Happy Festivus
"Many Christmases ago, I went to buy a doll for my son. I reached for the last one they had, but so did another man. As I rained blows upon him, I realized there had to be another way..."
-Frank Constanza
So a few years back I decided to partake in dry January. Figured I would start off the New Year right, get in shape, take my health more seriously. The first 31 days of the year came and went, and I didn't feel a bit of difference. I was determined to get results from consciously making "good" decisions, so I kept dry January rolling straight into February. Another month comes and goes, and still nothing. My mental and physical health remain unchanged. But I was not to be deterred - we head into dry March. As all of you drunk Irishmen know, your god's day is in March. When the 17th rolled around and not drinking a drop of alcohol had yet to make one bit of difference, I indulged in the festivities.
Eventually, I ran my experience by a friend and they told me that I most likely didn't feel any different because I didn't have a problem with alcohol in the first place. Here I am, thinking I'm doing everything right, and instead, I'm telling on myself for being a fucking loser without an alcohol issue. Double whammy.
I bring this up as I recently tried the same thing with social media (I only use Twitter). Even with the experience of depriving myself of something failing miserably in the past, I thought this would be different. Taking some time away from Twitter would be a good thing; less of a time suck, less annoyed with things that don't matter, more focus on life around me. Plus, I have my second child coming in the Spring and I thought this would be good practice for when I have to remember how to take care of another human and can't spend my time being irrationally angry at internet strangers.
Long story short, the break from Twitter did next to nothing. I guess I did realize that not opening the app 27 times a day is easier than I thought it would be, but overall, little to no improvement in my mental or physical state. Taking longer breaks throughout the day will definitely be easier, but for the most part, I just felt out of the loop and uninformed. Have to admit...being an Ohio State fan made the tail end of my hiatus much more palatable. 95% of sporting outcomes have no impact on my life, but being a lifetime Buckeye, I'm not able to shake this last bit of fandom. It's ridiculous and I'm a child, but it eats me alive.
So here we are, back on Twitter, diving into the cesspool that we all enjoy far too frequently. It’s the time of year when friends and family are around more often and we get the pleasure (?) of their presence. It’s a time to reflect on what has gone right and what has gone wrong. But more than anything, it’s the best time of the year to let others know how we feel. 2024 was a hell of a year, but Festivus couldn't come at a better time. I would like to air my grievances. I GOT A LOT OF PROBLEMS WITH YOU PEOPLE AND NOW YOU'RE GONNA HEAR ABOUT IT.
Frank: You, Kruger. My son tells me your company stinks.
Circle Back
This causes me great pain, but Festivus is a time for being honest. This show stinks. Let's take a step back before we get into the meat of the discussion.
When I first heard this type of show was being released, I was so excited, but also extremely jealous. I had this idea a very long time ago, as I'm sure at least 10-20 other people on gambling Twitter could claim. It's just too obvious. Sports betting has progressed rapidly and there's essentially zero new information being provided anymore. The occasional good podcasts happen when someone tells a story no one has heard yet or speaks of an experience that was possible a decade or more ago. Edges will not be discussed, valuable secrets will continue to be kept (as they should be), and the content that does get released is mostly watered down for the masses. The only logical way to progress was to view our sports betting ecosystem as a trashy reality show with some of the most fucked up cast members imaginable. The 'TMZification' of sports betting, if you will. The show was there for the taking.
So, Circles Off and The Hammer crew comes along to fulfill that niche in the market. Sounds great, most of what they do is really well done, so this potential goldmine of a show will be no different. Boy, was I wrong.
In the spirit of continued honesty, I have to admit that I only listened to the first 3 episodes before pulling the plug. I felt like I gave it a fair shot and it didn't deliver like I thought it would. It's superficial at best, touching on the lightest of subjects, still appealing to the masses and edited so that YouTube or their show's sponsors don't get too upset. If Simon Hunter calls Rob a pedophile, Rob has the right duty to fire back at him using his own platform. Tell the people what kind of cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-ass, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed sack of monkey shit Simon really is. Instead, we get some sort of light-hearted fluff with a cast of sports betting-adjacent characters.
