird in that situation. And we go in and it's like a high end women's clothing store and we go to the back and there's like the big wooden door that doesn't really look like a door but it's placed in the wall and he opens it and inside is a lady sitting. She's got all these computers, their servers, back in the room and it was their main server hub where they had just installed DGS software, which was an arm of Don Best back in that time to put on their website to take bets from customers. 

21:29
So the website at the time was paradisegamescom, which was one of four licensed gaming operations in the Bahamas and it was primarily a casino and lottery operation. So they took bets on the US lottery, primarily a casino and lottery operation. So they took bets on the US lottery, which is a very real thing in the Bahamas. But instead of paying like 500 to one for the pick threes, like they do in the US. They were competing with other places in the Bahamas to pay upwards of 900 to one on the lottery. So these guys were legitimately writing hundreds of 1000s of dollars a day on lottery bets off of US lottery draws and televising them online and then running an online casino, and so sports betting for them was very much like an afterthought. 

22:14
But they had a very real gambling business, unlike the refurbished casino, and I didn't know how big it was at the time, but I was just there to meet everyone because I was going to be the guy that was changing lines and things like that, and so that was the introduction there, and I spent a week learning the software that they had just installed, seeing the retail operations that they had, and then they were like okay, well, we don't want you in the Bahamas. And I was like, well, where do I go? Like I didn't have any plans, and so they're like you can be anywhere, but you can't be in the Bahamas if you're running the software Right. And so I was like all right. So I went back to the Dominican and from that point on it went for five years. 

22:54
We went through legalization, we went through the merger where a sure win split off into Paradise Games. They became two different companies that competed with each other, and so it was Island Luck was number one, assure Win became number two, paradise Games was three, and then, through a family connection, chances Games, which is out of Freeport, was number four, and I was, by the end of the fifth year, doing all of the odds and all of the risk for those three sports books and serving their customer base. And so it was a very, like I say, legitimate business. But it was a legitimate bookmaking business where, again, it just was like making mistakes and learning on the fly, but that kept me going till the end of 2015, into 2016. 

23:40 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Did you actually enjoy doing what you were doing? 

23:43 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I did until I got married. I didn't realize how much I was actually doing. Until it was a year after marriage with my wife. We were living in Medellin, colombia, and she was like we've lived here for a year and we've not left the city, lived here for a year and we've not left the city, because I was on call, essentially looking at this, for 361, 362 days a year, like it was every single day there was something, and especially during football season, which is just it's massive there and for the clientele they were taking just enormous. Um, it was every single day, all day. 

24:27
And so when I was by myself in the dominican whatever I was going around with a laptop, I had the usb sticks, I had like everything to connect to the certain networks and the remote desktop, like I could get in from anywhere. It was amazing. It was like I'm getting paid to watch sports, I can be anywhere I want, like this remote lifestyle is phenomenal. Like it didn't matter, I didn't have to like report in at certain times to people or be physically in one spot, I could just do whatever and it was amazing and I was getting paid. Well, and as it was growing, I was getting incentivized even more. But then, like you get married and you try doing that with life and everything, it just became way too much, and so that's the only reason I ultimately left. If it was a little more manageable, I'd probably still be doing it. 

25:11 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, that makes complete sense. I mean, also, I can draw on similar experiences. I mean it's different. It's just another person in the picture that you have to devote more time to. So I completely get it. Now we fast forward to now 2022, which is roughly six, seven years later from what you're talking about and you have now made the shift from the bookmaking operational side of things into a strategic, you know, advisor for covers, where you are producing a lot of content on your own. Was that something like that? Just hit you one day all of a sudden. You know I'd like to get into the content space. I want to do this. Was it something like an industry trend that you wanted to take advantage of? What made you go from the shift of like the behind the counter type of stuff to helping the average better on the other side of things? 

25:59 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I don't know exactly, like when it started and like I could probably go back as far as like the forum days in like 2008, 2009,. Like there was always something I really enjoyed about At that time just doing write ups, like to write something up and to have people look at it and learn something and reply to you and have like a community off of that. Like that was to me. It was like wow, this is like people value what. I think like this is quite something. Like that was to me. It was like wow, this is like people value what I think like this is quite something. 

26:28
And then, while I was doing all of the bookmaking stuff, um, I didn't really do a lot of that and I guess I didn't realize that I like missed doing that or having like at least some sort of like creative output of any kind. 

26:39
I was just sort of I had the software up, I had the monitors and that was the extent of it. Um, so I would say probably like somewhere around 2017, 2018, although I was kind of always there. That's when, like the effort actually started and it was just it was a way to like be creative and enjoy doing things and it's it's turned into like far more than I could ever imagine. But there was never like this time where I was like okay, like this is what I have to do and I'm going to start doing it. Like now. It would just kind of happen very naturally and grew like from an organic way, which is why I think that some of the stuff that I put out gets the engagement level that it does, because it's it's just coming from me, off of experience well, we've noticed, like, obviously from the last couple of years you tried a bunch of different stuff as well. 

27:28 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Right, so you're not just sticking with like oh yeah, write one article a week. You had the text message service, slack channel, different things like that. So I guess the question is more like you know what, what did you find works? Why all the shifting around? You know, I guess, trying different things and what, what was the the best success? Because a lot of people stick to one avenue. 

27:46 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Sure, I think if you're doing anything in content, you have to try different things and try different platforms, and I mean in betting specifically, it was forums forever and it shifted, and it was Twitter forever, and now podcasts have obviously emerged, but it's very sort of like bucketed and there's a lot of like. The tech and the platforms and the mediums are growing far more than the creative output is from a betting perspective, and so for me, over the last kind of four years, it was just trying different things in a way to be first, maybe, but also just out of like curiosity and so, like when I, when I started the Slack channel in 2017, that grew into something significant. It lasted three and a half four years. The text message list, not nearly as successful. The podcast has been like just wildly successful, way more than I ever imagined. Um, so that's by far been the biggest, but it was not. It was not anything more than just being curious and trying different things and seeing what worked or trying to deliver messages in different ways. 

28:59 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, that makes total sense. Um, adam, what do you think are, I mean, the biggest challenges, let's say, in the sports betting space right now in terms of producing content, like inherent challenges that you might face regularly? 

29:14 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
This can go a lot of different ways From just like just speaking from like the like the business side that I'm now on with covers in that role. Finding new talent is extremely difficult but also extremely competitive. A lot of maybe people don't know, but TV networks are going after a lot of like big names with lucrative offers to sort of lock that up and we've seen some of the deals come out in the last even like three to four months have taken what the content value is actually worth and just sent it through the roof. Like a perfect example is like the McAfee deal, like edit because we like it or don't, that is a massive influence in the betting space and so when other people that are starting out see a guy like that get 100 million plus for a deal for a show that like in their mind they don't think is very good because the betting content on it is relatively low brow, but you see that price tag associated with it, all of a sudden when you're like it just changes the demand and it changes the opportunities that you can have with people Like there was a time where anyone would go out of their way to be on just like the worst produced show ever that was seen by 20 people. 

30:44
And now it's like just simple requests to like beat writers or anyone that's associated with a team. We were trying to do coverage of the national championship and like you're reaching out to guys that cover teams and you're like, can we borrow three to five minutes of your time for a quick segment? And you're like, yeah, here's my price. And you're like, whoa, right, right. And so it's from not only like the betters side and the people that do this and create actually like great valuable content. That's challenging to find in its own right, but now the people that you could actually use to provide like useful supplementary information to betters that they could find useful. That's now getting extremely expensive and so it's becoming really tough to find things that you can use and people you can hire as talent to expand and grow. That's the biggest challenge right now from the business side. From a personal side, that's changing quite a bit too. 

31:40 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I want to just hit on one thing that you said right at the beginning there, which was the finding talent. I mean, you explained a lot of it after the fact about the price, the prices associated with a lot of the talent. Now which I've noticed, the same thing. I mean, my first job in a professional capacity was producing radio, where I used to book guests where prices didn't even come up I had. The only person that I ever paid for anything, for any sort of hit, was Mike Florio, and this was literally 12 years ago. At the time it wasn't even, you know, pro football talk was even close to the size of what it is now, but we paid Mike Florio. 

32:14
Uh, but in terms of finding talent, um, obviously, with regulation happening and sports betting being less taboo, you would figure that there would be an influx of new people into the space that are willing to produce content. When you're talking about finding talent in specific, is it just that the influx of these people into the space? They're too raw, uneducated on the space where it becomes difficult or challenging to produce any sort of content with them. 

