Hey everybody, and welcome to Gambling with an Edge. That's right, It
is Gambling with an Edge, not Life Is a Gamble. Reports of our
death were exaggerated. So yes, we will occasionally be doing episodes of Gambling
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oh, you know, we should, we should do an episode.
And so here we are for today's episode, which we talk about super Bowl
twenty four and in addition, we talked to some of the things going on
in Las Vegas. I just wanted to also say you can always get a
hold of me at Life Is a gamblepod at gmail dot com, or you
can find me on Twitter at RWM twenty one. Now here's the show.
Good afternoon. You're listening to Gambling with an Edge. Now here're your hosts,
Bob Dancer and Richard Munchkin. Good afternoon, Welcome to Gambling with an
Edge. I'm Bob Dancer and I'm Richard Munchkin. Now, Gambling with an
Edge doesn't do many podcasts anymore, kind of somewhat randomly, but today we
have on Anthony Curtis and Frank B We're going to be talking about the Super
Bowl, which is being held in Las Vegas, and it's the first Super
Bowl ever with a Taylor Swift aspect to it, and where we have other
things to talk about as well. So Anthony and Frank, welcome to Gambling
with an Itch. Hey guys, hey there, thank you all right.
So every year at Super Bowl, the Westgate gives out a big line of
props. Pro stand in line, get to make one bet and then they
go to the back of the line and it lasts forever. Anthony, you
were there this year. How did that work? There was no line.
I got Actually I showed up about an hour after the opening, and I
was absolutely shot. There wasn't a single person in line. There's you know,
I've gone to I don't know how many of these fifteen or so sixteen
and it's diminished over the years. But in the beginning and years after when
I started going, the lines would be around the corner and would last for
hours and hours. So I got there an hour late, figuring, you
know it was it would still be going, and there was not a single
person in line. There was only one person I knew I saw pheasick there.
It's just a changing of the guard, you know, the way it
is. And apparently they came out online, you know, a couple of
days earlier, and that scene is over. It's just gone. It used
to be the big on, you know, the big reveal, and it
was absolutely nothing. I was I was shocked. Do you think Westgate will
try to preempt people like in the future so that they because that was kind
of a cachet that they were the first, right that they would put out
the props first. Do you think they want to go back to that.
I think they would if they could. But I mean they've lost a lot
of them. You know, Frank can speak to us probably better than I,
but they've lost a lot of their their fire in a lot of ways,
you know. I mean, they were the super contest. They were
it, and that just you know, that title got heisted by sir.
You know, the circa contests absolutely crushed west Skate now and you know,
others wanted to have their props out first, and you know, as we
got more into the digital age and online books and sports betting around the country,
other places just hopped up in front of them. And I don't know
if they'll ever be able to get that back. What do you think,
Frank, Well, I think that the big problem with trying to be first
is that the way they go about it is they are very deliberate and they
take time, and they have a big template that they use every year and
it's just not automated, so they're doing things more by hand and involving recency
and these DraftKings, fandles, they're just almost literally pushing a button for this
to update the things that they did last week because because they offer a big
menu like that every week. So on Monday morning, you know, DraftKings
was up, Fandel was up, ESPN had some stuff up, and you
know, it sort of takes the air out of the balloon for Westgate because
they go about things a different way, a better way, a more competent
way, and a more responsible way. But you know, that's just the
way it is. So I think that's a thing of a past. I'm
being the premiere of the lines. You know, it's the unveiling of everything
because they do things that other places don't. But the days of them being
you know, the premiere of everything and anything that's going to be super bowl.
Those are long un see that was going to go see that's what's going
on with these places like fandul and Draftking says, it's all algamariva. You
know. They've got all their stuff. They pop it in and they simulate
these things a million times in ten seconds or less, you know what I
mean. And so they can they can beat anybody to the punch on this
and get reasonable lines. You know for sure, even with Westgate where they
have things maybe that other people don't when they open them at the super book,
do they put them on their app at the same time so you don't
really have to go down there. There's a slight delay. I believe there's
a slight delay. I did. I wasn't checking in real time last night,
but they get that would even take the air out of the balloon even
more if you didn't even have to show up for it. So usually by
the end of the night, Yeah, and the line diyed. So who
knows when they put them up. I have to ask some guys that were
there, but they kind of like listen, they used to keep the sheet
secret for a day or two. You couldn't get a sheet for a day
or two. Now you can go right online an hour or so after and
get the whole sheet, and they literally hand them out to us. Like
last year they handed them out standing in line. So I'm standing in line
and they just go, here's a sheet. So yeah, I mean,
you got to keep up with your competition, and the competition says, you
know, when to play these games. You know we're going to we're going
to get stuff up early, we're gonna make the information available to you.
And they had to follow suit. You know. It's kind of another example
of what Frank's been saying now for two years, is that not just forget
about the Westgate specifically, Nevada is just losing the crown, you know,
of being the sports betting centric place. Everyone else is moving forward and Nevada
seems to be stuck in the mud. Yeah, it seems to me they're
the worst state to be a sports better. I mean, well, Richard,
have you gone have you even have you gone to Arizona and experienced the
difference between betting on your desktop and betting on the phone. We're getting to
the point where we have to start calling this archaic. Why they can't get
it done, I don't know. Yeah, and not only do you have
to bet on your phone. You can't open the account unless you actually go
to the casino, whereas in Arizona you can open an account, you know,
from your home in your underwear. And it's yeah, it's absurd how
bad it is here. And the original thought as to why they're doing this
once the other states started to open up is that, you know, Vegas
guys, you know, you got the reputation Vegas guys are those are the
shark guys. The shark guys all move into lot, you know, move
to Las Vegas, you know, apply their trade there, and so we're
gonna make it We're not gonna make it so easy on them. We don't
want them having this, for that's too much access. We start to lose
control when that happens. That was the thinking. I'm not so sure that
that's what is. And then I don't know if they're just lazy or a
bit arrogant saying, oh, well we're Las Vegas, we don't have to
do that. But whatever it is, it's definitely just because it costs a
bunch of sharp guys moving out of town to better states. That's that's not
so no big loss for them, but it's still they would do better business
if they could just get that, just get the website stuff going and make
it more easy, more impulsive for somebody to get money into a time where
they could just get on their phone, didn't be sitting on the toilet.