This comes from a place of love as the show had so much potential. It could still be turned around, or a competitor could pop-up and do it right if they wanted to put the time in. To my dozens and dozens of readers - DM me your resume to create a much better version of this show. To be fair, I should really go back and listen to some of the more recent episodes, but that might ruin my jokes, so I refuse. Here's what went wrong:
I hate to give a boost to this fella's ego as it's already overflowing like your drunk uncle's cup of eggnog, but he got it right from the jump:
It's like Rob and Ggeofff were sitting in the room ready to tape when they looked around and realized there were only two of them. So they pulled in the two dudes sitting behind the glass who were supposed to be producing the podcast (not dissing producers, producers' lives matter, shoutout producer Zack) and gave them a mic. I completely understand the show isn't that serious and isn't meant to be dissected like I am, but at the same time.....what is a TakesbyJ and a Jacob Gramenga? Know what would give a lot more credibility to the sports betting taekes flying around a sports betting drama show? If the people firing the taekes had credibility in the sports betting space!
Next up - and here's the real reason I stopped listening after episode 3: I've never heard one person speak as much as Geof did on that podcast. I think, somehow, Rob spoke less when he did the solo episode of Circles Off a few weeks back. I swear to god this is a true story - I listened to that episode while I sat in a dealership as my car's brakes were being checked. They were screeching super loud and it was driving me nuts. As the episode was nearing completion, the service manager came out to tell me the brakes were still screeching and they couldn't figure it out. I told him it was no problem and to please give me my keys back immediately as the screeching brakes might drown out Fienberg. Jgeoff - you don't have to be making a noise at all times. Even when you're collecting your thoughts, which seems to take a while during these shows, you can do so silently. Other contributors are allowed to speak. So many "ahhhhhh....I don't knowwwww...ahh...like, you see.....uhhhh....ahhh....I guess you're kinnnnddaa right, Rob" sound bytes. Your takes aren't even that bad and I don't disagree with some of what you're saying! We just need a little less noise from your mic.
The show needs to have a rotating cast of characters. I believe they've brought on Kirk Evans (pre-body slammed version) more frequently, which gives the credibility a big boost. But you can't have the same people making these same judgements every week or it loses a lot of the zest. Rob as a mainstay to keep everything on track, everything else is interchangeable.
Lastly, and this might be the most realistic option - a show like this can't be scheduled for a weekly release. A lot of things happen throughout the week, but not nearly enough to warrant a 1+ hour show every single week. I know that one of the biggest factors of success for any podcast is regularity, but maybe the regularity needs to be once every 2-3 weeks? Otherwise, you're gonna end up touching on some ridiculous topics, like a discussion around one of the hosts potentially changing their Twitter profile picture. OK, I'm just being facetious, there's no way that would ever happen, let alone it being used to promote an episode of the podcast. But the point remains, we can't fill air time just to fill air time.
Elaine: Hey, how did my horse do?
Bookie: He had to be shot.
TBone
Alright, continued honesty during Festivus: I've had TBone muted for the better part of a year, maybe more. I couldn't take one more post about that SteveWillDoIt guy. Truly, I still have no clue who he is and I have no plans to figure it out. The best part is there's no chance Steve knows who TBone is. He's just that coked up dude who's always in the back of his videos making migrant worker and sexist jokes.
It sounds like TBone is having a rough end to 2024. It appears he was fired He quit being a runner for a group after some sort of ticket writer tipping fiasco and took some Twitter heat as a result. In a different universe, TBone might do a quick introspection and gauge his current standing in sports betting. I'd like to imagine it would go something like this:
"Alright, TBone. We've had a great year. Mentioned Steve 8,000 times and only got thrown out of 2 casinos. Took some heat on social media lately, but let's log on to see who has our back....."
"Ahh, shit. It's that American, who lives in the United States Midwest, but is bizarrely employed by a Canadian sports betting exchange no one has ever heard of, which 95% of her followers can't use, and made the odd decision to joke about problem gambling. Not great, but we can bounce back as long as no one else jumps in to cause more damage...."
"Motherfucker."
The Feats of Strength
Joey Tunes
I feel like I'm about to give a Steve Fezzik-esque disclaimer here, but I do like Joey Tunes. Meeting him in person at Bet Bash was a treat.
With that said...Joey - what the fuck is your Twitter account? Have any of you ever scrolled this thing? It's this insane collection of half thoughts, things that don't make sense, copy and pasted news that could have been re-tweeted, and fake stories that actually are re-tweeted.
We gotta clean this up, Mr. Tunes. Although I'm with you on this Kirk Evans character. I've heard from reliable sources that his fantasy football team sucks dick and he snuck into the playoffs with the 3 seed cause his points against were BY FAR the lowest in the league and if he was a real man he would have given his spot to more deserving owners. Guys like him deserve to be body slammed through a table.
Kramer: And is there a tree?
Frank: No. Instead there's a pole. Requires no decoration. I find tinsel distracting.