32:43 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I'd say there's two problems. The first is definitely that that there's just if you're really good at betting, in general you don't want to do content, and I think as much as people say that is to protect their edge or they don't want to give anything away, which is definitely real for some people. There's no doubting that, I think, in general has bettors and gamblers. What you need, personality wise, to do that at a high level in general does not correlate with being overly entertaining and enthusiastic on camera and like it's. I think there's truth to that, but there's certainly there's not a lot of people that can do it. 

33:24
The second thing would be that a lot of the people that come out and want to do it don't see a podcast like this or shows we're doing at Covers or other content that the three of us would hold in high regard as like what they aspire to be. 

33:42
They see Barstool. They see these entertainment guys on TikTok and YouTube that are throwing out ridiculous things that are more like on the entertainment side, which certainly has a place, but that's what they're now aspiring to be and what they're aspiring to do, because they see the clicks and the hits and the views that come with that and associate it with long-term money and value. And so there's even the people that have, like, an interest. That entertainment side is becoming a lot more appealing because that's where a lot of people are getting paid, compared to, like, the informative and education side, which is never going to grow at the same rate but in my opinion, has a much higher retention rate long term to holding an audience. And so that's that's kind of. The second issue that we have is like everyone's being enticed to go to a different side of the industry. 

34:34 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, we personally see that on our end as well. I mean, we're obviously trying to grow Betstamp, we're trying to grow this podcast and we do have a TikTok account now and an Instagram account, and we're trying to figure out ways to produce content that is geared towards the people that are consuming content on TikTok but still make it educational in some capacity. And it's definitely a challenge because that's just a platform where it's quick, entertaining and you know things that could potentially go viral and telling someone you know how they should bet a teaser, for example, is not making for the most engaging content on a platform like that. 

35:12 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I'll give you a really good example on top of that of like. 

35:15
I think and it's a huge challenge for me daily but I spent the first seven months at the company on the product side and I was tasked with changing the odd screen that they have and I was getting feeds, I was getting quicker times, I was getting more markets. 

35:35
I was doing all of these things and trying to get all these vendors to make it the quickest it can be. The biggest jump we saw in engagement with the users and this page is reaching 250 300 000 unique users a month massive. The biggest jump we saw in that seven month time, despite doing all of these things, was putting logos on the table, and so it's like we think about, when we're doing all this stuff, like there's this content that we're doing. We're like okay, we got to make it like basic because we're gonna like really appeal to the users, and so we're like, well, let's say things clearer, let's explain stats, let's start with, like you said, teasers or line shopping or anything like that, and even that like the most basic level for the average better, that's now being like created within this wave of regulation is like way at the top level advanced, and so it's like that the whole spectrum of like what people think is important is like completely shifting to, which is making it really tricky. 

36:40 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, I mean it's definitely a challenging space trick. Yeah, I mean it's, it's definitely a challenging space. Uh, we had preston on one of our previous episodes sports cheetah for those who follow him on twitter who I thought really did a an amazing job of this when he was on daily wager on espn, which was taking these extremely advanced concepts and just pardon the lack of the term but really dumbing them down so that someone could understand them easily. And I still think that there is some value in that. And I just wonder whether it's maybe the platforms that this content is appearing on right now, or why the recreational slash casual better does not gravitate to that at all. 

37:20
And maybe it's for me like very difficult to get out of my mindset where, if you told me when I was 20 years old, here you're losing money, rob, on sports betting, you can do these three things and you're very likely going to be a long-term winner I would have absolutely absorbed that and love that, but for some reason or another, in this space right now it seems like that type of stuff just falls by the wayside and the daily picks content surfaces to the top the TikTok videos of people making picks by having you know their cat pick, uh, which bowl they're gonna eat out of, or whatever, like that type of stuff seems to just is driving tons of engagement and, um, maybe this is like you know. I'm 35 years old, I'm not a boomer by any stretch of the imagination, but I adam, I just don't get it, man, like I don't really get it. 

38:05 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Look at the most popular tweet in betting so far this week. It was a picture of Julian Edelman betting half a million dollars that he was paid to promote the tweet with, or $100,000 on a parlay on two futures that were like at the worst price in the market. 

38:20 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It was Bucks, Bucks Patriots Super Bowl 100,000 to win 545. 

38:25 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
And a terrible price, by the way, like anyone could find a better price easily, within a second, on just the Patriots. 

38:33 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
But nobody cares, right, because it's like that's what's working right now. But, like to your point, what I believe in and I know the team at Covers believes in, is there's all of this noise going on everywhere and that's going to last for a long time and that's what people want in general at scale right now. And there's stuff like what you guys are doing. There's stuff that we're trying to do it's what I'm trying to do on the podcast every day myself where there's actual value behind the content that's educational and teaches people. 

39:05
For me, it's about teaching people to lose less. I'm probably not going to turn everyone into a winner with my content, but maybe you ultimately smarten up one day and you don't want to lose as much. I might help you do that with some of the stuff I do Over time. That's going to cut through, and so we're intentionally not aggressively shifting to try attract all these people, because we know that one day that's not going to be what people value the most, like they do right now, and by just continuing to do it now, we know there's long term value someday when it shifts, because the more noise there is, the more people are going to be able to see and call it out when it happens and the more that actual, genuine content is going to shine through within that noise. So it's going to take time, but I think it shifts back at least sometime in the near-ish future. 

39:58 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yep, I think I would agree with that. I'm hopeful of that as well. There's a common criticism in this content space right now. I get this a lot, in fact, it was like part of. I had a negative engagement with Kelly in Vegas on Twitter this week, who I would have considered a friend of mine at one point as well, who kind of referenced something along the same lines of this as well. But the same 20 to 30 people are appearing on each other's podcasts all the time, um one twitter user pardon the french excuse to refer to this in my mentions as a giant circle jerk of podcasters in the sports betting space um, anyone who is not part of this inner community of people, um, is disrespected, so on and so forth. Do you feel that there's like any validity to that criticism of? You? Know, it's just the same people that we're regularly seeing in the content space and other people are not being given a chance. 

40:56 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I don't agree with the not given a chance part. Back to sort of what I was saying earlier, where there's like there's all the chance in the world to do anything you want in content right now. I just I genuinely believe that a lot of the people that are are good at betting, that wants to do content, just take that stance because they're just not going out of their way to do it. There's like and I I think that we generally have probably felt that at one time where it's like, well, I want to, I don't want to do this because it's going to hurt my reputation to be on this show or whatever. Do I want to associate with that guy or whatever it might be. 

41:32
I think there's all the opportunity in the world for anyone to do content that they want handful of guests on different shows. It's because it's either really hard to find people or, when you're trying to do something like this, it's more on the educational side. If you're bringing people on, there's only so many people that are going to be able to speak to that conversation and actually do it, and so I don't. I don't look at it as a negative. I look at it as like a massive opportunity for all of the people who may want to do content but just have never gone out of their way to do it, to like step up and do it. Because, like again, like I'm speaking from our side like it is brutally difficult to find anyone that has like a general idea of what they're talking about when it comes to betting, let alone someone that actually has experience, and so, like, there's there's, there's so much potential for people to come out and do it. They just have to do it. 

42:28 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
But, um, I think that's why we're seeing so many people repeat I, uh, I, for one, I can see the side of that side of the argument because I think back to when I was growing up and the people I was exposed to in the betting space were all the same people. I'm not going to name names, cause that's not what this is about, but it was the same people regularly mostly touts, who are giving up given a platform on TV at the time, but also once we started getting like some sort of video versions on Twitter vine was a thing at the time which was basically tick talk when I was younger or whatever. But, um, I I think back to that now and I'm like, well, you know what? I saw the same dozen people over and over and over and now I'm more nuanced in the sports betting space and those people had no idea what they were talking about. So I wonder if there's people that are coming into the space now that are thinking potentially the same things. 

43:17
I keep seeing the same people over and over selling me bet stamp and covers and unabated and whatever. All of these have some sort of ulterior motive or some incentive to grow their product. Should I be listening to them? Type of thing. So I can see that side of the argument. I don't necessarily buy it, but I think that that is something that is brought up, since a lot of us are associated with products now as well yeah, and I mean you guys probably, as a show, have the most professionally skewed audience or like advanced skewed audience of any betting show out there. 

43:52 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
There's maybe like one or two others I could think of. 

