Battagliaspicks

[zxvtrp]

Anyone try them. They seem to be very good. yesterday on the E-mail I got, he gave the first 4 horses at the 11th Saratoga and it was the Superfecta at $1197, the Trifecta at $382 and trhe Exacta at $52. He guarantees 10 winner daily! zxvtrp

[barry2006]

I GOT THE SAME EMAIL AND WON THE TRI. I HAVE BEEN RECEIVEING HIS EMAILS FOR ABOUT 5 MONTHS AND THEY ARE ALWAYS WORTH LOOKING AT HE HITS 3 OUT OF THE 4 SLECTIONS A LOT a:

[HANK3849]

he is pretty good but most times you must play all 4 of his selections to be a winner. I'm not in a position to pay $12.00 or $24.00 on each race. When he say's he won 8 out of 10 it's because of the 4 selections he gave. Your odds on winning go way down if you just play his top 3 selections w/o playing the alternate selection. I'm sure there are some pretty good handicappers on this site who could do pretty well picking the way he does.

[dudeman]

If you look at todays racing card for Arlington and Saratoga you will see that they average 8.75 and 9 horses per race respectively. It does'nt take rocket science to pick 4 off the top to hit a high percentage of winners.

[Mister Sanderson]

IMO, you can get Battaglia's (if your referring to Mike Battaglia) selections without spending a dime. Just look on the bottom of the program and you will get 95% of his selections. I live in KY and follow the circuit. Battaglia is about as predictable as you can get, very very seldomly making selections outside of the listed chalk. It's just my opinion, but I see no imagination in his handicapping.

[Jerfi]

I have subjected Battag's picks to micro analysis ... and overall, he falls short of winning with win bets on ROI.

I sure agree with the above note that when one picks four in each race, a lot of hits will come along... even if you pick the four with a dartboard.

[Flynn is fine]

How do I get on the list? Thanks

[ken]

Not very many public handicappers track their own ROI.

[Jerfi]

Not very many public handicappers track their own ROI.
I suspect that most public handicappers do track, but do not publish, their own ROI.

In my opinion, ROI is the ONLY viable stat on public handicapping that means anything.

While it is true that any handicapper can occasionally hit a $15 horse, track any of them for a month, at $2 per bet, using either their top pick, or all three or 4 picks, and you will find a negative ROI.

The BEST one I've seen is Michael Nunamaker ... who publishes a BETS BETS OF THE DAY sheet ... for $10... and covers every track running. He selects the best race at each track, then summarizes with his best 10 bests of the day.

I tracked him daily for six weeks in May, June, and July. When it was done, his 10 best of the day showed $732 invested, and a return of $722. I've not tracked anyone else who came close to that.

If you want to track him for a while... go to www.equibase.com (http://www.equibase.com), and on the left menu on the home page, select EXPERT SELECTIONS, then select 'YESTERDAY'S PICKS', then scroll to his sheet.

You get THE PREVIOUS DAY'S sheet for free... and you can check him out. He publishes every day, 7 days a week.

Here is his list for yesterday:

Ten Most Probable Winners

CAT SINGER at Thistledown in race 12 at 4-5 by 5.7 lengths
$3.20 $2.80 $2.80

AN ANNIKA MOMENT at Golden Gate in race 2 at 4-5 by 4.3 lengths
Ran last of six


CHIEF OFFICER at Finger Lakes in race 7 at 1-1 by 4.9 lengths
$3.10 $2.40 $2.20


GALLANT DREAMER at Remington Park in race 6 at 1-1 by 3.7 lengths
Ran last of six


SCARLET RIBBONS at Calder Race Course in race 3 at 1-1 by 4.5 lengths
$3.20 $3.00 $2.40


SIR FIVE STAR at Remington Park in race 8 at 1-1 by 5.2 lengths
$10.00 $5.40 $3.80


MIDNIGHT SHADOW at Woodbine in race 8 at 1-1 by 3.2 lengths
3rd of 9 $2.40 for the show


SUN SPUN at Arlington Park in race 1 at 1-1 by 2.8 lengths
$2.80 $2.20 $2.10


INDIGO DREAM at Timonium in race 3 at 1-1 by 2.6 lengths
$3.80 $2.20 $2.10




FINANCINGAVAILABLE at Woodbine in race 4 at 1-1 by 2.7 lengths
$3.80 $2.30 $2.10






So... you can see that he hit 7 of the 10, picking ONE horse ...
$20 in and $29.90 back .... a 50% ROI.



I will readily acknowledge that this particular sample is above par ... but he does have MANY days of 25 to 50% ROI ...and a few days of negative.

[traynor]

Battaglias picks, at four entries a race, "guarantees" that there will be X winners out of the 36-40 entries listed. The guarantee is that if there are not X winners in the crop, you get the next day free.

If you box four, that is $48 for exactas and $48 for trifectas, at $2. If you are pushing that much cash through the window, a few wins are not overly remarkable. Breaking even is remarkable.