Okay, I just deposited to Westgate. I just deposited to MGM. You
can't do that. You can do that everywhere else. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, I mean, and there's at least one casino I know of where
their attitude is, we're not going to take more than five hundred dollars on
the app because if they come into the casino, they might play, you
know, so they want people to go to go to the casino, which
you know, just seems stupid to me. Right, they can't get they
can't get that, they can't get what their game plan actually is because it
used to be in the OL days. Yeah, we will provide things that
we don't really make a lot of money on in the casino just to get
them in and marring the wife in, you know, and they'll play slots
and all that. It's they can't figure out what they want to do,
and uh, you know, it's definitely costing them and they're falling further and
further behind. Well, that was the whole thing about, you know,
contests. They were doing contests where you have to come in every you know
week during the football season and to put your picks in. And now you're
there and now that's all changed too. Any contests to do. You can
now put your your picks in, you know, through the phone, you
know. Motally, it's just everything's changed. The whole world has changed.
They tried to keep it a certain way, and technology just took it to
a point and Nevada has just been real slow to to you know, tot
to go along with it. Yeah, it was the same arrogance. They
killed the horse business here twenty five years ago too, when they passed a
law saying we're not going to give anybody a rebate and and all the big
horse players just moved off shore, moved out of that, you know.
Okay, So getting away from Nevada situation. On the Super Bowl prop bets,
generally, they continue to get harder and harder to beat, are they
Is it more of the same this year? The books are getting smarter and
the edges are smaller. Have you been able to evaluate that Frank Well,
it is still early in the betting cycle for the Super Bowl, but you
know, you see the trend that has been going for years because of the
introduction of the new books, and they're basically things flatten out more, things
get straightened out more because there's just more players throughout the whole country that will
straight have money on deposit, will straighten things out. So I would say
that the primary players and primary props, those are a not that difficult to
make lines for and be any inefficiencies get ironed out, including anticipation of which
way the money will go, which when it comes to those kind of things
usually is in I guess you would say the positive direction, the direct you
know, four things that happen, four guys to go over. So the
strategy has been you know, if you're going to adjust, your strategy is
to target secondary type bets and secondary type players where there's a lot more variance
and questionable methodology when it comes to making lines for those guys. Because it's
not tough to make a line for Patrick Mahomes, it is difficult to make
a line for Kyle Uschak, which by the way, reminds me of a
blackjack ball question, which because if you can spell use jack, I'll buy
you a dinner. But you remember the one where it was can you spell
Skrzewski? Oh? Yeah, yeah, And I couldn't do it. I
watched basketball. I couldn't do it. There's too many z's and c's and
so I got the K right. So yeah, I would. I would
say that your shit, Your strategy should be shifting to look at what they
would call derivative secondary markets, including the fringe players that don't don't don't normally
get lined during the course of the regular season, and there you can find
areas where they are not as sure of what they can do, and you
know it's going to come down to your evaluation of how that player is going
to be used. And you got to use some pretty solid fundamentals to come
up with something to make a line for a guy who only actually gets a
touch in two thirds of the game he appears in. But they're putting lines
up for guys like that. What about the bridge jumper bets? Historically,
no safety has been a solid bet mathematically, but when it goes wrong,
it goes really wrong. And since the public likes to bet on the yes
so much is still betting no on those bridge jumper bets at good play.
Well, for you know, the high volume player in the Super Bowl prop
market. That's a bet that you make right close to game time because you
got to let the public get a hold of it first, you know.
And they're not the typically not the people that are betting twelve days out.
They're betting one and two days out. And once they get a hold of
it and start the bet and start to take that nice plus money, then
you then you may be able to find some places where you're getting you know,
value on the bridge jumper. So and also it works very nicely for
the guys that do bet a lot because by then you can assess how much
of your bank roll, if you have a limited amount you have left that
you could devote to something like that, because it is a bet that could
cripple your bad if it goes the wrong way, and you put in a
lot of work throughout the you know, the previous ten days, and then
it just to blow up because somebody takes a safety or something. So that
in the overtime you're you're waiting till the end anyway on those and value may
may may appear. You know on Super Bowl weekend you just have to wait
and see. But I still know a lot of guys that do it reflectively.
It's almost like a gorilla bet, Gorilla super Bowl bet. You know,
it's just like just through brute for it. This is always right,
and I just we we know we all have mutual friends that show up just
to bet those couple bets. Yeah. Well, and also you's didn't clothed
more things like no fourth down conversion or things which are not bridge jumpers anymore.
Yeah, well, the you know, the two classic bridge numpers are
the O T and the safety come up with all kinds. I mean,
you can bet no Oregami now you know which is half People don't know OREGANI
is, Will there be I just saw Richard shake his head like, yeah,
that is well it's these little paper mache Yeah, no, it's it
is a I believe the OREGANI is will the same players score both a touchdown
and the subsequent extra point, you know, the two point conversion? So
it was done not too long ago. I don't know if you know a
guy that could do would be somebody like Lamar he could do it, or
because he could run both in or maybe a kelsey to catch the ball and
then they go for two and you catch the extra playt but you got to
get a two point conversion in they're a successful one to begin with, so
you can start doing the math backwards for their what's the likelihood of a two
point conversion and then go through your chanities for that. I don't think the
Oregoni's a very good boot. Do you have any thoughts about betting the Super
Bowl in game? I mean, you think it'll be different than betting any
other football game in game because of the amount of people watching it and potentially
betting in game. Well, I guess the volume would be, you know,
dramatically more for the for the live betting and the you know, Richard,
that's one I'm not so sure because I am not an in game better
that much. I don't bet that much, and you know, I'm wary
of it unless it comes during a break where I know action is stopped and
I'm not getting you know, you know, heads eye win tails. You
lose with the sports book when they it comes to accepting the line that you
want to bet, So I definitely don't. I don't make the attempt to
do it. So I'm kind of the wrong guy to ask about the live
betting. But I think just when you when you just try to reason it
out, I'm guessing you might get something pretty decent, you know. I
mean, an avalanche of money comes in anytime a key guy has looks a
little wobbly, and they take them off the field and then they go to
commercial. All of a sudden, you get a bunch of you get a
bunch of action. Oh, he might be out, he might be out,
and then they see him come back for commercial. There he is,
he's getting ready to go back in, and then everything snaps back. So
if you want to sit there and be that play that much attention to the
screen during the game, you know, God bless you probably can't find something
worth doing. Yeah, then you can't go to the parties and have fun.