43:54
That would be like kind of closer on that same level and so like, unless people saw my name and they skip past the show and they're waiting for next week. But if they didn't, then they're listening and they got this far to me, ramble, um, and and I'm sure that there's so many people that listen to it they're like if they just reached out to you guys as like their first appearance, you would probably welcome them on as like a different name or a different experience level, in the same way that we would love to have that happen for us too. Like we just we just we're looking for people, plain and simple. And so it's like if you're sitting in that position and you're frustrated with the same people being on the same shows or the same networks and you hate what they say and you know that like you're better at betting than that person that you're seeing on the show, like there's there's never been a better time to send a direct message and be like can I come on for 10 minutes? 

44:51 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It'd be amazing. Fair enough, okay. So let's move on from the content. I think you brought up a lot of good points. Like I agree with you when you're saying there's going to be a breakthrough eventually, because the reality is for most of the you know. Advice I would give to anyone on like betting. It's just like bet what you want, but just shop around and get the best price. That's like the simplest thing, you can do so. 

45:08
It's not even like, oh, do this research, do this? It's really just like bet literally whatever you want, pick a game for whatever reason that makes you happy. Um, you know you're a leaf fan, you want to bet the leafs. Bet the leafs, but just shop around and get the best price, that's it right. So eventually, like, that is not really good content, it's not very like exciting and stuff like that everyone wants to hear like the whole. Uh, like yeah, james harden's out, kevin durant is out, this guy bet this because, like they don't really understand it's factored in all things like that already. So I got you. I think one day, you know, hopefully, it breaks through in terms of like a little bit more educational content, but for now, even the recreational stuff, right now it's like it's all fine, it's all there and as long as it's getting people excited and have making them have more fun betting, there's obviously a place for it. 

45:54
But moving on from the content stuff, I wanted to talk about your betting right now. So I know you had a um from what I, from what I could see obviously I don't I don't have the exact records in front of me, but a pretty solid football season. Um, to date I don't know if you're gonna include playoffs, but regular season's over. I know you had a pretty solid season. Let's talk about your betting. What are you betting right now? Is it just nfl, anything else? How's everything going with your process? Maybe just give a quick overview? 

46:19 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
um, it's a fraction of what it once was in terms of volume or output. Uh, during that time, through the Dominican working in the Bahamas, living in Colombia, was, was playing and still like, looking back, like was making good money, but betting like way over my head, like the numbers. I look back and it was like what was I doing? Um, now it's, it's a fraction of that. Again, a lot of that stems back to like that sort of realization I had where it was like this is like a couple years ago. I was looking at it and I was like, am I doing this when I'm 35, 45, 55,? It's like the amount of effort it took for me to just stay semi competitive and just get a little bit out of what I was doing at that level. I was like there's, I'll be dead by the time I'm 35 or broke a lot sooner. And so it was like I've scaled things back in an enormous way Betting NFL, as I always have and probably always will, I'll take my little bit here and there. 

47:22
I still have connections to South American soccer leagues and I'll play some of the domestic stuff as well as the international cups, just because I feel like the info is good. But then also I enjoy following it, I enjoy watching it. This year I'm not going to be doing a lot of golf because, again, like I just I could see it. Like I couldn't compete anymore, especially with match-ups. It just wasn't there, the effort I had wasn't there. 

48:03
So it's, it's a lot less, but it's. It's a'll call them offshore sports books, unregulated in Canada right now, with like 26 different offers and they're all starting to offer daily specials and boosts, so like there's a lot of money up for grabs that, like I've played a long time at like six or seven. I didn't realize there was another 20 plus out there. It's like they have such easy access and so once football starts I'll be probably trying to get up as much of that money that's just sitting there, um, as I can before we get into regularization in ontario I'm sure it'll be a good couple weeks until you're, uh, limited to pennies. 

48:42 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But it should be a good couple of weeks until you're limited to pennies, but it should be a fun couple of weeks for sure. 

48:46 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
It goes quick, but it's, it's out there. 

48:49 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Absolutely, absolutely. So yeah, no good good to hear In terms of, like the betting stuff. Just one follow-up question on the NFL stuff. Like so are you, are you basically, like you know, originating, I know you're, you're betting a lot of like the opening numbers, things like that, like what? Talk us a little bit through your process If you want to get into that. If not, you can cut this out. It's all good. 

49:10 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
No for sure. So, playing a like, I've always played some extent of openers. This year it's, it's more than I usually have, just because for me what I'm playing like of what you guys are betting like it's it's not competitive to what you guys are doing and so I'm playing a lot more. About 30 to 40% of what I played this year was Sunday night, monday morning stuff. Um, the rest of it was later on Monday or Tuesday. But it's just for me where I am now betting at the level I am, it's just it's. It's not. I'm not running into the same issues you guys are or past guests have had, because I've just I've lowered it down so much just because of where I am. And so, yeah, I'm playing, I'm playing. 

49:54
A lot of those openers have played a little bit more into the prop markets than I usually have this year, just based on some connections I've made over the last year or two and taking a bit of a different approach to that. But then otherwise it's, it's primarily kind of Tuesday, monday night, Tuesday stuff that I'm playing earlier in the week because, like, I'm not going to be competitive betting late in the week. I know that and I I know who's betting Sunday night, monday morning. I know what people like to bet. I know where it's coming from. I know what people like to bet. I know where it's coming from. I know what's good or bad. 

50:27
If I'm waiting till Saturday night, sunday morning, and it's star lizard laying off a quarter mil on a game that I'm better Like, I don't have a chance at that, there's no way. And so it's like. I know where I. I know my limitations now and I'm not in a spot, like life-wise, where I want to like, push and try to get back to there, cause it's just I. I did it for a handful of years and it was. It was just. It was a lot on on the old day-to-day life and lifestyle that I enjoyed it, but it's just where I am now. 

50:57 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
It's just not what I'm pushing for yeah, it might be honestly the best answer we've ever gotten for one of these questions. 

51:02 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Like I, I I compare it like a good golf analogy. You guys are playing the tips. I realized that, like I'm not, I'm not shooting in the seventies anymore playing from there. So I moved up to the white tees and I'm happy playing there and I'm getting what I can. 

51:18 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
What tees are you actually playing though in your golf life now? 

51:21 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Well, in real golf life that's going the other way and I think that's why I'm a lot happier of a person. 

51:27 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
There's probably a direct correlation between inverse correlation. 

51:31
More time spent on the golf course, less time spent betting? Yeah, I'm very jealous of. I've seen the simulator pictures that you have. I think you've been working on your swing over the course of the winter, which is, our houses are so clustered together at least in my neighborhood it's very difficult to get a simulator in anywhere. A single car garage, basement with low roof and stuff like that. So I dig that setup. That's like my passion right now is I need to get through winter to get back to golf season. Adam. 

52:02 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I don't know if you guys felt it, but like I know the pandemic was incredibly hard on a lot of people. But like and I'm not taking away from that, but I tell you, like that lockdown that started mid-March, that out here anyway, like it carried through the summer and it was like your only options are to go outside with the dogs or golf, like those months where you weren't thinking about sports, you weren't thinking about sports, you weren't settling up, you weren't chasing anything down. Like that was like to me a massive eye-opener because, like I, there was not really a break for like seven, eight years there. It was just constantly pushing and pushing and pushing. Like to have that eye-opener and like being on the golf course on a wednesday morning and not worrying about injuries or something moving and just being able to enjoy it. Like that was to me. That was like, wow, I missed this, and so that was a big change for me. 

52:52 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
That those were arguably the best days of my life. I'd be completely honest with you. Just knowing that you can play and not have to check the phone in the middle of a round to see what's going on, um, those were great. I mean, I do miss those. I missed that break. Um, that's. You know, it's the grind of being a sports. Better is the is the reality. It's a lot of work. I don't think people really understand the day-to-day effort that needs to go into it and and just being available all the time. Like I go into a movie theater and sometimes I can't even turn my phone off, like I have to leave. 

53:23 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
It doesn't end. 

53:24 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It just doesn't end. 

53:25 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I went in another, like just quick story on this. So in October there was a betting group out of California. You guys probably know him, but I met him. I met the guys in Kansas city one of them's from Casey and is a huge cheese fan and like they bet a ton and we went to the game against the bills and we were all staying together in one house that they had, and so there was the full day of tailgating. It was the bills chiefs game, with the rain, delay, with everything that went on. It was the uber back and forth. 

53:58
We get back and it's like 1 30 in the morning after being out all day and there there was the jets Falcons game early. So we were all up at like eight. Anyway, it was one 30 in the morning and we all got home and I pull up the laptop and I just I looked through box scores quickly after every game. Just it was like keeping me up to date Cause I didn't watch anything. 