As for ROI, it is highly deceptive and misleading, unless "controlled for outliers" and highly specific about what--exactly--is meant. To claim an ROI of X, it is essential to define the precise wagering strategy to be used before the race, then the result, over time. Overall ROI seems impressive, but is most often the result of a few unusual (read "unlikely to repeat") events.

Example; I picked a couple of nice Pick 3s at GG and SA a couple of weeks ago. While impressive, they were anomalies, because I hate chalk plays, and all three winners happened to pay decent prices. It would have been easy to "do a Ray Taulbot" and put together some figure like "Pick 3 wagers at Santa Anita had an ROI of 234% in September" or some such.

On the surface, true, but still deceptively misleading. ROI is only relevant when it holds into the future; it doesn't matter what the ROI was last week, unless it is repeated (within a few points) this week and next week. That presumes a mechanically repetitious nature to both horse racing and betting patterns that doesn't exist.

ROI figures spin on what Tversky and Kahnemann refer to as "the Law of Small Numbers," the eroneous belief that a small sample is likely to replicate (more or less exactly) another small sample. It is not only poor handicapping, it is poor thinking, and even worse decision-making. Classic example is the Sartin-type "Brohamer Model" of "what is winning," (usually mixed with absurd ROI figures based on a $45 winner in a 20 race cycle).

All that said, I have no objection whatsoever to ROI figures, as long as they are corrected for anomalies that are unlikely to repeat. Most current software apps have "regression" facilities that churn out ROIs for win, place, and show position for each of dozens of different "ratings." Those numbers are virtually useless for predictive purposes.

If you want good numbers on which to base an ROI, sort and rank your mutuels. Extract and average the middle half (discarding the lowest quarter and the highest quarter). If you have 100 races in your sample, average mutuels 26 through 75. Just total, and divide by 50. Multiply that sum by 1.5. Set your software (or calculate your ROI) to truncate any mutuel price greater than the 1.5X figure to that figure. (If your average mutuel for the middle half is $6, count any mutuel higher than $9 as $9 when calculating ROI.)

This is not funny stuff. If you are going out into the real world to bet real money, you need this information. It is the most elementary form of data analysis, contained in every basic statistics class, and is totally ignored by system sellers claiming ROI figures. Google "outliers" and "interquartile range" for some interesting stuff, very readable, not intimidating, and incredibly illuminating if you bet real money.

The "ROI Myth" has been milked for years by convincing a gullible, uncritical public that events in a small sample are "meaningful." Along with its cohort "win percentage" it has done more to make bettors lose than almost any other factor. Consider: my "win percentage" averages (a hypothetical number, say 40%). Of the 10 races on a card, I just lost the first 6. Does that mean I should bet with both hands on the remaining 4 races, because I am "more likely" to win them?

Not at all. That belief, as absurd as it may seem when expressed in those terms, forms the basis for the Gambler's Fallacy (another interesting term to Google).

I want people to win. Winning is good. It encourages people to bet more, win more, enjoy the races, and have a nice life. I really dislike false, deceptive, misleading claims of win percentages and ROI that seem to mean one thing when in reality they mean something quite different. It is not necessary to study statistics to handicap horse races, nor to go through complex calculations to arrive at ROI or win percentages. All that is necessary is to view such claims critically, and realize they may not mean what you think they mean.

Best advice I can give to handicappers: Get a great little paperback book, highly readable, incredibly useful for handicappers, called "Decision Traps: The Ten Barriers to Brilliant Decision-Making and How to Overcome Them" by Russo and Schoemaker. In case you think it is "too fluffy" to be useful, I discovered it when it was used as a text in a university graduate class in managerial decision-making. Good stuff, and a really easy read. Should be available on amazon.com for a couple of bucks, or in a used book store.

Good Luck :)

[traynor]

Battaglias picks, at four entries a race, "guarantees" that there will be X winners out of the 36-40 entries listed. The guarantee is that if there are not X winners in the crop, you get the next day free.

If you box four, that is $48 for exactas and $48 for trifectas, at $2. If you are pushing that much cash through the window, a few wins are not overly remarkable. Breaking even is remarkable.

As for ROI, it is highly deceptive and misleading, unless "controlled for outliers" and highly specific about what--exactly--is meant. To claim an ROI of X, it is essential to define the precise wagering strategy to be used before the race, then the result, over time. Overall ROI seems impressive, but is most often the result of a few unusual (read "unlikely to repeat") events.

Example; I picked a couple of nice Pick 3s at GG and SA a couple of weeks ago. While impressive, they were anomalies, because I hate chalk plays, and all three winners happened to pay decent prices. It would have been easy to "do a Ray Taulbot" and put together some figure like "Pick 3 wagers at Santa Anita had an ROI of 234% in September" or some such.

