MLB Overtime Betting

In 2012, 192 games went into overtime, making up 7.9% of games.
In 2013, 243 games went into overtime, making up 10.0% of games.
In 2014, 231 games went into overtime, making up 9.1% of games.
In 2015, 212 games went into overtime, making up 8.7% of games.
In 2016, 185 games went into overtime, making up 7.6% of games.

For decades, the percentage of MLB games that go into extra innings has hovered between roughly 7.5-10%. Given that, it seems to me that betting against overtime would be one of the most solid bets, as the probability is relatively low for most games. That being said, betting sites and handicappers seem to agree, as bets against overtime are typically over -1000. My question is, provided a bettor has a sizable bankroll to protect against eventual losses, would betting against overtime be a good way to make a profit?

I don't watch baseball anymore. What is your explanation as for the reason there seems to be less games in extra innings?

Statistically speaking, the overwhelming majority of regular season games don't end in extra innings. I wouldn't say there is a particular reason, aside from ties just being less likely. Happy to hear any other theories as to why this is.

Quote: onenickelmiracle

I don't watch baseball anymore. What is your explanation as for the reason there seems to be less games in extra innings?

I don't know what the OP thinks about it.....but, it could be a few things.

1. A coincidence, where the % goes down over the last 4 years. The expected value could be about 8%, so 7-9% would likely fall within normal deviation (I haven't done the math to confirm the SD size).

2. Baseball, like all other sports and games, changes over time. Rules change. New techniques and other advances are made in the game. Players (on average) get better because of that.

Quote: RS

I don't know what the OP thinks about it.....but, it could be a few things.

1. A coincidence, where the % goes down over the last 4 years. The expected value could be about 8%, so 7-9% would likely fall within normal deviation (I haven't done the math to confirm the SD size).

2. Baseball, like all other sports and games, changes over time. Rules change. New techniques and other advances are made in the game. Players (on average) get better because of that.

If there was a reason besides coincidence, common sense leads to two reasons. There are not many runs, and not many hits. The more runs and more hits in a game, less likely to be a tie. Bad pitching match ups would not be the day to bet, I think you would want good pitching. Pitching seems most likely to cause extra innings, but good defenses and poor hitting teams could be something to look at. I suppose you wouldn't want teams with homerun hitters if you're seeking a tie.

Having a large BR doesn't matter unless you're sure these are good bets.

Quote: DLS1960

For decades, the percentage of MLB games that go into extra innings has hovered between roughly 7.5-10%. Given that, it seems to me that betting against overtime would be one of the most solid bets, as the probability is relatively low for most games. That being said, betting sites and handicappers seem to agree, as bets against overtime are typically over -1000. My question is, provided a bettor has a sizable bankroll to protect against eventual losses, would betting against overtime be a good way to make a profit?

If you could lay exactly -1000 on all games it would be profitable. What was the average line on games that did go into extra innings? That would tell us how good the books are at making the lines.

If you want to bet on long shots, bet on a tie in baseball. I think there has only been two in the last 15 years.

First a quibble: There is no "overtime" in baseball. Because there is no time in baseball. Not regular time, or over, or any other sort of time for baseball to be over. A baseball game ends when it ends according to the rules of the game, regardless of what time it is. Of course you are talking about MLB games that require more than nine innings. There are a variety of complex related factors that are specific to individual teams, to the significantly different ballparks that greatly affect run scoring, and different lineups used and pitchers available or not on a given day that are likely to affect that. As they do things like the probability of scoring more or less than any specific total number of runs.

Games that are played in a way that results in low scoring, often decided by a few tactical decisions that manufacture or prevent a single run, are more likely to be close and require more than nine innings than high scoring slugfests with many extra base hits throughout the game. And the point of my quibble about thinking and talking like some other sport played in "time" and therefore sometimes "overtime" is to encourage you to get a lot more familiar with the particular sport you'd be betting on before putting much money on it, expecting to turn a long-range profit. You won't. Annual averages among all teams, on all days with different lineups, at all the very significantly different MLB ballparks, under the differing rules of both the NL and AL, will NOT be very useful in predicting the probability for a particular game in a specific ballpark on a given day.

I've never seen a line for this sort of thing, only for game totals of runs scored. A "fair value" line would vary, as do the commonplace lines for o/u run totals. If the betting lines didn't, and were simply a reflection of overall averages, they'd be very bad lines that would be exploited by the bettors who understand the particulars of this sport well after following it in great detail for a long time.

Quote: onenickelmiracle

I don't watch baseball anymore. What is your explanation as for the reason there seems to be less games in extra innings?

I have no idea what may have given you the idea "there seem (sic) to be less (sic - fewer?) games...." I don't see any place where the OP said that, and neither did the small sample of annual averages he posted. If the annual number of such games does prove to have changed, it will likely be partially related to the increased overall scoring and home run hitting that began to occur suddenly and dramatically beginning in July of 2015 after the annual all-star break. And if someone is unaware of that and doesn't have a definite conclusion about the conditions that likely led to it, they really should treat their baseball betting purely as a form of entertainment spending (which this clearly isn't) because they will not be winning money doing it.

A small side note: I think there's either a typo or error if you calculated the percentages, or if you got these stats including the resulting percentages from a 3rd party source, you may want to be cautious about using them and make a habit of independently checking any of their work that you use.

Quote: DLS1960

In 2012, 192 games went into overtime, making up 7.9% of games.
In 2013, 243 games went into overtime, making up 10.0% of games.
In 2014, 231 games went into overtime, making up 9.1% of games.
In 2015, 212 games went into overtime, making up 8.7% of games.
In 2016, 185 games went into overtime, making up 7.6% of games.

There are 30 MLB teams playing a 162 game schedule, and with 2 teams to play each game this results in 2430 scheduled games (30 / 2 = 15, and 162 * 15 = 2430). There are sometimes a couple of games on the schedule that never get played, but not frequently enough to be material. Taking the posted number for annual totals of extra inning games at face value, four of the five calculations for percentages are accurate to within a tenth of a percent, as posted above. But for 2014 it is not. 231 is not 9.1% of 2430. 231 is 9.5% of MLB games (231 / 2430 = 0.09506, or 9.5% rounded). A difference that would represent nearly ten games.