Though. So speaking of the parties, where are the good Super Bowl
parties this year? Oh my gosh, I mean, I couldn't possibly you
know, put them in order or pick them. Every single place is going
to have something in Vegas, you know, remember it's going to be in
Vegas this time. And we just wrote in the advisor We're like, you
know, for decades Vegas has always been the second best place to be if
you're not in the stadium, and I would argue the best place to be.
You know, I never if I had a choice, it's right here
in Allegiate. You could give me tickets. I don't think i'd want to
go. I mean, I'm saying that now because who knows I might.
But you know, bucket list, right, sort of bucket list. But
I mean the parties outside are just so good. From the regular house parties
that people invite you to to every single bar, they're all going to have
you know, pools and squares, they're all going to have specials and food.
You know, we're we've got a big folder full of different things and
we're just going to put one big long list up. There's not one Downtown
Grand is having one that looks really good. And just everything that Downtown Grand
has been doing doing recently has been good. They really look at the bargain
value side of things and they're going to have a party there. That's one
that sticks out for me. But you just can't go wrong, you know,
you know, as a fail state, just walk into any sportsbook and
it's going to be absolutely madness. Just because the game is here. I
don't know why all these people are going to go. It's really cool.
I want to be outside of where the stadium is, you know, so
where people are going to come to Vegas like that. But I don't have
a specific recommendation there, except unless it was the Grand. But it just
doesn't matter if you just can't go wrong. Yeah. Well, I'm getting
a bit older and a bit crankier, is you know. I'm more than
a get off my lawn guy these days. So I don't really want to
go to a casino at all. I don't care what do you offer me
to go to a casino party. You would it would have to be all
laid out in detail, exactly what's going on in there, because I want
to watch the game, you know, because you end up at some of
these parties and there's a mild interest in watching the game. There's there's a
they're doing all. I've gone to parties where it was difficult to watch the
game and I left at halftime. You know. A couple of years ago,
I went I met hurt at a bar, and I think that's actually
the best call to find yourself a local bar, and in this case,
not a cac bar and not a San Francisco bar, just a bar that
you're comfortable at, and you know, you know, scope it out a
day or two an advanced final what's going on? And Tree's got a huge
list. It's either that or you get invited to somebody's house to watch it,
which is you. You know, now, you're pretty sure that you're
going to get at least a good viewing experience. But the days of me
going into the casino on Super Bowl Sunday are old. Well, I think
they're going to have a lot of these Yeah. Yeah, by the way,
I'll vouch for that. You know, frank'slit. Well, are they
going to have to sound on well, how loud is it going to be?
Uh? Well? Uh? Going to parties with him is like I've
been really fun. Well, but but Frank, aren't there bets you want
to make right before the right before it starts, I mean, or on
the day of That's why God created apps. Well, but in Havana they
don't take hardly any action on the apps, or maybe they will the super
Yeah. Well, Richard, when you when you've been doing this for as
many years, you realize, listen, there are going to be places where
you could get to the window in a reasonable amount of time. It's it's
it's just a mess parking and getting in there, and you know it is,
I done it. I can't be trying to think. The last time
I ran around and was betting live on a Sunday morning was I don't know
it was. It might have been the Patriots undefeated season. It might have
been because because we were doing some we were doing some scout, some arbitrage
on the Yeah, we needed we needed the money line. We needed New
England on the money line. I remember that well. In those days the
lines were they were so long. They probably are still. But think about
this. You know when you talk about not being being able to get that
much down most better, that's fine, right, What kind of bests are
they gonna make? They're making twenty five dollars bets, one hundred dollars bets,
maybe that sort of thing. You can get those down on the app
and you don't have to be there in those lines, you know. I
mean, it's I thought it was the greatest thing in the world better when
the apps came out, because that's the first thing that I put in LVA
is you don't have to pay those lines anymore because we've run around and I
go, seriously, we're going to wait in this line is going to take
an hour and a half, you know, before you get that's probably alleviated
now more because of the apps, because a lot of those people are making
small bets, you know, twenty dollars bets, fifty dollar bets. Yeah.
And also when it comes to the day of and the day before,
that's when most guys, I know it'd definitely be you know, that's when
you start ampting your offshore accounts. Now you're not not Now you're dealing with
all that stuff. And on Sunday morning, you know, I'm just I'm
more on Pinnacle and Chris and the other offshores than really fishing around on the
Westgate app and whatever. All those all those bets, a lot of them
have been made. Now you're gonna go in there and look for the value,
which we probably will get to talking about soon. How you know,
once the public gets a hold of the things that we know, they're going
to bet beyond the point of reason that you're going to get in there and
buy some things back. And that's what you know, the Vegas and the
US books are good for. But outside of that, yeah, you know,
I'm just you're just trying to use whatever money is that you have left,
trying to use that up and get it in somehow read that that that
sounds reasonable. Well, so let's talk about that. What what what kind
of things are you looking for that the public is gonna whack out of line?
Well, I don't know, you guys don't say what no safety?
Oh, no safety. Well we talked about that in the overtime, right,
yeah, but when we're talking about you know, because because I prefer
the player stuff, So let's talk let's talk about real quick, because I
get I got this question a few times already because they saw the line go
up to West Gate. They believe it one up, three sixty five.
Will there be a touchback on the opening kickoff? Okay? So that's a
real popular bed. And in the the popular side over the last few years
has been to at the no because you were getting plus money and the uh
as. It was being reasoned that the nerve factor, not only that you
know you can be the kicker, is going to be a little you know,
have a little bit of the yips because it's such a big stage.
On top of the fact that some people speculate that the team that's returning the
ball, they're we're going to start dambling right on the back and even if
the ball goes in the end, they're going to try to run it out.
So that's been getting a lot of play over the years. And I
saw the line came out. I don't have it right in front of me.
I think it came out around three sixty so minus three sixty, yes,
And to me, I made the line three hundred maybe maybe three ten
minus three ten. And it's based purely on, you know, a season
performance. You got two the three things you need to consider, all right,
the each kicker and how they do on the road. So Butcker for
Kansas City kicks a touchback eighty three point three percent on the road. Moody
for San Francisco, he's not as goods sixty four point eight percent on the
road. Now, the third thing is the venue, which is the stadium
in Las Vegas, and okay, it's it is the best stadium in the
NFL for touchbacks. It is number one, and the reason I reckon it
ranks overall number two. But that takes into account the home team kicker,
and to me, I don't give that a bunch of weight. I give
how all those other kickers that perform there. And it is number one at
eighty six percent touchback right, So if you try to make a little mild
of all those numbers, you're gonna come up with something in the neighborhood of
seventy five seventy six, you know, depending entered by a couple percent,
and you know it's signed that margin of arestine when you come up with something
about minus three hundred maybe minus three twenty, and that's what it is.