On the surface, true, but still deceptively misleading. ROI is only relevant when it holds into the future; it doesn't matter what the ROI was last week, unless it is repeated (within a few points) this week and next week. That presumes a mechanically repetitious nature to both horse racing and betting patterns that doesn't exist.

ROI figures spin on what Tversky and Kahnemann refer to as "the Law of Small Numbers," the eroneous belief that a small sample is likely to replicate (more or less exactly) another small sample. It is not only poor handicapping, it is poor thinking, and even worse decision-making. Classic example is the Sartin-type "Brohamer Model" of "what is winning," (usually mixed with absurd ROI figures based on a $45 winner in a 20 race cycle).

All that said, I have no objection whatsoever to ROI figures, as long as they are corrected for anomalies that are unlikely to repeat. Most current software apps have "regression" facilities that churn out ROIs for win, place, and show position for each of dozens of different "ratings." Those numbers are virtually useless for predictive purposes.

If you want good numbers on which to base an ROI, sort and rank your mutuels. Extract and average the middle half (discarding the lowest quarter and the highest quarter). If you have 100 races in your sample, average mutuels 26 through 75. Just total, and divide by 50. Multiply that sum by 1.5. Set your software (or calculate your ROI) to truncate any mutuel price greater than the 1.5X figure to that figure. (If your average mutuel for the middle half is $6, count any mutuel higher than $9 as $9 when calculating ROI.)

This is not funny stuff. If you are going out into the real world to bet real money, you need this information. It is the most elementary form of data analysis, contained in every basic statistics class, and is totally ignored by system sellers claiming ROI figures. Google "outliers" and "interquartile range" for some interesting stuff, very readable, not intimidating, and incredibly illuminating if you bet real money.

The "ROI Myth" has been milked for years by convincing a gullible, uncritical public that events in a small sample are "meaningful." Along with its cohort "win percentage" it has done more to make bettors lose than almost any other factor. Consider: my "win percentage" averages (a hypothetical number, say 40%). Of the 10 races on a card, I just lost the first 6. Does that mean I should bet with both hands on the remaining 4 races, because I am "more likely" to win them?

Not at all. That belief, as absurd as it may seem when expressed in those terms, forms the basis for the Gambler's Fallacy (another interesting term to Google).

I want people to win. Winning is good. It encourages people to bet more, win more, enjoy the races, and have a nice life. I really dislike false, deceptive, misleading claims of win percentages and ROI that seem to mean one thing when in reality they mean something quite different. It is not necessary to study statistics to handicap horse races, nor to go through complex calculations to arrive at ROI or win percentages. All that is necessary is to view such claims critically, and realize they may not mean what you think they mean.

Best advice I can give to handicappers: Get a great little paperback book, highly readable, incredibly useful for handicappers, called "Decision Traps: The Ten Barriers to Brilliant Decision-Making and How to Overcome Them" by Russo and Schoemaker. In case you think it is "too fluffy" to be useful, I discovered it when it was used as a text in a university graduate class in managerial decision-making. Good stuff, and a really easy read. Should be available on amazon.com for a couple of bucks, or in a used book store.

Good Luck :)

[horsecrazy]

Well, I don't think I would ever go to his website. Even though everyone is saying he is very good at predicting what horses win, I would not gamble with money. EVER!!!

[kflickster]

I get the free email everyday and have bought his sheets at Turfway.Hes just like us sometimes hes hot,other times hes terrible.Im pretty sure his guarantee only goes for his first 3 picks though.The alternate horse is in the event of a scratch on the first 3.

[ProJoe]

This Guy gives Free picks to our e-mails and believe Me, His picks run 2nd and 3rd more often then Win. He's good at giving You horses for pick 3s and 4s if You already have the other races singled out. He's not all that good and He always lets You know when He wins. Whats the stats on him losing. td/ td/

[kflickster]

I agree with you Projoe if you are betting win only,but he has had some really nice hits on pick 3 and pick 4.I saw on the Keeneland site he had the free picks for each race and just for the heck of it I paid for his sheet that day,every pick was different than The Keeneland site.I like to do my own hadicapping but I work until 5:30 and sometimes use Turfway picks at the otb out of laziness.

[Jerfi]

Referring to TRAYNOR'S post a couple of messages above .....

Sampling on a small scale is incredibly deceptive.

When I test for ROI, I use a sample of 30 ... and I do it 30 times. Statistically, that is sound selection. ANY failure of the system during the 30 sets invalidates the system .... UNLESS ... the total of ALL 30 is a substantial positive result.

I once visited with a computer capper who assured me he had found the holy grail of trifecta picking. When I looked at his system, he was looking at the ALSO ELIGIBLE horses that did NOT draw in that day, but were in a race within a day or two. When he ran his program, he had a couple of hundred races in the data base, and sure enough, the ROI was there. When I examined those races, though, there was ONE trifecta that paid $1400. Taking that one out, his ROI was a negative 50%! :)