Matt Holthe's Fleeting Thoughts

Back on January 14, 2009, I went to the Florida/Auburn basketball game when I was in Georgia doing some work. I finally got around to pulling the pictures off the camera and decided to post them here.

Several years ago I started tracking how Tiger Woods was doing in comparison to Jack Nicklaus in terms of majors won at the same point in their careers. What used to be interesting is that Tiger was way ahead on wins but not even close on top-5 or top-10 finishes. It seemed (past tense) that Tiger would either win or be way out of the running. Over the past few years, Tiger has started to catch up on the top-5 and top-10 finishes in majors. At the 2009 Masters, completed yesterday, Tiger tied for 6th. Through 47 majors as a pro, Jack had 11 wins, 10 second place finishes, 26 top-3 finishes, 30 top-5 finishes, and 33 top-10 finishes. Now that Tiger has completed 47 majors as a pro, he has 14 wins (3 more than Jack), 5 second place finishes (5 less than Jack), 22 top-3's (4 less), 25 top-5's (5 less), and 30 top-10's (3 less). That's the thing that I found so amazing about Jack - not only did he win the most majors ever (which Tiger will most likely beat) but he was in th...

Sunday at the Masters was fabulous. Phil Mickelson shot a record-tying 30 on the front nine (guess I should say "first nine" - that's what Augusta National calls it) to put himself in a great position. Tiger Woods came along in the middle of the round to also put himself in position. The best each of them could do was one shot off the lead (Tiger never did overtake Phil) and then fell off on the finishing holes. Then a three way playoff was in store. Kenny Perry lost his way with his irons, and that cost him the tournament. Chad Campbell went from being in position to win on the first playoff hole (in the fairway with a great angle to the hole and the other two not on the green) to out after the first playoff hole (poor approach shot and poor putt). Angel Cabrera ended up winning his second major. Those majors are also his only PGA tour wins - he's the first golfer in 50 years to have his first PGA tour wins be majors.

2010 Thursday, March 18, and Saturday, March 20 Providence, RI (Eastern time zone), New Orleans, LA (Central), San Jose, CA (Pacific), and Spokane, WA (Pacific) Friday, March 19, and Sunday, March 21 Buffalo, NY (Eastern time zone), Jacksonville, FL (Eastern), Milwaukee, WI (Central), Oklahoma City, OK (Central) Thursday, March 25, and Saturday, March 27 Syracuse, NY, and Salt Lake City, UT Friday, March 26, and Sunday, March 28 St. Louis, MO, and Houston, TX Saturday, April 3, and Monday, April 5 Indianapolis, IN 2011 Thursday, March 17, and Saturday, March 19 to be announced Friday, March 18, and Sunday, March 20 to be announced Thursday, March 24, and Saturday, March 26 to be announced Friday, March 25, and Sunday, March 27 to be announced Saturday, April 2, and Monday, April 4 Houston, TX

Overall, a pretty poor NCAA tournament ended last night in the largest championship halftime margin ever and the largest championship final margin since 1992. Some stats: Top 3 seeds were 24-0 in the first two rounds. No upsets. Top 4 seeds were 29-2 in the first two rounds. Wake Forest was the only #4 seed to lose its first round game. And they lost by 15, so it wasn't really all that exciting. Three #12 seeds (Arizona, Wisconsin, and Western Kentucky) won first round games. #12 seed Arizona made it to the sweet 16. Purdue (#5) was the only other non-top-4 seed to make the sweet 16. There were no overtime games on the first day of the tournament. On the second day (still the first round), Wisconsin beat Florida State in overtime and Siena beat Ohio State in double-overtime. Those were the only overtime games in the whole tournament. Out of 63 games, there were 2 games decided by 1 point, 6 decided by 2 points, 1 decided by 3 points, and 3 decided by 4 points. That's 12 games (...

Official Statement from Bally's: Effective March 31, 2009, the Bally's Sportsbook will temporarily close for the season. The management team at Bally's Las Vegas anticipates a tentative re-opening date of early Fall 2009. Fewer than 10 employees were affected by the temporary closure. During the closure, Harrah's Entertainment's will continue to offer 7 full-service Sports Book locations in Las Vegas, including Paris Las Vegas, Caesars Palace, Flamingo Las Vegas, Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino, Harrah's Las Vegas, Imperial Palace and Bill's Gamblin' Hall & Saloon. Due to the close proximity of the Paris Sports Book, we anticipate that guests will not be inconvenienced and will continue to receive the same high level of service.

I really like reading Casino Player magazine. This month, they had an article documenting how slot payback percentages have decreased over time. There were several charts listing payouts for different denominations at different casinos. For the Las Vegas strip, Nevada law doesn't require each casino to report their numbers, so they are grouped together. Instead of listing out all the individual casinos all over (there are lots of tables) I've only listed the Las Vegas strip table. Here are the historical payouts (how much of the money coming in is returned to the players) for the different denominations over time. Notice how the percentages generally decrease over time.   March 2000 July 2003 July 2007 July 2008 January 2009 Pennies No data No data 89.0 88.2 86.6 Nickels 90.8 90.3 88.9 88.5 88.0 Quarters 92.8 92.8 91.8 91.8 90.5 Dollars 94.3 94.7 93.4 93.3 92.1 5-Dollars 95.3 95.7 94.8 94.9 95.1 From July, 2008 to January, 2009, only the $5 slots...

Tim and I have been doing a bracket challenge on CBS sports for 6 years now. Here is the history of our results: 2004: Tim with 139 points (41 correct), Matt with 124 points (38 correct) 2005: Tim with 165 points (41 correct), Matt with 136 points (39 correct) 2006: Matt's 2nd bracket with 217 points (38 correct), Tim's 1st bracket with 213 points (37 correct), Matt's 1st bracket with 189 points (35 correct), and Tim's 2nd bracket with 178 points (34 correct) 2007: Matt with 276 points (46 correct), Tim with 171 points (34 correct) 2008: Matt with 177 points (34 correct), Tim with 169 points (33 correct) 2009: Matt with 263 points (42 correct), Tim with 252 points (44 correct) - this is the first year that the person with the most points didn't also have the most correct picks Obviously, Matt in 2007 had the best year with 46 correct. But I didn't even get the national champion right that year (I had Ohio State, who ended up as runner up to Florida). In 2005 Tim...

From the March, 2009, issue of Casino Player magazine... In a single game of blackjack, you have a 46.4% chance of winning a hand (assuming optimal play). You will win 8 consecutive hands once in every 469 hands. (This means that if you play at a "normal" pace of 65-70 hands per hour, it will happen on average once in every 7 hours). You will lose 8 consecutive hands once in every 145 hands (every 2 to 3 hours). Your chances of winning 20 hands in a group of 30 is about 1 in 50. Your chances of losing 20 hands in a group of 30 is about 1 in 9. That last one got me. Let's say you normally sit at a blackjack table for 2 hours. That's somewhere around 130 hands played. Which is a little more than 4 groups of 30. Chances are that every other time you sit down to play blackjack you'll have a group of 30 hands where you lose 20 of them. Because you only win 46.4% of the overall hands, that is why is it extremely important that you take advantage of double downs and spl...

Well, it's a good thing I don't bet on sports for a living... Baylor beat San Diego St 76-62. Baylor covered (I said go with the underdog) and they barely went over 136.5 (I said go under) Penn St beat Notre Dame 67-59. Penn St beat the spread (I got that right) and were well under 138 (I said go over)