It's that that that number sits right in the middle of minus three sixty plus
two eight. So it's no play for me on the opening kickoff. So
very one that the public might that the public likes to get involved in this,
Yeah, they like they love that plus money on that. And then
you know, lately they've been betting the last few years that most of the
action and the talk is about betting the that that no, that won't be
a touch back because of the reasons that I just described. And then the
other thing that was in play in the playoffs that sometimes happens, uh and
and right out of the gate you have something going down, is who will
receive the opening kickoff and how that affects all the different products. And fortunately
in this game that's not in play because the team that would have taken the
ball had they won the coin toss, the Detroit Lions got knocked out had
they not had a whole other sense of urgency right out of the gate betting
the props as they put them up, because then now you have an idea.
Now you're pretty sure who's getting the ball first, and so all these
other things, which like what will occur for who will cross the fifty yard
liners, what team will pump first, which one of these players Kiddle or
Kelsey will catch a pass. All of a sudden, you got a big,
you know, a big head start if you can get down on the
Detroit players. And like I said, fortunately that's not in play because on
those Super Bowls, that takes a whole bunch more money to properly cover everything,
because you've got that whole thing going on right away, and then you
can go about betting the rest of the stuff. So now you're past the
opening kickoff, and I don't know, is there any anybody you know,
yeah, I have a question on that. Sure, Uh, Travis Kelcey,
there is a Taylor Swift effect a lot of the extra parts, so
he is getting extra popularity, and so the squares are going to bet he's
going to catch more for more yards and whatever it seems like. Is that
going to be a big enough effect so that betting the no on that makes
sense? Well, okay, so Chelsea is is Uh, Kelsey's lines are
pretty much what they should be, but people are going to give him credit
for being because first off, he's coming off a really big game. Okay.
Secondly there is you know, some people was like, oh, they're
gonna want to get them the ball more for various reasons which we don't really
need to go into. You know that they want him to do well for
you know, because they want to see all these the after after the game
and that you know, whatever happens after that. But I will tell you
that the San Francisco forty nine ers are number four in the NFL defending tight
ends. That's not a good you know that that's one check mark against against
playing on Kelsey. The lines are already much higher than what I do.
First is I I calculate all the mediums with no other I just say I
don't want to know his median for the season. I'll start to filter things
out for you know, a change a change in say snap count or recency,
but that really doesn't apply to him because he's on the field all the
time and he's always going to be a target. Well, Kelsey's median is
six receptions, and the line right now is anywhere from six and a half
to a heavy over to seven. So he's getting all the credit in the
world and a little more for going to be being able to overperform his seasonal
average. The yardage is kind of in line with what he normally is,
but the catches are up there, and I will have to say that the
long catch is also in line at around I think I saw twenty one and
a half and that that's what I made it. So, you know,
outside of looking to fade his number of catches, I don't really see anything
that's not about what it should be. We can talk about another thing in
a little while, because I want to cover this thing about the betting a
specific player to score a TV He scored in seven of eight. He scored
eight touchdowns, but he only scored in seven games, and but he has
a yes in the last two. So the last two games he did score,
and that this whole, the whole. What did I just last see?
That's what I want to bet on? Is another reason that Kelsey is
catching a lot of action. So I would say I can't bet him over,
but I might be betting him under on receptions when that peaks, and
I might have something cooking with no TV. Right, So if you want
to talk about the td thing, we can talk about because he's part of
another bet that I just saw on on Westgate that I think illustrates a good
concept, which is when when you're trying to evaluate these bets, people take
a look at the at their performance throughout the season and they start to do
a bunch of averaging, a bunch of averaging. So you have what they
did is they matched up who will score a touchdown first, Travis Kelcey or
George Kittle. Now George Kittle is one of the guys you have to be
very careful with when it comes to I guess you would say being a being
sure that you don't fall to counterfeiting on these tds. What that means is
Okay, he scored eight tds, I'm sorry, seven tds in eighteen games,
but three of them came in one game. Okay, so he really
only scored in five games and he played eighteen of them. Now, had
he scored in seven games, you would do reverse engineer the price that they
made for him, which is kittle to score TV plus one fifty. That's
what it should be. If he scored in thirty nine percent of the games,
which is seven into eighteen. He didn't, and he got three of
them against Dallas. You kind of look for an explanation for that. Well,
there is one is because Dallas is a team that you would target your
tight end more often to Dallas defensively was very good against the past and they
they were top six or better defending against every type of receiver that you know,
running backs, wide receiver one y, shoot two or shoot three,
but number seventeen against tight ends. So when you're drawing up your game and
said, wow, well when we really need something, you could probably get
it at the tight end. And they did. They got they got you
know, three touchdowns out of them. But that kind of screws up kittles
frequency of touchdown. If you're if you're just gonna sit there and average his
touchdowns into his games played. That's not the case. Now. Kansas City
covers the tight ends very well, and we just saw it last week because
at Baltimore they have literally who were the top five tight ends in the league.
Because when Mark Andrews went down, who's definitely a top five tight end,
he was replaced by the younger dude, Isaiah Likely, and that guy
in the stretch that he was in there the six games, he was the
best tight end in the league that was. I mean, that guy's going
to be a number one tight end for somebody soon. But the Kansas City
Chiefs held them Andrews to two for sixteen and I believe likely two for fifteen.
They shut him down in a game where Baltimore lost their mind trying to
pass the ball. They threw the ball thirty seven times when they normally throw
a twenty six. They listen, they played a dumb game. And there's
nobody's gonna say that Baltimore. They played like the dumbest game that you could
see that you would see all year. They led the league in rushing.
They're the number one rushing team in the league. They gave the ball to
their running backs six times. Running backs had six carries in the entire game.