Elf
I think this kid would get distracted by a plastic bag blowing in the wind. I dislike everything this kid does so much that I'm almost coming around on him. I can promise you it won’t happen, but he seems mostly harmless. Him and +EV are off in their little corner discussing nerd actuarial science or some shit like that while the rest of us gamble and lose like real men.
Elf seems like the kind of sports betting newcomer where you could insult him to his face and he has absolutely no idea he's being insulted. Wait...
I think he's in the Hall of Fame for sports bettors that have entered the space and determined they're a seasoned pro after arbing with OJ (wow just realized if he didn't die we may have seen some of the best affiliate marketing with an ex-athlete/convict of all time) for a few months. Pretty sure he would shill for a used condom company if he thought it would further his brand and/or he could make a quick buck off of it. I recently checked NoVig for odds on him releasing a shitcoin to rug pull and it was -1000000. Seems cheap.
I like to envision him and his social media manager (read: unemployed friend that's on social media too often) meeting about his sports betting profile:
Elf: Alright, let's talk strategy sesh. Should I give up the weirdo arm sleeve of stuffed animals?
Social Media Manager: No way! That's your brand, man.
Elf: Cool cool cool....and what do you think about me shilling products? Should I lighten up on that sports betting credit card thing that requires you to withdrawal massive amounts of funds from all your sportsbook accounts every single night to earn an extra $50?
SMM: Are you kidding?! Sportsbooks and banks are gonna LOVE when customers adopt this practice and start using this fake credit card thing to collectively request withdrawals for hundreds of thousands of dollars! No downside there.
Elf: Nice, nice nice....alright, but are these weird, AI generated Elf videos played out?
SMM: Nah, gotta stick with those, the people can't get enough!
Elf: Yep yep yep....and should I keep signing off each night with me throwing up the deuces from a weird selfie angle?
SMM: I'm not even answering that question.
Jerry: A donation has been made in your name to the Human Fund. What is that?
George: Made it up.
Jerry: The Human Fund. Money for people.
George: What do you think?
Jerry: It has a certain understated stupidity.
Redacted G4MBLER
A certain understated stupidity. This guy(s) is actually great, but I take major issue with one thing: he posted an entire thread in a normal, logical writing style.
Do you know how unsettling it was to read through that? I mean, it's even discussing one of the best topics of all time - how much of a loser Steve Fezzik is and how he steals other touts' plays. But I could barely take in the message because IT WASN'T IN ALL CAPS. How fucked up have our brains become when we are thrown off by a member of gambling Twitter NOT tweeting like a deranged lunatic? Speaking of which....
Frank: It's made from aluminum. Very high strength to weight ratio.
Kruger: I find your belief system fascinating.
Diggs
This guy's belief system is extremely fascinating, let's dig in (pun always intended). If you, the reader, have heard the same stuff I have, we've always been under the assumption diggs is an endboss originator for the NFL and is able to beat the sport in the most liquid markets at the highest limits. I have zero reason to believe otherwise and his reputation has always carried weight amongst sharp sports bettors.
I don't know why I've always assumed that endboss originators like him would carry themselves differently, maybe not interact on Twitter the same way us nobodies do. Like, I knew there would be some Taylor Swift content retweeted from endboss originators, but didn’t know the commitment I was making. Diggs has always perplexed me, and I've definitely been intimidated by his reputation. I really do think a lot of people, weird as it may be, are scared to say things on Twitter for fear of him and his buddies piling on. But when you peel back some of the layers, you start to realize there's no reason to feel individually attacked. Scroll through his replies and see the inordinate amount of time he spends just hurling random insults at Twitter users of all shapes and sizes. Just a constant stream of telling everyone how dumb/wrong they are. Imagine this, over and over and over.
It's just these odd little pop-shots at people non-stop. You start to maybe not feel as bad when you see how he sprays insults like he’s firing a Tommy gun in Angels with Filthy Souls. And part of this issue is just me reading too much into what is considered “sharp” gambling Twitter. I guess I’ve always assumed people held in higher, “sharper” regard would be more of a reflection of those well-regarded viewpoints. Then again, look at the people currently running or about to be running the most powerful nation in the world. One is drooling into his oatmeal by 6:30 PM each night and the other has a better chance of destroying the country than creating any real, meaningful change. Maybe we (Edit: I) should stop placing as much importance or weight in people that have reached the top of their craft? Lastly, I've been on record about this several times, but if this is what's beneficial to you, as an individual, more power to you. If calling people out for stuff is what keeps your mind at ease and keeps you sane, then by all means, continue doing so. No one should tell others what is and isn't healthy for sanity.
George: What is that? Is that the pole?