54:17
He sits down with the paper, two phones and he's settling everything up and he's doing all of his figures and we're just chatting and I'm like I'm going back to bed and I had the flight at like four in the morning coming back to Canada. I got up to like a couple hours later to go back. He's still there settling and doing it and just my, I think, and I'm like I remember being in that spot and like the guys are awesome, but like I'm like man like this is, it's so much more than what people look at at the surface level where it's just betting and watching games and having fun, like all of that extra stuff. It's exhausting, especially over the course of a year if you might not have things going well, but like that's the whole side of it. That's not out there. That I don't know if people are fully aware of. 

55:00 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I think in in pretty much any job, whether it's sports betting or not, there's people that are ambitious and they have an addiction to the craft and they just really want to be really good at what they do, and that's something that's always affected me personally. I obviously don't want to lose money because it's my livelihood, but on top of that I just don't want to waste time. I want to spend time improving, and it gets to a point where you can go over the top on it, a lot Like even during winning stretches. I'm spending more time honing my craft. Like what else could I possibly be doing to get an even bigger advantage? And sometimes you need to take a step back. 

55:33
I mean, we've had Rufus on quite a bit. 

55:35
He's obviously been very public about meditating and Buddhism and things of that nature, and I've had a chance to speak with him a couple of times and I honestly, you know, sometimes I'm like I should really listen to this guy's advice and just do some things for myself every now and then and get away and stop thinking about the opportunity cost of me not being at a computer. 

55:56
Um, you know, like I watched yellowstone, on which I know you're a fan of adam, but like I'm catching up on it while I'm, while I'm scouring twitter for nhl news and NFL news as well, I can't really pay attention to the show. I have to like rewatch episodes and stuff like that and it just becomes a uh, very cumbersome at times. So it's not a rant about my personal life, but I think it's just um. You know, you hit a lot of good points and a lot of things that hit home with me, but particularly the amount of time and dedication it needs to beat something like golf as an example, when you're betting into a market that's shaped by some very, very strong bettors. 

56:31 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Yeah, good luck watching Yellowstone on a Tuesday night. If you're betting on golf, you're dead, it's just, it owns you. 

56:40 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Right. One thing that's always I've always been curious about. I don't know you well and I guess from a social perspective I've probably been following you for three or four years. I think I first came across you, maybe doing matchbook podcasts as well. I might be wrong about that, but to my recollection I don't recall you ever betting on daily sports, whether that's NBA, mlb. But most importantly and what really gets me is you're Canadian. You spent the first 18 years or so of your life in Canada. I've never seen you make a comment on hockey or hockey betting ever, and I'm just curious why that is. 

57:21 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
The last. I don't remember what year it was, but the last hockey game I remember watching, even like more than like a period of uh, whatever year. Halak was with the habs and was just like ridiculous in the playoffs making 40, 50 saves a night. So whatever that year was was the last time I watched hockey. And really it was like once I left saskatchan, especially in that grade 12 year, like there was no hockey anywhere. I went for the better part of eight years like anywhere whatsoever. 

57:51
No reference of it wasn't on TV, it wasn't going out of my way to watch it and so, like, just from that, got into football for a while, was in the golf, enjoyed some tennis and then soccer, which was just kind of with the cycles, enjoyed some tennis and then soccer, which was just kind of with the cycles, but it was just I think it was part of that just what I was exposed to when I was learning about betting and actually doing it at a at a high level. But now it's just like that almost kind of painted my interest going forward, where it's just kind of what I was getting at, where it's like the daily, every single day, having a bet, being involved in something now, with that being less interesting to me. It's maybe not a coincidence that I'm not doing it, just like I'm not watching it and sort of getting away from doing that as itself. So I think that's that's probably why it's just kind of the culmination of things yeah, I just find it interesting to each their own. 

58:42 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Obviously, whatever sports you like I mean it's very subjective you bet on whatever you want to bet on, you watch whatever you want to watch. I've just always found that interesting, with you spending the majority of your life in Canada and not really, you know you can't really get away from that stuff. Like you turn on a highlight show at night. It's very difficult to find NBA or MLB highlights. Like your lead off is hockey and I mean it's that's always been a challenge. I mean that's part of the reason why I bet so much hockey is. 

59:08 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I think I just naturally gravitated to it because I was around it for my whole life yeah, I mean, and to that point like I don't have a subscription to sports net because it's it's all hockey and basketball and so it's like my tv is the nfl network, the golf channel or whatever the wife is watching, and like it doesn't deviate too far from that unless it's for a live game, and it's just. I sometimes I wish it was different because I grew up enjoying it. It was a Flyers fan in the nineties with Lindros Recchi but Claire and like they had an awesome so it was fun to watch that. My dad's a huge Leafs fan, but it it's just once I kind of left from that environment. That was. That was it for me we got another one here. 

59:48 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Who doesn't want to get a good cable package to live bet. 

59:52 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Johnny makes fun of me all the time because I do the Twitter stream the last couple weeks and I'm using a streaming package from from Bell which is like 20-30 seconds behind real time. I refuse to get actual cable nowadays because I don't need it anymore. 

01:00:07 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
He doesn't want to pay literally 50 bucks a month. He doesn't want to pay 50 bucks a month to get regular cable. Adam and listen, we literally had Eric Eager from PFF. We had him on the podcast on the Twitter space. 

01:00:18 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
He was behind, I was listening. Eric was telling him to play before it happened. 

01:00:22 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Rob's behind. It's literally the Chargers are coming back. Fourth and 10. Literally, think about how many fourth down completions they had there on that last drive and plus the last touchdown. And everyone Eric's like, oh, oh, my God. And then Rob's like and then it would be wait another 30 seconds and he'd be like the play is known right now. I'm just going to wait for Rob to catch up. Be like the play is known right now. I'm just gonna wait for rob to catch up. Everyone on twitter space is watching the game. They see rob's reaction like oh, mike williams got it on fourth and ten. It's really ridiculous. 

01:00:52 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Two things two things about getting you a cable package. I, I don't want it. You can keep the cable package. Two things about this. One I don't care about having games spoiled. For me, it's never been a problem I. I consume Twitter during red zone on NFL Sundays and again I'm 30 seconds behind. So I know something is going to happen before it happens. And the reactions on Twitter are never specific. It's never like, oh, what a great pass. It's just like oh my God, omg, omg, like crazy stuff like that. So I know something's coming. I like the adrenaline. The second thing is from a pure listener perspective. Don't you like I? I think it's kind of cool that a listener could be watching the game in real time and then, knowing something is coming, and get the reaction of the host after the fact, like you know. You know what I'm getting haven't you wish you could? 

01:01:39 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
just, you know, the commentary on the tv was just 10 seconds behind 20. Haven't you always wished that? You know, even 30 seconds behind sometimes would have been would be awesome, Right Cause you could get the touchdown, long touchdown bomb. Wait 30 seconds and then you can get a oh he's, deep touchdown. You know, wouldn't that be great if that was 30 seconds delayed. Come on, what do we do? 

01:01:59 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Well, I mean, first of all, like I don't know how you comfortably sit on the couch and don't have just a remote to flick through things after the game is over, like to me that's the whole benefit of having cable. Is it just like mindless occupation without loading time, but the on that stream? I don't know how you did that comfortably being behind, because like it was like you were, it was. It was a really great stream, especially in the fourth quarter with eric, and like you you were obviously playing at a disadvantage and you kept it entertaining the whole time. So like there's skill in that too. So it was like to me it was part showing off as well. 

01:02:31 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I appreciate that. I mean, I am a professional. I do put a lot of effort into this. The only time I've watched live football this year, truly live, was when I was going on the Covers halftime show with you, Adam, where, like, I joined at the two minute warning and I had my stream going and covers had the stream going and I'm like, oh, I'm like, I'm like I'm trying to time the difference and it was like it was about 30 seconds difference and I was like I would have really joined late, I would have joined after halftime if you didn't tell me to join at the two minute bell, five TVs calling it into your house. 

01:03:03 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
You can't even control it, by the way, if I just install it at your house. 

01:03:06 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I had, I I've had the long story and I'm sorry to derail this. Adam, I'm the this is important. 

01:03:13
People might want to know this. Uh, if it hasn't been, it's been discussed before. I swore off cable a few years ago when I was with I don't, I only want to say the company, but I was with a company first couple weeks of the regular season. Everything's going smoothly. I'm watching red zone. Week three comes, I sit down. I go to turn on red zone, three minutes before the game start tells me that the that channel is not available. So I'm like no, this can't be right. I go to my online account, I have the channel, Everything in my billing is correct. So now I have to call this company. I have to wait on hold for 40 minutes before someone gets to me. So I've missed the first 40 minutes now of one o'clock NFL, which is going to drive any NFL fan insane. I get a customer service rep that tells me oh sir, you're on the wrong channel, Flip over to this. So I flip over to what he tells me, and it's nfl network. 