I don't know what they were thinking. And so, okay, it
was a dumb team, but Anti City handled it. They shut they shut
those those tight ends down, even though they were throwing more frequently. So
I think Kittle's got a tough match up here. So there's some things regarding
Kittle, and not only this little goofball thing going on with his touchdowns,
which is which is mispriced. So when you put Kelsey against him to score
a touchdown, you may only make Kelsey mind us a dollar forty. That's
attractive to me, even though I don't think Kelsey is going to be valued
individually to score a touchdown. I think he against Kittle, who will score
a touchdown first, I think is what the prop is. Yeah, I
like Kelsey mind us a dollar forty because when you when you when you make
the line for Kittle, will he score a touchdown? It's somewhere in the
neighborhood of plus two eighty and Kelsey is plus one sixty three. Yeah,
So even laying forty cents that that that's me is a bet I'm going to
be looking to make. Is that one you're going to wait on or are
you going to bet that early? I don't know. I don't know.
I don't have it available to me. I got to have either have somebody
better for me or I'll be getting to town this weekend and then I can
run around and get it. Uh, you know, it could go up
somewhere else. But yeah, I'm like I said, it's all, it's
all. It's all hinged on the fact that I think kittles in this priced
to score a t T across the board. All right, So we've talked
about Super Bowl. Hope it's a good game. Let's change the subjects a
little bit. Anthony Toluier, you have a member's book, rewarded book.
How was that different this year than it was last year? Oh, it's
better, it's a lot better. Things are changing out there a little bit.
The casinos are, you know, their gravy train is slowing down a
little bit, you know. I mean, after the pandemic, people came
back and droves and the casinos were making money hand over fists like they've never
done before. So it was a it was a difficult road for us going
out there and dealing with getting them to give incentives to anybody, and that's
changing a little bit. For one thing, I think just the credibility of
what we do for some reasons, picked up in recent years. So we've
got we've got more coupons, more offers than we had last year. But
the value of these things and some of the creativity of it is better than
it's been in many years. So you know, real happy. If you
look at the numbers here, it's really easy to quantify the value of the
gambling coupons. So I'll talk about that mostly, but in general, if
you used everything, I mean, we've got some really good room discounts,
we've got we've got food, we've got drinks, we got we've got attractions,
we've got shows, you know, the whole thing. It's like about
twenty five hundred worth of value. It's crazy, man. You know.
It's like people ask me about it and they go, you know, how
many subscribers do you have? How many numbers? And I'm like, you
know, well, we vacillate between ten and fifteen thousand. But and I
just when I say that, I shake my head. You know, we
had to have one hundred and fifteen thousand in Vegas alone, because just because
of the value of this stuff. But it's a great book. It's a
very very good book, and I pump it up every year, like and
people go, man, you're such a Carney salesman, you know. I'm
like, no, it's the reality. People just don't believe it. Yeah.
The first thing I noticed, because I just got mine the other day,
and the first thing I noticed was a three to one on blackjack coupon
and a two to one on blackjack coupon. And those two copons alone,
right are, Yeah, I'll give you I'll give you a load on that
because that was that was an interesting one. For years, we've had two
casinos that have paid two to one on your first black jack for a bet
of up to twenty five dollars. So the way to play that is pay
at constant twenty five's, you know, all the way through, and you've
got an edge on the whole thing. And the two casinos are Silver Sevens
and which needs to be Terribles. Then before that was you know whatever continent
Alan or not. But Silver Sevens and Golden Gate they've always done this and
every year I kind of hold my breath it's like, are they going to
do it again? Because it's such a cool coupon, it's so much fun,
you know, because it's not a hit and run thing. That's why
they like it. You give them, get somebody a match play and they
walk. And we've got plenty of match play in this one. We've got
two fifty dollars match plays in here and two twenty five dollars match plays.
But a lot of players will play at once and leave. I don't blame
them. That's what I would do too, you know. But the casinos
aren't crazy about that. They want people to sit and play. So what's
great about the first first natural paying double is that you have to play to
an average of twenty one between twenty one and twenty two hens before you're going
to hit it on average. So they don't get the hit and runners.
They get people sitting down and playing, and when they finally hit it,
whether they hit it on the first one or the one hundred and first one,
you know, they're usually invested to some degree. They're either ahead and
they want to keep playing with house money, or they're behind, they're stuck
and they want to keep playing to catch up. So this works out for
everybody. Players got a TV and the casino has a good shot at the
player, and so it's a great coupon. And this year we had two
others Downtown Grand and the plaza said they wanted to do it, so all
of a sudden, and the other two came back on. So all of
a sudden, we've got four coupons paying two to one on blackjack. Well,
things change toward the end of the year, everything gets all jumbled and
everybody changes their mind. And the plaza decided and staid they wanted to do
a fifty dollars match play. Okay, I'm like, why do you want
to do that? Really, it's like the match play is going to cost
you more than the two to one on the blackjack, right, But they
preferred to do that. They thought that'd be better for them. Meanwhile,
Silver Sevens comes back and says, okay, we're going to do that.
We want to do the blackjack bonus again, but we want to make it
not two to one. We want to make it three to one for up
to fifty dollars, and we want to do it once a month. And
I'm sitting here going that's like one thousand dollars worth of value. It was
a lesson I was about. And yet I go, you're going to be
attacked by all the people you don't want to see, and that part of
our job with us. People are probably out there shaking their heads, but
part of our job is to make sure that the casinos don't get slaughtered,
because then they won't work with us anymore. So I go back to them
and I, you know, I put the numbers together and I put it
in front of them. I go, you don't want you know, you
really don't want to do this. So what they settled on, which I
think is great, is three to one on your first black jack fifteen dollars
top bets, and you can do it once a month through what we call
member rewards online. So that one coupon right there, if you were to
play it every month, it's worth two hundred and forty six bucks an ev.
And what's really interesting about this, this just shows you the value it
and in reverse that shows you the advantage that six to five pays is that
the casinos that are doing the normal twenty five dollars maximum at two to one,
the value of that coupon is like a little over ten bucks, all
right, they're giving up ten bucks an ev the fifteen dollars one at three
to one is worth twenty dollars and fifty cents. So it's just jumping from
two to one to you know, to three to one, but down from
twenty five to fifteen. If you can follow this, it's worth more than
double. That's how powerful the blackjack bonuses are. That's how much it hurts
you when they cut it back, like in a six to five situation.
You know, it's really ironic that that's silver seven's because when Terribles open,
they had a two to one on blackjack promotion with a five hundred dollars may
Yeah. I remember that. Yeah, And at midnight when it started,
every single spot went from five dollars to five hundred and the color drained out
of everybody's face. And it didn't last very long. They realized, oh,
maybe we made a mistake here. Yeah. I remember walking through there
and it was like every chiseler I'd ever known. It was like a chiseler
reunion, but there I couldn't even get a seat. I remember that.