Frank: George, Festivus is your heritage. It's part of who you are.
George: That's why I hate it.
The Unabated Crew
For people that, once upon a time, were not here to sell you anything....they sure did find a way to sell you a lot of stuff! Not only will they continue to find products/services to sell, they will do so before the rest of their offerings are far from perfected.
Before I dive into other observations, I have a genuine question for those reading this silly blog: how perfect should a product be before you release it for sale to the general public? Yes, I took some intro level business courses and understand that there is no perfect response to this question. The product has to have the right combination of innovation, customers' willingness to look past the imperfections because of the perceived upside, and a price point that justifies what a customer gets. If these things are mostly in place, the product should be ready for sale. So as far as the Unabated founders and day-to-day employees are concerned, as long as people's monthly or yearly subscription renews, they must be doing enough things right (Ed from RAS vehemently nodding his head in agreement).
I'm definitely attempting to hold them to a higher standard and scrutinizing what they pump out, but we should be doing this with every new product released in sports betting. The space is still ripe for releasing "cutting edge" tools that someone, somewhere, will come along and purchase. It doesn't make it right to continue releasing additional, for-sale products when you haven't fixed everything you started with.
I've used Unabated for a while and I think it has a lot of practical, useful tools. The calculators and line comparison tools are easy enough to use and save an advanced user some time, which is really the name of the game. The derivatives, alt-line calculators, and futures simulations can also be super useful. Do I feel as though I've been able to find enough value from Unabated to warrant what I paid for a yearly subscription? No, I do not. I don't want this to be some long, running list of everything that's wrong with their site, but I here's a few general sentiments I think a lot of users would agree with:
- The entire site is fairly glitchy, and I apologize for not having a better description. If you use it regularly, you know what I mean. It will log you out frequently. It gives you error messages if you click around too often. Feeds struggle to stay up to date. I remember when I first signed up I wanted to try out that concierge tool - you know, the one that spoon feeds edges to players who refuse to use even 1 brain cell. I cannot tell you how many of the lines were stale. It was so far from being ready to sell.
- The odds screen has feeds that are constantly down, and they don't release any type of wide-spread communication about the feeds until they absolutely have to. I don't use the site as my main source of an odds screen, but people who do use it regularly shouldn't constantly be asking when Caesars is going to be functional once again. And don't give me some sort of "you have to be in our private Discord to stay up to date" - that's complete bullshit. Paying customers shouldn't have to navigate to a seldom used app to hear about major site disruptions.
- The odds screen is frequently laggy. Pull open your SpankOdds real-time feed next to an Unabated screen to see what I mean. I know that the odds screen is just one of the many features of Unabated, but let's be real, this should be a no-brainer, slam dunk of a product offered by a company focused on odds. Even the books that have a little green dot, claiming to be "real-time," are delayed when comparing it to the moves you can watch on SpankOdds.
- The importing of your own player projections is also super glitchy and running them on the player prop pages takes a ton of time. The site also doesn't allow you to do enough sorting and filtering of games, which means you're left staring at a whole lot of information you shouldn't have to sort through to find your bets. As we all know, speed and a focused set of data are things all sports bettors should strive for.
Additional Festivus issues I don't have enough material for to give their own section:
Broner - My guy, you are the absolute best. But nobody, and I mean nobody, gives a shit about boxing.
Benson - Hey normally spelled Jeff, how about you get off Twitter for 2 seconds and start pricing some of those derivatives and player prop markets where we all make our money and everyone is convinced you would offer if you came to their state?
Trench - Buddy, come back to Twitter. There's a huge, gaping hole. Just a massive hole that only you could fill. You would fill that hole so nicely.
Johnny From BetStamp - You claim you don't have social media profiles, but you're always very well aware of what's going on in the Twitter streets. We know you're lurking on your burner. Come hang with us. Be one of us.
NoVig - Can we calm the hell down with the marketing notifications?
OH SHIT, NoVig is giving away not one but two sets of AirPods! That makes me want to deposit millions of dollars buy millions of dollars of NoVig cash that can be bet and later redeemed for real money!!! You guys gotta be more like that Alex Kane dude from SportTrade. I have no fucking clue how his exchange works, nor can I use it, but damn if I don't read his tweets about it every couple of minutes.
Spanky - How's the American Bettors' Voice coming along? Is the state of Wyoming ready to lead the charge against the unfair practice of limiting winning players?
NFLPinnacleBeater and Gamberly - No jokes to make here. The real Festivus issue I have is that the American education system failed you, and for that, I am sorry.
Happy Festivus!
Until next time.
Ferris
@FerrisB_86