01:04:09 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I'm like nobody, I don't want nfl network I need nfl red zone. 

01:04:12 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
He's like no, no, this is nfl. I'm like no, I'm a season, I do this for a living. I'm telling you this is the wrong channel. I spent 10 guys, 10 minutes arguing with this guy and at the end of the convert mid conversation, I said cancel everything. What was his? Bella rogers? 

01:04:27 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
it was rogers. Okay, so you're getting bell 5 tv to your house? It was nope, don't hold a grudge. Also, someone asked on twitter for canada. This is important. If a couple people are asking it, I'm gonna answer for all someone asking in. They're like hey, I'm in toronto, johnny mentioned on the pod. We want that. We want the fastest cable for live betting. Like what would you recommend? Like rogers, bell, whatever? So for us listeners sorry it's, I don't know the answers but for canadian listeners, rogers ignite tv. And again, no gripe against rogers. They're a great company and it is what is. Rogers ignite tv is not real time. If you have that ignite box, you're on a minimum 45 second delay for nf at least yeah, and, and like you're toast, see ya, rogers ignite tv, try and charge you 160 bucks. 

01:05:12
Sayonara, you know you're going with best bang for best bang for your buck. If you want the best up-to-date service, you're going rogers digital cable, not ignite tv, or you're going Bell 5 TV with the 4K box that's actually plugged in. If you use the other receivers, they're about four to five seconds delayed. So 4K box, bell 5, or Rogers Digital, not Ignite TV. Sayonara, ignite TV. They got me with it and I was very, very disappointed. So we both have a gripe to pick with Rogers, actually, I guess. But that's the answer. We answered the guy on Twitter who just asked that. We answered you as well, but now everyone gets it on the podcast. 

01:05:51 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Sorry, Adam Rob's explanation. That's a Canadian Seinfeld episode right there, that back and forth You're just holding out out of spite just not to have it. 

01:06:00 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Now, with the amount of profanity I was using, it was more like a curb episode and it wasn't a Seinfeld episode. 

01:06:06 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
But this guy's killing himself. He's like you know what. Cancel my service. I'm watching every single game 35 seconds delayed for the rest of my life. How's that? What's going on, you know? 

01:06:16 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
the best part about this whole. Like, years after the fact, the score was purchased by Rogers, the Sportsnet Rogers, but the sports net, the TV side, moved over there, so a lot of my close friends ended up. I are still at sports net, where one of them reached out to me a couple of years ago Like we can get you free, a free service, rogers. I'm like no, I'm not out of principle, I'm not doing it, absolutely. That one guy I don't remember his name, I don't care what it was, but he talked to me like I was an idiot and I didn't know what channel I was on. I'll never go to rogers again. They'll have to pay me to take their service, that's, that's it all. 

01:06:51 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Right now, the one thing that people in the states have an advantage over us is they either have the local radio, which covers all the football and basketball games which will it's like one to two seconds behind, like the. If you go on actual radio, you're right in line with it, or they have, like the serious remember the serious boom boxes they used to have where you'd put the little thing like on top of it. 

01:07:14
I do yep when they had all of like the nba channels and nfl I. I still think they do, but they're trying to push everything to the app. But if you still have like the actual boom box with the receiver, that's like not built into your car but it's like on sat, whatever it is, satellite I guess um, that's like two to three seconds. It's way quicker than any tv. It's like they. If you live in the states and you get the radio and you want to like bet in play because you think a book is slow, you just that radio's the answer I think that makes sense fair mean enough. 

01:07:45 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I gotta add that to that. I don't do a lot of live betting. 

01:07:48 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I listen, I do appreciate the offer and I would. I would definitely take some live tv like, but it just can't be rogers at this point and it's it's such a headache, like it's just another headache for me to deal with I'm sure you guys understand this, but like I just don't want to deal with it, that's. 

01:08:02 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
That's all it comes down to fair enough, but for like for the cost you do if you're doing uh it on your own, not live betting fine, like we're doing. The twitter spaces now they're doing great, I loved it, it was a great time, but the 30 second delay there was just frustrating. So I'm like you know what, I'll suck it up front of bill and pay for rob's cable if he's just at a regular speed, you know, even a one, a one like a two, three second delay is fine, but it can't be 30 seconds down the road. He's literally running the next play and he's celebrating the Mike Williams first down. 

01:08:33 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I'm like here we go. We got a fourth down coming up, eric's. Like we know the result of the fourth down play. 

01:08:38 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
He's like Rob. The result and honestly, eric, you're a legend for dealing with that Because I don't even I would have left this. I would have left this basis out of sheer, like I would have taken it as an insult and left this space I'm like I got to be on with this guy. He was being so calm. He's like Rob. The result is known here. I'm just going to let you know and you let me know when it's done. And one time he was even like. He was even like, oh because like a sick plan, and then he was like oh, and he's like something. 

01:09:07
In the other room he said something like that to not and I was like this guy is a true professional. Eric, you're a professional. 

01:09:14 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
That was fantastic. 

01:09:16 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Adam, I wanted to talk a little bit about covers. For us in Canada, definitely huge familiarity with that brand growing up, that would be when I first started betting on sports, where I got all of my info for everything. I loved so many things about that site, including seeing the crowdsourced picks, who everyone was picking, but also the team experts for every single game who were the ones that built up a record, and I was into trends at the time had all sorts of stuff that was very useful for me. I'm curious for you how you got involved with the Covers brand. 

01:09:52 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
How did that come about? Well, just like everything else in life, it was by no way intentional. Last football season when it ended, we couldn't, all the borders were shut down or whatever. And so I went with the wife to Tofino in BC and one of my really good friends, jesse, who was the number three at Pinnacle for a number of years, we sort of like came up together through the industry. He went the very professional route. 

01:10:15
I went to the Bahamas to book people, importers and exporters. But we always stayed closely connected and I met up with him in Victoria for lunch and we were walking around and he knew that at the time. So I don't know if it's like widely known, but last fall winter like my plan was to go work for Circa in Las Vegas. It didn't ultimately work out because of being Canadian and everything but, and so he knew that I was kind of like at the end of an opportunity there and he was like wow, did you know that covers is higher? I was like why in the hell would like, why would I ever want to work at covers? 

01:10:54 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Like you were going to work at circa. 

01:10:57 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
So this, this makes a lot of sense now, because I remember I had talked to you. Uh, you had left the matchbook podcast and they had reached out to me saying Adam can no longer do it. I had reached out to you. You said you know, it's just a conflict of interest for me. Now some sort of news is coming down soon, and there was a long period of time where no news came down. I'm like what is Chernoff doing? So? Okay, this makes a lot more sense. 

01:11:18 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
You had told me too that you were looking at joining the other side of the table or something like that, the other side of the counter. And then, yeah, and then you just went to cover it and I was like, oh, I don't, I don't consider that the other side of the counter, I guess. 

01:11:28 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
So that's definitely not right now. 

01:11:30 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I understand what you meant, okay. 

01:11:32 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
But no, it just came down to like being Canadian and how when you're involved with gaming in the States, there's even just moving to the States as a Canadian on its own is very difficult, but when it comes to something that's like gaming specific and what that entailed and my lack of any university to justify that there was no one, it just it became really tough. And so I have nothing but good things to say about everyone there and would have loved to be involved in some way. It didn't work out ultimately, but and so that's that was correlating with the end of the season. It dragged on for a bit and but I ended up in Victoria and he was like did you know covers was hiring a product manager. And I looked at him and I was like why? And he's like no, like they're there, it's legitimate. Like you should give them a call and check it out. 

01:12:22
And and I had no idea, like I, like Rob, you were saying, like I used the site. I knew what it was. I probably had not been on it for a long time back like post forums and the scoreboards and the pages with the stats and everything. What I had no idea about was like it is a massive. At the time it was 60 plus people in a huge office in Halifax that were recently acquired with like just this wide, open direction to go and just like incredibly professional. I assumed it was like two to three guys with a website just somewhere parked in Canada, and so I saw that and I was like this is like really legitimate. 

