Saturday, 3 January 2009

First Impressions

Since Last Post P/L: £40.98
Monthly P/L: £40.98
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Celebrity Big Brother got underway last night and even though it may seem a little sad, the thought of all these prima-donnas arguing over the milk gets me excited. The line-up is a good mix of personalities but one in particular looks to have stolen the show already.
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Verne Troyer is best known for the role he played as Mini-Me in the Austin Powers series of films, and even though he only measures 2 feet 8 inches it seems he's been keen to explore other opportunities since the last movie 'Goldmember' was released in 2002. Gus from the Tellybetting blog has already pointed out that Verne has some form when it comes to reality shows and as I'm a big believer in first impressions I've decided to make a play after just the first show. I'm opposing the female contestants as voting usually goes the way of the males when the decision on who gets evicted gets put to the public. Here's my book as it currently stands:
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Tonight also sees the start of the NFL playoffs and as usual I've tried to predict the eventual winner of the Superbowl. Last year I did quite poorly so I'm hoping to rectify things over the coming weeks and the following rankings are how I see the teams at the minute based on them meeting at a neutral venue. The latest Betfair odds are in brackets.
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1. Pittsburgh (6.4)
2. Baltimore (16)
3. Philadelphia (16.5)
4. Indianapolis (12)
5. NY Giants (4.1)
6. Tennessee (7.2)
7. Carolina (7.0)
8. Minnesota (42)
9. Atlanta (36)
10. Arizona (65)
11. Miami (55)
12. San Diego (22)
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With the way the seeding system works it's not just a case of backing the top team, so after trying to decipher the outcomes of each game I've dutched the following teams:
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The big gamble is opposing Tennessee. I think they've flattered to deceive this season and even though they finished the regular season with a 13-3 record I can't see them pushing past the likes of Pittsburgh at this stage. They have afterall, lost 3 of their last 6 games. Famous last words eh?!?

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The PDC World Darts Championships also now rolls onto the Semi-Finals and how good was it to see Barney take out a 9 darter last night? He was on fire against Klaasen and the thought of him versus Taylor in the Final is a mouth watering prospect. I can't see Wade causing him too much of a problem on current form.
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I blew a bit of profit last night but at least I've started the year in a positive way:
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Darts
King v Bates : £25.54
Taylor v Stompe : £44.97
Nicholson v Wade : £49.73
Van Barneveld v Klaasen : £79.26
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5 comments:

Craig said...

Hi Mark. Long time reader, first time poster.

Just a quick question about your NFL Screenshot. You have San Diego ranked 12th, quite rightly in my opinion, and Miami ranked 11th yet you have green on them? I was just wondering if you could explain why / how you arrived at this?

I thought it may have been home advantage but then realised that you were red on 10th placed Arizona who are also at home.

Cheers and good luck.

Craig

Mark Iverson said...

Hi Craig,

Nice to hear from you!

Ideally I want as many teams on my side as possible but obviously also want to end up with a value bet so I run through a process of elimination until I feel comfortable with the odds on offer.

Even though I don't think Miami will go all the way it doesn't mean that they won't. After looking at their possible fixtures it doesn't seem beyond reality that they'll beat Baltimore at home, sneak a victory at Pittsburgh and then win at home to the likes of Indy (they would get home field adv. in the Conference Championship if Tennessee lose their game which I think is a decent possibility). For this reason I wanted to keep them in the mix and because their price is 55 on Betfair, I'm able to do this at a low risk.

I hope this makes sense mate :-)

At the end of the day though I'm still working on the NFL so it could all go pear shaped!

All the best,

Mark

P.S. I just can't fancy Arizona - if they get past Atlanta they have to go to the Giants and I think that'll be a bridge too far.

Anonymous said...

Hi Mark,

Happy New Year. Hope Christmas went well for you all. Hope Nic and the little guy are well.

I am on Mutya and Tina in Celeb BB, purely for fun though! I have no idea who Tina is!!

All the best for the New Year, hope to get the blog up soon again.

Gareth

Mark Iverson said...

Hi Gareth,

Happy New Year to you too!

What happened to the blog? I thought you were making a come back :-)

Big Bro should be interesting and with Lucy Pinder in there I'm not going to miss many episodes!

All the best mate.

Mark

Anonymous said...

I agree with you on Tennessee, I really like Baltimore to go far

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