This one seems to have promise, as at least he had great results the last three years. As for this year, I tracked it myself though games of Sunday, and it is 10-8, +2.06 units the first four days of May. Enjoy!


Bullpens: The key to winning MLB handicapping
By: LT Profits Sports Group


We have always felt that if you only bet on quality bullpens, you should virtually always have winning seasons in Major League Baseball.

This is because baseball betting lines have always been based mostly on starting pitchers, while the bullpens have been undervalued. Well, we decided to go back and put out theory to the test over the last three years, and even we were pleasantly surprised with the results. It has almost gotten to the point that we could simply stop handicapping baseball altogether starting May 1 and strictly play the bullpen angle.

There is one factor holding us back from doing that however. While the results from last season were excellent by most standards, they actually showed the smallest profit of our three-year study. Thus, we could say that perhaps the oddsmakers have found their errors in their ways of the past, and that they are starting to incorporate bullpens into the lines a bit more adequately. The pens still look undervalued, just not as undervalued as they used to be. Thus, we would not recommend abandoning other baseball handicapping methods just yet, as they may take center stage again in the next few years.

For now though, we are confident that our bullpen angle will have another profitable angle this season. For starters, here are the results of simply betting on every team that is in the top 10 in the Major Leagues in bullpen ERA entering each day’s play for the last three seasons, from May 1 through the end of the regular season:

ALL Top 10 Pen ERA Teams (Starting 5/1)

Year W L Pct Units
2007 727 646 52.9% 40.20
2006 752 623 54.7% 67.52
2005 740 635 53.8% 59.84

So by doing absolutely no handicapping whatsoever, one could have picked up an average of +55.9 units per season the last three years by just betting on the top 10 bullpens from May 1 onward! This is certainly a nice starting point that will be greatly improved on with a couple of easy filters, which we are about to get into.

First of all, betting on every top 10 bullpen ERA team would mean making 10 MLB plays on days with full schedules when none of those top pens are facing each other. While having a high volume like that is good for sampling purposes, it is not optimal from a betting perspective, especially when the profit could be increased greatly while playing fewer plays with two very basic tighteners.

First of all, we would pass on any game when two top 10 bullpen teams face each other. We toyed with the idea of always taking the underdog in such circumstances, but the results were not to our liking. Secondly, while a top 10 bullpen team would be an automatic play as an underdog of any price vs. a non-top 10 pen team, when the top pen is favored, we found the best cut-off point to be only favorites of less than -130 (i.e., up to -129). Take a look at the three-year results now:

Top 10 Pen ERA vs. Non-Top 10 Pen ERA
As Dogs or as Favorites < -130 (Starting May 1)

Year W L Pct Units
2007 375 400 48.4% 76.24
2006 399 383 51.0% 112.08
2005 387 392 49.7% 104.70

We now have a strategy that could stand alone starting in May, although we will not go that route personally, continuing to use other methods also. The three-year average of +97.7 units in five months is certainly impressive, but as we said earlier, the distribution has us thinking the bookmakers are catching on. Now most people would be happy with 76.2 units, and we would certainly take it, but last season was a bit disappointing after two seasons over 100 units.

It is interesting that the winning percentages were under 50 percent in two of the years and a nondescript 51 percent the third year, but that is the beauty of playing primarily underdogs with a few small favorites sprinkled in.

Interesting theory, good read. Most of the thought in terms of determining odds in baseball is ERA differential in starting pitching match ups. Its a good angle to play I guess. I am assuming that the main angle here is that a good bullpen is a key feature to a winning club and due to that is good for holding leads and getting wins.

Is there a site where the bullpens are listed by ERA?

FYI, I would not use this system with 5 inning lines.

The thoery is acually in the article, that being that the betting line is based on starting pitching and bullpens are undervalued in the line.

Bullpen ERA rankings are updated every day at covers.

No, this is definitely not intended for 5-inning lines. One of the beauties of betting a team with a good bullpen is that the team could fall behind early, and the pen could shut down the opposition and give the team a chance to come back.

3 money making teams this season (AZ, Oak and Fla) are all in the top 10

It looks like no plays tonight unless the Dodgers drop below -130

would seem that 2 top 10 bullpens facing each other would lead to unders?

It would tomla, but I just don't know and am too lazy to analyze it myself. ;)

Covers.com has the Bullpen's ranked (by ERA.) Just click on MLB, then Statistics.

I like to combine good bullpens teams with good pitchers too ;)

Would be interesting to see how the bullpen ERA's for home and away would do.

Statfox gives these numbers for each team, but perhaps BP ERA and Home/Away BP ERA could be included on the page with all teams.

Ah yes home/away performance should make some difference!

this did very well last night :)

http://mlb.mlb.com/stats/sortable_team_stats.jsp?statType=2&statType=2&timeFrame=1&timeFrame=1&c_id=mlb&c_id=mlb&groupByTeam=true&groupByTeam=true§ion2=null&sitSplit=grp&sitSplit=&checkBoxTotal=0&statSet2=null&Submit=Submit&Submit=Submit&baseballScope=mlb&baseballScope=mlb&timeSubFrame=2008&timeSubFrame=2008&timeSubFrame=2008&sortByStat=ERA

Here this might make it easier for you! Since this a public forum I will share this EVERYONE!

Bullpen system sounds profitable why not continue it?

The system I was using was to match TLA stats and Jeff Sagarin's pitcher stats. Results were good but not good enough. Sometimes a "better pitcher" may lose to a "worse pitcher" then I noticed that "loser" team has got better pens. I'll try to include BULLPEN factor too. baseball is not all about pitchers anymore.

yesterday's result (minnesota-boston game is nıot completed but minny is 7-1 ahead so I assume that minnesota win)

6-28 w h
5-29 w h
10-16 L a
2-30 w a
9-22 l a
12-23 w h
3-27 w a
17-25 l h
8-13 l a
1-19 l a
15-21 l a
4-18 l h

first 10 vs last 10
4-1 record yesterday..

with some filters (starting pitchers, winning records, run average etc) we can improve it maybe?

Looks interesting..

Anyone have record for 2008 Season?