01:13:05
And what I liked about them specifically was they, over the last year, had an initiative to remove all of the banner ads and aggressive marketing campaigns for sports books and any of that from all of the info within the site, and so it was like we're taking that out of there and the value proposition is genuinely making smarter sports bettors, giving you content to help you improve, and we're just focused on putting out as much content as we can and then, over time, if you value it in some way, that is going to come back to us. And so hearing that versus what other competitors are doing and I mean you guys read it. Everyone else listening reads it. You can't go more than two sentences in an article without having a push to sign up somewhere or a link or anything like that. 

01:13:58
And so for me, seeing how professional it was, the direction they were going, but also the willingness to actually like do something that I also believe in, and with it being Canadian just at the time in my life, it was like the perfect combination of things and just an opportunity that would like give me a chance to to do what I like on a daily basis in life still be involved with betting, but then also actually have a life outside of it for the first time in a long time, and so I've been with them since March of last year is when I started, and even since then we're up to over 90 people now in that office and it's expanded across Canada, so like it's. I had no idea how big it was and how actually passionate about betting the people behind it were. 

01:14:46 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I had a general idea of how big it was. I had done a lot of work in Halifax previously as well. What a city I don't know. 

01:14:55
I've never been to Western Canada, eastern Canada to me, for those who are, even in the US, just absolutely gorgeous, beautiful, like, if you like, seafood, if you just like the pubs that they have, like just the, the very Halifax, very like college vibe and I know I'm like 35, I'm not hanging out with young kids, that's not the point of it but it's very like, uh, energetic. Like you know, there's a lot of things happening in the city. 

01:15:21 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
For such a small city, it's one of actually my favorite spots in the entire world yeah, you're not missing much out here in western canada, especially in the area where I am where are you not much going? On. Uh, I'm about 30 minutes northwest of calgary so not quite in like the canmore area, but just general called. 

01:15:40 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
What's the city called? Are you trying? 

01:15:42 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
to hunt the guy down or something over here. You need the longitude and latitude as well. 

01:15:46 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I was wondering if there's any NHL players from there. That's it. 

01:15:49 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
No, I'm west of Cochran, so like I'm out the door, 30 steps left, and it's like rob. You watch yellowstone. It's field until rocky mountain. That's all it is. 

01:16:02 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
There's just, there's nothing if you want to look up where he lives. I bet you can just follow those directions and then search golf course, and it's probably the golf course, as probably there's one nearby. 

01:16:11 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, there you can you've posted enough pictures from that golf course in the morning that somebody could probably do like a google overhead view and be able to decipher exactly which one it was as well no, it's near a tim hortons glen eagles. Oh, glen eagles, it's close to a tim hortons because you do the ice caps in the morning yep, it's on the way there you go, classic canadian move. 

01:16:31 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Um, okay, you know what, now that we're actually just got into canada, we'll, we'll skip forward to that. Um, for the american again, this is something that we're more passionate about in terms of regulation in Canada that's impending right now. It's coming really soon. So, adam, we wanted to ask about the Canadian regulation and what you think it will open up for Canadian sports bettors, for everything around here. Just curious to hear your general thoughts. 

01:16:56 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Well, it's going to be better than Proline and Sports Select, that's for sure. Um, bc, from a government perspective they actually did well. Um, I thought that product relative to like other offshores or even like bigger regulated ones now in the us it was it was actually really well done. Pricing was generally fair. The offerings were solid and they weren't playing at the time. 

01:17:18
Sorry, play now, this was yeah. Playing out BCLC would be that yeah, they. And apparently like I, had people messaging me and saying like they were taking a fair bet. So good on them for doing that. Alberta not so much, quebec not so much kind of the opposite side of the spectrum. 

01:17:40
But I think obviously where you guys are is the big focus in Ontario. The rumor was that it was going live December 6. Now it's rumored to be March 1. But now there's also the election that's hanging it up right and so it's like a push to get it before. But the latest that we've heard, we've got Jeff Saccotney, who's like the industry analyst, who's on top of everything, but his I was chatting with him the other day he actually is more uncertain about what FanDuel and DraftKings are going to do than the other operators. It and he he was like points bet who just now announced like another sponsorship opportunity for whatever reason. They're pushing harder than anyone at this moment. Um the score, obviously, with their new office downtown in toronto on the water, like they're making a big effort for it too. 

01:18:31
Rush street is another one that's pushing for anyone who's at yeah, bet rivers exactly, but weirdly enough, like the quietest and most uncertain, from what we know internally, has been fan duel and draft kings. But whenever it comes up, I think pricing is first of mind for us and a lot of people like what's that going to look like? Because like minus 140 aside and mandatory parlays is what's conditioned the Canadian culture for the last like 30 years. So it I'm going to be very curious to see. Is it just like duplicated from the US? But at the same time we've seen some states come up with like crazy pricing to that we're in smaller population centers. So I'm curious. Ontario is absolutely going to be first and that's going to be a big deal when it happens hopefully this spring, in March, but it's. 

01:19:22 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
It's going to be interesting to see how much they're willing to sort of bend, especially around some of the business models in Canada too, offshores for many years and there's been no shortage of them because we have the native reserves, um in montreal, where a lot of um offshores operate and there's there's buildings on those reserves and um. 

01:19:47
I'm curious what you think the landscape is going to look like in terms of the number of operators. Like, we have the bet 99s now, who have the george saint pierre as an ambassador, and the cool women cool bets uh, bet on women as well with bet 99. Yeah, I, who have the George St Pierre as an ambassador, and the cool on women cool bets bet on women as well with bet 99. Yeah, I shouldn't leave that out. Cool bet sports interactions been a brand in Canada for many, many years. Do you see these offshore operators entering the space in terms of trying to I mean legally service players, or do you think that it's going to be a case where a lot of these guys just close up their books and say, okay, we've, we've had enough, we don't really want to pay tax on top of this and we'll potentially service other regions in the world? 

01:20:27 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
so sports interaction, cool bet and bet regal are the three that will like aggressively push to be regulated within ontario and probably beyond and those are the ones that are sponsoring a bunch of stuff as well, like cfl sponsorships, nhl stuff, like that that's kind of like the big tip off at the moment to sort of see like who's posturing um, and they're all offering like free play products at the moment on those like advertising networks to obviously build up the database because they're gonna have. What's going to be interesting is when you have the existing players that play elsewhere, like Bet365, for example, or even like a pinnacle to a lesser extent, but last year at Bet365, canadians turned over. I think it was like four and a half billion at Bet 365 and so like everyone that you know that's just a casual better right now in canada has like bet 365 as their go-to app, and so it's like to me what's going to be the interesting thing is not necessarily like how sia or regal or cool bet, who are trying to like grab some portion of the pie, maybe get involved, but it's like what is what happens with bet 365? Do they go out of their way because, like money is not a problem for them, like do they try maintain this and hold on to that customer base? And if no, how do these other books that are coming in try get those players away from it? 

01:21:57
Because I don't't know, like to this point we haven't had a scenario, despite there being efforts to like close off bet 365. I mean, like eight, nine years ago they were basically keeping the CFL afloat Right and so like the connections that they have I don't think can be disregarded, but they also have such a huge pull on so many players in the country. When you compare the bet 365 app, say what you like. I'm limited to a buck for anything. I think anyone is who has half a mind about betting, but for like the average better if you compare the bet 365 app that we have in canada to some of the apps that are coming in and never mind going to like a cool bet that doesn't have an app, or like these lesser books they're trying to get regulated like the experience is so one-sided into bet 365 that I think that alone is going to go a long way to sort of keeping that divide existing. So that's to me like the big thing to see play out I. 

01:22:53 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I think bet 365, in my opinion, has like a killer product, both on app and web. Uh, very nicely laid out. They have tons of markets, which is obviously appealing to the recreational better but also very easy to find. Search function works great. Like to me, bet365 is, my opinion personally, gold standard in canada right now. I wonder, like to me, obviously, you going to get a lot of operators applying for licenses in Ontario. 

01:23:22
I think whatever Bit365 does has a large impact on whether or not those operators will last in market, because 365, like you said, has such a huge market share right now. It'll be interesting to see if anyone can steal some of that market share. I imagine they will be able to through big bonuses. That market share I imagine they will be able to through big bonuses. But the way that you can promote bonuses in Canada is very differently as well from the way you can in the US. You see all these affiliates in the US marketing $3,000 free play. Well, we can't do that over here in Ontario. You just have to market your product. You can still give away the bonus, but you can't market that bonus. So I think that's going to have a huge impact. But I'm just curious as to whether you think that you know. 