So most of them, I mean, there are a lot of chiselers who
can't afford to bed five hundred dollars. So it was it was the highering
they were selling their seats. They were selling on the seats. Yeah yeah.
But they had some new people at the Silver sevens this time, and
they're like, we really liked this, we like doing this with you,
and we want to raise it to this thing, you know, three to
one for fifty dollars. And I just I just had to put it in
front of them. I just said, you know, it's up to me
to try to make sure that this thing goes on and on and it doesn't
get canceled aft it's three days. And I said, so here's how we
want to make the adjustment. And I think it's great. You know,
you go, you sit down, he'say, fifteen bucks a hand, and
you that's the other thing. You know, it's worth twice as much as
the as the twenty five dollars one, but all the all the risk is
reduced, right you drop it from twenty five dollars to fifteen dollars, and
I mean, nobody's going to get hurt on this, and it's it's fun
and I know I love that group. And then you get it every month,
Yeah, I know, I so go in and do it every month.
So another one that came out that was I thought was pretty good,
and Bob can comment on this one is the Plaza where Jonathan Jossel is a
is a pretty forward thinking guy. He comes to me and he goes,
what if we were to put a bonus on the on a royal? And
I go, well, a lot of places do bonuses. You know,
they'll put one hundred and fifty or two hundred on the royal or something.
He goes, no, he goes, oh, I do five hundred.
I do five hundred on the Royal. I go, well, I said,
if you put the five hundred on the royal and your quarter games out
in the casino, it's still negative. I go, fifteen hundred dollars.
Royal isn't going to do anything. He goes, no, we'll make it
only in the Sandellar downtown, which is there, which is their bar down
there. Now, the machines in there are different the on the quarter machines.
They're the same as outside, but inside on fifty cents, they've got
some good games, the best one being ninety six Bonus Poker Deluxe. So
that's like of like a nine point six ninety nine point six four percent return.
You put the five hundred down it and all of a sudden you're you're
one hundred and one percent or so. So that's another one that we've got.
Now, you can't cash that until you hit the you know, you
got to sit there and play to the royal. But literally, if you
were to play it to conclusion, on average, it's worth like about one
hundred and forty eight bucks, right, Bob, that's not about right to
you something like that. But royals are hard. Yea, yes they are.
Yeah, But I mean think about that from their perspective. It means
you're gonna be there. If you're really gonna chase that, you're going to
be in the plaza all the time and you're sitting at a bar. Some
guys are gonna drink. Maybe they're not going to play that well, I
mean yeah, I mean, I don't know how many of the normal civilians
are going to chase a royal like that though. But here's the point.
You don't have to play it. Really the conclusion. If you're gonna play,
and you want to play, you come to Vegas and you go,
I'm definitely gonna play video poker, and fifty cents is cool with me.
So I'm going to play there, and you don't ever play it. If
it happens, it happens, and all the great stuff is. And you
know, Bob has been the preacher of this forever. It's not about your
final score. It's I mean, it is about your final score, but
it's not about your score today. It's the way he always likes to say
it. And as long as you're playing with an edge, you're doing something
right. So everybody is coming out of this ahead. And that's what we
strive for when we put these deals together. You know. I I didn't
know anything about Jostle at all, but I just recently discovered that the Plaza
has a podcast called on Main Street and he's the host of the podcast.
And I was really shocked at one of the episodes I was listening to.
It might have been the one with Salpiacente or I don't know. I saw
some episodes. I was like, Oh, this looks interesting, But I
was very impressed. He totally understood the advantage slot players that were down there,
you know, And I don't know he he came across as a as
a very sharp guy. To me, and I mean he's not throwing out
the slot players unless they're being abusive or whatever to other customers. And yeah,
anyway, I just was impressed by him after hearing him talk. He's
progressive, forward thinking you know, GM or owner or you know whatever his
president. His situation is there. He's the guy, he's he's in charge,
and he's he's very thoughtful about what he does, and he's willing to
give a fair gamble in a play. I mean famously, there was the
thing where they were paying the thirty percent bonus on taxables and everybody you know
flew in there and started playing Keino. This is We're doing a book called
Advantage The Advantage Players by Michael Kaplan, and this is all written in one
story about a guy named Eddie Tea and Jostl is in there where you talk
about Jossell walking up the teams and going I'm going to get killed on this
promotion, right, and Teams goes, yeah, you are actually what you
know what, Frank, It wasn't Teams. It was Miller in the story
who was playing the teams. Yeah, but anyway, and Joscel and the
guy goes, are you going to cut it off now and he goes,
Nope, I said I'd run it till midnight, and I'm going to run
it till midnight. And they lost tens of thousands of dollars. But he
did it, and he learned a lesson. I've been on Jossell's podcast.
I've been on that podcast and he asked really good, solid, smart questions.
He's a good guy. This is a good place. The Plaza has
got like seven or eight coupons in the Membor Rewards book, including two to
one food at three o their outlets, a fifty dollars match play, even
a Bengo deal, some slot play. I mean, they really, they
get into it. I love the Plaza. I think it's a great place.
It's also i think the only place downtown that has single zero roulette.
Yeah. I mean he so he is trying to, you know, give
give a better gamble to. He wants it to be a gambling joint,
you know, he wants to go back to the way it always was,
you know. I mean they've got a great restaurant there with Oscars, so
they've you know, they've got all of that, but it's you know,
it's downtown. They don't have retail, they don't have a show, they
don't have all the stuff. They want to make their money on the casino
floor. So he's doing things where you've got places like like Station Casino and
Boyds. All the boys are downtown, right, and they're tight as a
drum, and guys like him and the Downtown Grand and places like that.
They're saying, you know, FHOI on you, We're gonna do it.
El Cort has to some degree, we're going to do it. So so
we're giving some value back and we're going to make our money in the casino,
and we're going to give you incentives to play in the casino. I
think that's great. So are they loose with their comps? Then? I
don't know really. I mean I hear from people and I hear that they're
they're pretty good. I don't know because I can't go in there and play,
so I don't know, but I know that you get on and they
send mailers, and I think overall, yeah, I think that they're aware
and they don't give away the store, but I think, yeah, if
you're in there and you're playing, you give them volume. You're gonna get
things. So all right, So a couple of other things, a couple
of other points I just want to make. We always look for cool things
to do, right with the with Memory Awards, and on this one we
got a I think it's twenty five percent off your entire bill, so that
includes alcohol and everything else. It might be, or it might be just
food only. I'm not sure. But a place down town called Verna Castra.