01:24:04
A lot of the conversation is about how big, how big an opportunity Canada is for other operators right now. I've consulted for offshore sports books before, some which service the Canadian market, some which service American markets, some which service Australia, so on and so forth. I'm very skeptical on the market size of Canada, more so like a lot of people are bullish on. This is a huge untapped market. I think Canadians have actually been betting for a long time. A large majority of them have been able to in some capacity. On top of that, I think Canadians and it's not a disrespect to any American out there, this is just strictly my experience and factual, I know where you're going with this they hold a lot worse. Like you know, a standard sports, recreational sports book hold for an American player is roughly somewhere around seven to 8%. I mean you can you. That's just an average. Canadian players are lower. I mean my experience is five to 6%, in some cases as low as four. 

01:25:01 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
So from that, because all the players that are playing the lottery are holding. That's a good, that's a valid point too. 

01:25:07 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
But I'm just I'm just wondering what you think of the Canadian market as a whole and whether it's as large as I think the the larger population believes it actually is. 

01:25:19 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Yeah, the CGA has thrown out some just wild estimates and I'm like I maybe, but I don't like some of the figures they're throwing out. That's like deep in the billions. I'm like I don't see it and I think to what you said is is very valid. Um, but I think to a to a more extent. Like bet sizing, too, is nowhere near as high on average in Canada as it is in the United States. Like it's just the risk is not there. But I think, like you mentioned too, that if you like, if you wanted to go out of your way and bet on sports, you're probably for the most part doing it in Canada. So, like the thought that there's like this untapped or unconverted audience, I think any estimates on that are like way too high. 

01:26:03
And I think pulling people away from the lottery like if you're going down to the store and you're still playing in cash and you're filling up the Scantron sheets with the pencils, it's because you very much regard the convenience and the trust that you have of betting at that and like you're conditioned into that. 

01:26:22
There's a reason that you haven't used your, your bank account, your debit card, your visa, insta, debit, whatever to deposit in any of these apps that have been available for a long time. I don't think that, like a fan duel, coming in and offering an attractive bonus, is going to be what those players that value that convenience necessarily want. Some of them will. But even if you convert that, like you're getting a $5 a day player that usually parlays six to 10 teams together Cause he's watching it on the couch and wants to win, or your pools player that runs last second on Sunday to fill everything out to watch a full day of NFL games Like you're not. You're not pulling this like massive volume player out of nowhere that hasn't been able to get down anywhere. It's just not the case. So, like I and it depends how segmented it is too Like if we're stuck province by province and it's different operators in each and they're offering different things, that makes it really messy as well. So there's a lot. 

01:27:24 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
That's, I think, overestimated, at least at this point. Yeah, I think the uh, the convenience store player is not the the biggest player by any like, by any capacity. So when you mention here like, yeah, if you want to bet in canada, you don't you, you, you know, could go to your way. You don't even really have to go to your way, you just bet you, if you've ever tried to stream anything online and get a pop-up for bet three, six, five, bodak, any offshore things like that, uh, you're going to get so much like referral bonuses, things like that. It's available everywhere. So what I, what I honestly think, is like anyone who bets right now using the offshore sites, um, if they get a bonus at fanduel and it's being constantly jammed down their throat or getting getting a bonus at any of these things, um, and they see the brand recognition and they see their buddies posting same game parlays and sharing and referral bonuses. I do think they will sign up at the regulated books just because it'll be a lot easier. They're going to probably own seo a lot more as well, but I mean eventually. But what I will say is all in the lottery player that you mentioned, like the person who's like doing it for trust and convenience. That's depositing cash. Now that is probably not going to change the person's paying five, 10 bucks, but the person who's playing, maybe on like PPH accounts had, like a local bookie, something like that, anyone who's had, like now, any single bad experience or version of like trust and the one to play in cash. They can now go deposit cash at one of these sports books, whether it be over the counter or through an alternate method, and now they can play in cash with a book that's a little bit more reputable. So I think, like the, the pph market that we have here will probably shrink, although it'll obviously stay, um, you know, somewhat relevant. The lottery market of people at convenience stores will probably shrink and then shift over, and then we'll have a lot of the offshore market. 

01:29:04
People who are playing at like Bodog or things like that come over to the regulated market for a bonus or for something like that, and then just those three alone, because we already have so many players that are gambling on a regular basis, so many people that are already. They already know what odds are. You don't have to teach them. You don't have to teach them all these things. It's a really big sports town, in toronto at least, and all their place in ontario. 

01:29:29
I do think it could be a massive market, right? It's the same same kind of deal with new york where, like, no one in new york is not betting if they don't like, unless you just don't want to bet, right, but the reason that you're not betting is not because you couldn't find a regulated account. But now that they have these regulated accounts, like everyone's going to give them a shot and sign up the. The key for canada will be, like someone who has bet 365, which is already the best player and you know I'm not even going to talk good about 365. I'm gonna hold up. I'm holding out for a fan duel sponsorship, influencer sponsorship. But but, um, anyone who's you know using those, will they switch over to fan duel? I don't know, maybe not on their own, but maybe, if they're influenced, if the fan wants to sponsor anything like that you know what I mean there might be some opportunity tv networks are going to play a large role in this too. 

01:30:14 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Tsn's, they signed a a significant agreement with one I. I don't know if Rogers has made theirs public yet. I'd be curious if they go exclusive. My question here is, on that New York point Would you rather be the biggest operator in Canada or the biggest operator in New York State? 

01:30:33 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I'd probably rather be I don't know New York State or all of Canada. New York State or all of Canada, new York state or all of Canada. So I mean, just because of the three, six, five presidents, like I wouldn't want to come in as a bigger operator in Canada, like there's no one who has brand equity in New York right now, right, so I'd rather choose New York, but I'd rather be bet three, six, five in Canada than bet three six, five, in New York, for example. 

01:31:01 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Part, part, part of it's also going to deter be determined by the tax rates that the operators have to pay. Yeah, so that would be sure, but I, I think new york market access is going to be. 

01:31:08 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
Is cheaper in ontario, yeah, but um yeah I'm not sure exactly what it shakes out to um, I'm not launching my own book I think it's pretty close on my end. 

01:31:18 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I think that's actually a really good question where you can make a decent argument for either side. Obviously, ontario is going to be a massive portion of Canada, quebec, I mean. The multilingual thing is going to turn a lot of people off in the province of Quebec as well, which has always been the case with a lot of the offshore sites as well. So it's mainly Ontario versus New York really when we're comparing it, because Ontario is doing like. The estimates are 60 to 70% of all the NGR in Canada currently for offshores and PPHs. 

01:31:54 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Yeah, no, I'm with you guys. And then that becomes like when you go Canada-wide, I I think population wise it's like double of New York state. But even then you think about it and you're like, well, like how much of Canada is kind of like just empty and not convertible. And then so you get to like the Ontario versus New York and it's like, yeah, it's, it's massive. But then you think about like how much bigger like New York is in comparison and like what went into like competing to get into there, and you're like how much of that is carrying over to ontario and it gets like that's going to be a really interesting like first couple of weeks that unfold for sure and like uh, you know, just to continue on, but ontario is obviously very large, but southern ontario is very different from northern ontario and the priorities of the people in Northern Ontario are more day to day and I don't want to lump people into a group, but it's very different. 

01:32:44
We were taking shots at Sault Ste Marie. Well, that's not that's. 

01:32:47 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I don't want any haters from specific, you know spots in Northern Ontario, but that's just the reality of things. 

01:32:53 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
This is a very different lifestyle, even though we're in the same are we allowed to mention sue samory greyhounds on a gambling podcast right now? Or no, hey, now I don't think we can. 

01:33:05 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Um, yeah, I've already gotten some calls from people associated with that. I'd rather not uh sue is gonna be. 

01:33:11 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I'll tell you right now sue same reason be a massive betting town if we, if you know, um people running back from there to thunder bay? Yes, that's likely um, go and close it off yeah, well, listen, this is an educational uh podcast. 

01:33:26 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I wanted to get some thoughts from adam here because he's one of the best educators in the content space, so just gonna throw a couple rapid fire things at you, adam. Uh, that potentially, uh, someone who's more recreational might be able to listen to and gain some I it's not just me and Johnny forcing our ideas down other people's throats. Maybe you might agree or disagree or whatever, but if you could give one piece of advice to a new, better entering this space, what would it be? 

01:33:56 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Open as many accounts as possible, even if you don't fund them. Just have them and learn to find the best price. I think Johnny said it better earlier in the bug Just shop. It doesn't matter if you're betting or not, just the accounts are free to open, do it? 