Oh yeah, yeah, it's a good, cool new restaurant down there
in the in the arts district. But the reason I did it, and
the reason I thought this was a fun thing to do, is the owner
of that place is a guy named Jeff Wong, who's spending on our show
two or three times. Yeah, yeah, yeah, And Jeff wrote you
know what they call book on pot limit Omaha. He's a terrific gambling analyst.
He knows the games backwards and forwards. He's a game developer and everything
else. But Jeff owns and runs to Vernica Stera. So go go.
You know, if you're an LVA member, use that one. Go go
visit a Basketbam. He'll come out and he gambling, very very cool thing.
Yeah, he also plays. Uh I'm sorry, go ahead, go
ahead, go ahead fish. He also plays guitar in a band. The
band plays there sometimes they have a really cool patio on the roof and uh
patio bar on the roof. Sometimes there's live music up there and on First
Fridays. It's a great place to go because it overlooks First Friday. You're
right there in the middle of it. So and it's also got a coffee
place attached to it called Dragon Alley. So yeah, it's a great place.
I remember, you know, a few years ago. It was one
of my recommendeds at the end of the show. So you're right, that
scene on the roof when the band plays is awesome. I mean it's it's
really great and the food's good. Yeah. I took some I took friends
there from out of town. They're visiting from Detroit, and I took them
there and they're looking at me. They go, we don't have anything like
this back home, you know, And they loved it. So yeah,
Tavernic Costero it's called. Now here's the other thing, the other difference.
You know, people you asked me at the beginning, Bob, you know
what's different about this one. Well, the two things that are different is
the creativity and the value of the Gaman coupons. By the way, I
didn't give you those numbers. You know, last year our Gamlan coupons was
I think it was four hundred and ten dollars. Was totally v if you
use them all this year is seven hundred and forty nine dollars and fifty cents.
That's pretty significant. And what we call AI coupons, with AI stands
for any idiot, meaning that you don't have to be an expert, you
don't have to be playing for royals, you haven't do anything. You just
played the free play in the match play. Anyone can do it, any
of it can do it over two hundred dollars two hundred and ten dollars.
So you know, the significance differences are in the value, especially in the
Gamly coupons, but also in the traction we're finally getting with the online coupons,
which we call MROs Memorywards Online. We talked about that earlier, how
you can download a thing to play the blackjack three to one, a coupon
to play the blackjack three to one once a month. The other thing that's
happening is the Rio, which has been now taken over by a new company,
all right, the Real. For years. When The Real opened,
it was one of the greatest casinos in Vegas. Then it got bought by
Harris, which became Caesar's and they ran it to the ground. They just
destroyed the place. It's now a dump and they sold it to this new
group called Dream Skates out of New York. And Dream Skates brought in a
bunch of people from the Cosmopolitan and they're putting three hundred and fifty million dollars
into a renovation of the Real and they're trying to bring The Real back to
its glory. Well, part of doing that was working with us, where
we haven't worked with the Reel for years because Caesars doesn't want to work with
us, and they did a member we're finalizing a member rewards coupon right now
that will be thirty percent off the room, which is they're all suites at
the Reel and they're renovating all the rooms, so it's a thirty percent discount
off the room and waive the resort fee, So thirty percent off and no
resort fee, unlimited amount of days up to their from which I think is
fourteen. Yeah, they're they're pretty I think they're going to be pretty aggressive
because I just I'm staying there over Super Bowl the five nights and they just
sent me a comp you know, not being a Cosmo player, having been
a they sent me a comp room comp and they've specified no resort fee.
So yeah, they're pretty good like that, because that can be a really
annoying thing. You can be a comp player and then they still try to
stick you for the resort view places. Not to mention any names like MGM
for example, but that's a really annoying thing if you're trying to you know,
wait, this is their brand new How did you get a comp?
Because I must have been in the role the role thing from either Cosmo or
they just took the player base from Rio and go through that. I don't
know how they went about it, but i'll tell you what. I was
there on opening night for when the new Rio, and I got a card,
and you know, I didn't put a lot of play on the card.
I didn't have time, but I did get a card and give them
all. It could have been just from that. I don't know, And
I want to make clear too, I'm glad you brought that up, Frank,
because you know, that is what they're doing over there. I think
we're going to see more and more good things coming out of the reel.
But they still charge their resort fee to the normal person. Now, if
you get a comp and they're gonna waive them, that's a great play.
But that's what's so great about this Memory Wards offer, this coupon, is
that a person they've never seen before. They've got three thousand rooms to fill
up there, and so that's why they're doing this. You know, not
only are you going to get thirty percent off the rate, they're going to
waive the resort for you. For you as well. This is a powerhouse.
I don't know how long they're going to do it. I hope they
do it all year, but for you know, they're gonna do it for
the first couple of months. It's a powerhouse. Do you know when that
renovation is supposed to be over, it's well, it's in progress right now.
I think the first thing they're doing they kept telling me they wanted me
to come over and see their rooms. So I think they're renovating all those
rooms right now. And they just opened up, you know, they didn't
the buffets have gone away in almost all the places. You know, there's
only twenty places with buffets now. There used to be twenty. There's say
twenty, I'm sorry, thirteen, there's thirty. I didn't think there was
that. There's thirteen. I predicted they were the twenty and I'm not going
to hit it. You know, it's going to go under. But there's
they're not bringing back to Carnival World to fay. But they just opened up
their big food hall called the Canteen and it's pretty good. I went there
and got chicken Tenders, a New York thing that had these chicken fingers that
were like almost as good as Crown and Anchor. They were really good.
They've got cheese steak place there. They've got a Ramen place there. They're
doing they're gonna spit the place up. I mean, if they can bring
the real back to anything like it was, it was always a gem,
you know, right off the strip. It was a place to go.
Well. I checked it out before the renovation and in terms of video poker
and slots, they had nothing interesting. So with a lot of machines turned
off and they say new machines are coming, but it was it was a
really a really yawn in there, so for gambling purposes, it was not
exciting. I don't know. But how long ago was that, well,
a couple of different trips, the last one possibly uh a month ago.