01:34:10 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Thank you for saying that. We will cut that into a short clip and repurpose that for our other platforms as well. Thank you very much. Okay, one common piece of betting advice that you think is often overstated or just straight up false. 

01:34:28 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
It doesn't matter if you beat the closing line or not, as long as you win. I think that's, and it's it's really tough for people to understand because of the like implied entitlement that comes from beating the closing line, where people will be like they'll take a four and a half and football that closes four, and they're like, well, I'm, I should win. Now I beat the closing line and it's like that's. That's not the point. You're doing it because it's a process orientated thing and and that half point, you're probably right on line with the vague anyway if you remove it. So like there's there's differences within that, but it's. It's hard for people to understand. But when you're just looking at wins or losses, you're leaving out the most important part of everything. 

01:35:11 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Agreed. Okay, so we're two for two on agreement here. Last one this one's actually not even educational, but I just really interested in it Um, one thing that currently happens in the betting space, that I mean you're a very positive guy, so maybe nothing drives you insane, but something that kind of drives you up a wall or irks you, and potentially a solution on what can be done to fix it. 

01:35:34 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Ooh Um. Are we talking like bookmaker, product offering? Are we talking like content and people thinking about that? 

01:35:43 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Anything, either either one. 

01:35:46 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
I would say and this is just because it's like relevant within football and it kind of goes back to that process and like thinking about that in a way, when people look at, like the last series of a game and how it might define a bet, but they leave out the other, like 58 minutes of a game and how that played into it, and they're like, oh, that was a lucky win or, boy, that was a, you should have lost that one, but you got away with it. Um, and it takes away from like either like how the entire game or bet or the whole market leading up to that transpired like just having that chunk of it. I think there's so much focus on that Then, and those comments and those discussions are are just nuts, um from like a, a product and like offering thing that bookmakers do. I think again, like I kind of alluded to it, you could go off on limiting for a long time, but I would say now what we're starting to see, which is for some reason becoming more common, is like unclear terms or like gaming around terms of either bonuses or just like day to day markets, with all of these specials and things that are popping up. 

01:36:59
There's just a massive lack of transparency. That's almost. It's not like I think to. For a while it was like a lack of potentially understanding, but I feel like now you see that books get it and they understand, but now they're like intentionally gaming around it with terms or how they offer things or how things are listed one way, markets without a way to play back the other side there's. There seems to be a lot of that. That's sort of multiplying for some reason, that I well money but like it's I don't know why that's taking off yeah, in some. 

01:37:35 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
In some instances it borders on predatory. In my opinion it does. When you're just, you know you can bet a team to win the Super Bowl, but you cannot bet them not to win the Super Bowl, type of thing. That's just a random market, but that kind of stuff irks me as well. So I think three for three in terms of agreement, because both those things you actually mentioned bother me. Before we get to our closing question, let people know, uh, where they can find your podcast and what you're doing with covers now which they can check out from a content perspective as well, sure? 

01:38:08 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
um, the simple handicap is, on apple and spotify it's in year four. You will find it for like another two and a half weeks and then it'll be gone till the off season in august. So it's just a football daily podcast, but then on covers um, doing covers daily. Uh, live stream on YouTube every weekday until the Superbowl and then beyond that. Um, still a little bit undecided, but I'll just be posting about that on Twitter. 

01:38:33 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I am a simple handicapped listener. Um, I really often have to catch myself when I do my Sunday morning morning nfl stream because I start my stream by saying good morning everyone, which I'm like I gotta stop doing that. And every week I remind myself and every week I don't. And for those who don't listen to, simple handicap, that's adam's sign online at the beginning. So, uh, yes, I am a. 

01:38:58
I'm starting to consume more content in the space, whereas I almost never did. Part of it is because I drive to the bed stamp office a couple times a week and when I'm in the car I just put on a podcast and listen to it, type of thing. So I am a simple handicap listener. Won't say I listen to every single episode, but I do get them in here and there with some other podcasts in the space that I enjoy. I appreciate that. All right, adam, let's end it off here. You've been very generous with your time. I think this is a really good episode. We do have a closing question. We ask to every single guest that comes onto the show If you could go back five years in time and talk to a previous version of yourself, what piece of advice would you give to your old self? 

01:39:45 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Exactly five years. I'll just go like to that general time, um, when things were saying I would say, put more of a value on patients. Um, I am very antsy and always doing something and trying to move around and come up with something new or great, and I I don't do well, just kind of like sitting and letting things build. And that probably has been a leak in betting, but also in like daily life too, where I just tried to push things a little bit too far when it probably would have been better just grinding it out and waiting and building something over time. So I'm learning that somewhat now, but if I could have been a lot more patient years ago, I may have been in a different spot today for the better. 

01:40:31 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
I think that's a really good piece of advice. It beats a lot of the I would tell myself to buy Bitcoin things that we get, which I mean ah, well, would have been nice but exactly, it's not doing anyone a service now to tell them that you should know, it is not five years ago. 

01:40:47
Appreciate your time, adam. You can check out his podcast, the simple handicap, check out all the stuff he's doing with covers. I do love the halftime streams that you have as well during the games, which are pretty cool. The second half bets I mean small sample, but they've been hot this year and actually all your NFL plays have been good this year. Candidly, before we log off, I'll tell you a real true story. I subscribe to Twitter notifications for you. 

01:41:12
I probably curse you more than anyone on planet Earth on a weekly basis when I get the Sunday night pick or Monday morning pick. On a weekly basis, when I get the sunday night pick or monday morning pick on a side that I agree with because you do have market influence. People tend to uh, to follow, uh you in general, um, but I occasionally get like one out of ten, maybe, maybe a little bit higher than that, where you're on the opposite side of a game that I like and I'm just there fist pumping and I'm like, here we go, gonna get a great number on this game. Um, not that I resent you or anything for that, it's just. I mean I have to try to keep up with the space and what other people are betting and why a number moved the way that it did. It's just part of my process. But, um, yeah, that's so. 

01:41:55
People follow Adam on Twitter. Good information at Adam Chernoff, uh, uh, but yeah, you're the Twitter notifications on a weekly basis. I'm like, ah, damn, I'm not saying damn it, I'm saying much worse words than that. But I'm like, ah, why do we have to do this right now? 

01:42:09 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Can you say if any of them lined up this week with what you were thinking, or am I in for a rough Saturday and Sunday? 

01:42:14 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Um, no. So I absolutely love the number you got on San Fran I would have for sure. 

01:42:19 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
BOL left it hanging. I don't know what they were doing. They had it up for like 15 minutes and I was like I can't. I felt that was the one probably bet of the entire year that I felt bad posting Because I was like this is kind of scummy of me to post it. So I should have posted three, but like that number they hung was nuts. 

01:42:38 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, I mean for me, like um I, I tend to not even look at the bed, online openers or even the lines on Monday. I actually try to avoid. I do most of my betting starting on Tuesday, um, just for reasons I don't want to get into, but part of it is limits, Part of it's a number of other things, but I typically don't look early, Um, but I do subscribe to your notification. So now when I go on Tuesday or Wednesday, uh, and I'm doing my work, I can kind of understand why something might have moved early, potentially. Um, just again, part of the process. I like to consume as much information as possible and I feel like it's just really valuable to to know that kind of stuff. 

01:43:18 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
Awesome, no, I. So San Francisco lines up. I saw you at new England, which I was slow to get to, but I'm glad that at least one of them is on the same side. 

01:43:26 - Rob Pizzola (Co-host)
Yeah, I mean it's, it's the playoffs. I could honestly shut it down at the beginning of playoffs every year and I probably wouldn't be leaving much on the table. Is my honest feeling about it. I think it's just so easy to make lines on nfl games once we have these large samples on these teams that yep, um, and they're fully motivated, like you kind of really know what you're going to get out of each team that um, it's just a little bit tougher. So I completely understand why someone would want to bet an early market, because you do get those numbers that are posted right away, which is just your opinion versus the odds maker and no other people from the market having influence on that number yet. So I get it. I never resent anyone for it to each their own, and but I just want to throw that out there because I do mention your name probably three or four times a week when I get that notification and I'm like, oh man, but that's it. I appreciate your time, adam. Wish you all the best. 

01:44:18 - Adam Chernoff (Guest)
No thanks very much, guys. Keep on all the best. No thanks very much, guys. Keep on doing the show. It's great and we're all enjoying it and the pros that you get on and the advice that you guys have done in 3738 episodes now has been invaluable. So keep it, keep pushing and keep the app going as well. 

01:44:30 - Johnny Capo (Co-host)
I appreciate that. All right, we'll see everyone next week.