Yeah, really it surprised me. Now, I mean I actually I know
the GM there. I've known him as a friendly as the guy who hung
out and had beers with you know, that sort of thing. And he
comes from Cosmo. And what surprised me about it is that they didn't do
anything to to entice people with their video poker. So I'm gonna talk to
him about it. You know, I've got zero and I'm gonna say,
look, here's one of the things you ought to be you ought to be
doing. So I don't know if I'm gonna have any influence there, but
I agree with you about there's nothing there, you know, ninety eight point
ninety eight as far as high as they go, right, that's about it.
Yeah, And then and the slots are not competitive with other casinos of
that size. What do you like like the advantage slots you're talking about the
advantage thoughts. Yeah, they had three in the highlight room. God,
what's the name of their ascensions? They had three of those in the high
highlight room. That was the big target because I was there when they unveiled
the machine. They took the rope away and said okay, we are now
the Rio and you can start playing machines. And there was a foot race
to those. But outside of that, I didn't see much. They didn't
really change much. It was like the only new thing that they put in
there, and they really weren't that good to begin with, you know,
prior to the switchover. So well, they got some smart people over there
now, I mean I know a few of them that are over there,
and I don't know. I say, watch the real just like I said,
you know, watch the Downtown Grand, Downtown Grand. The Rio took
this idea of the no resort fee from the Downtown Grand. You know,
Downtown Grand did that with us last year and renew that again this year.
So you've got two places with memorywards that you can go as a person off
the street and stay for no resort They and they, you know, wave
the resort fee. And Downtown Grand is another one that's just doing things.
They've got to. They put in a hot dog cart so you can get
a hot dog and a beer for two bucks. They've got a shot and
the beer at the bar for three point fifty. It's a shot of like
you know, Kevin Walker, I think bourbon or something like that, really
good stuff. They got dollar blackjack there two or three tables going all the
time that I'll tell you what. For quarter play, you almost can't do
better than that Furnace bar where they have a double double machine that that starts
at twelve hundred and it's a multiple progressive and it's almost always over one hundred
percent. I hit the aces with the kickers. I want to ever play
that game, but I hit it there the other day on the quarters for
almost nine hundred and I mean that's high for that machine. That machine was
at about one hundred and two percent when I was playing it. So I
mean Downtown Grand and Rio, these are places that are working with us,
So of course I like them, but there's a reason to like them,
so I like to promote them. Hey, Bob, did do you when
I said that as soon as they opened the gate, you know, sort
of figuratively opened the gate for the new machines that people ran for that ascension?
Do you do you understand why? Well, presumably they the reset by
the manufacturer when they open them up is more positive, but that was going
to be hit immediately, right. The reset displays every possible facet of the
game, and because they want to show it all on one screen, the
multiplier, the super and the regulars did, it's all there, and it's
all at different level. So the default is actually really good. You could
see it from outside, even though they had it roped off. You could
see that it was sitting there at you know, at resetting. If you
could see every machine, you could see they were all the same. So
they was That's why they were. The people were sitting there ready to you
know, I wasn't going to compete with them running and pushing around to see
one of those three machines. But I was there when they opened it.
And yeah, people were stalking that place for two days because the default on
that machine is highly identagious. And but after they go through the default,
it's uh ascension does become positive periodically, but it takes a while and there
has to be a lot of UH square play for it to become positive.
Well, but think about it. If if the one you're looking at is
positive and that's the default, you know, like I said, I wasn't
gonna I was standing right there when the race, when they opened the thing
and the race was on, and these guys were warning me, don't try
to don't try to mess around. We've been waiting here for hours. I'm
like, I'm not gonna fight you for it. But those are multi denomination
and then within each a nomenate nomination, there's five different Just think if they
were all set like that. To be honest, it bothered me so much.
I didn't want to stick around to see if that was the case,
where they sat in there and just made a ton of money because they got
fifteen different shots on each machine. So I walked out. But I suspect
that there's a good chance that that was the case. Wow. Yeah,
I got paid off all lot for getting that up at four am to try
to get in there. At five am when they hooked it up, there
were already guys that had been camping out there. Well, I heard the
same thing happened in Fountain Blue. When they opened their eyes, they're just
waiting to get to the machines for the same reason. We have a little
time left. Speaking of Fountain Blue, that has generally been a clusterfuck s
that's it? Open? Is that a fair analysis? Anthony? And we
say clusterfuck on this show. That's cool. I think that I think find
how would you what would you say? It is? Clusterfuck kind of sets
it says it pretty well. It's a strange place, man. I mean,
the whole theme of this issue of the Advisor, the February issue of
the Advisor is you know, Found Blue, and I think the lead is
what is this place? You know, I mean what does it want to
be? You know, does it want to be a casino or does it
want to be a hotel that has some gambling? And unfortunately it's the latter.
They made this beautiful, gorgeous place that has like hardly any appeal to
gamblers of any level. And I know I walked through there myself and said,
you know, people, I know, you know, lower rollers,
you know, middle market, low high, nobody's going to want to come
here really unless they're playing relatively high enough to get to get comps. Because
they got a lot of great restaurants. But the comps are horrible, I
mean horrible. I I you know, I heard I've just heard number of
horror stories of people who went in and put in big plays at the beginning
and basically got nothing, you know, fifty bucks or something. I walked
it with. Then again with the guy I know. I won't mention his
name because he's in the business and probably wouldn't appreciate it. But this guy
is an expert. And it wasn't Steve Seer. It was another guy,
and he's an expert in you know, foreign VIPs. And he pointed out
one thing after the next, after the next, that's wrong, and Fountain
Blue and why his players would never want to go there. But they were
doing everything wrong from the bottom up there doing everything wrong. You know,
of all these bars, they've got thirty six restaurants and bars, many of
them. Of that thirty six are bars, only one of them has video
poker, has has Bartop video poker. And that's the time in the UH,
in the in the much magetor in the sportsbook, and there's it's almost
like they they decided they didn't want video poker. There's like hardly any video
poker anywhere in the whole place. You know, just these new, these
new new age slots and things. But it's just it's gorgeous, but it's
dumb. Well, so all their executives have are gone. Right, They've
lost like, what four executives in the first month that they have, yeah,
four in the top and they've lost three more before that, so it
was like a total of seven who were consequential there that from the time they
decided they were actually going to open to now almost two months later, they've
lost seven top executives. So what does that tell you? That tells you
that they're not being listened to. And this guy that I walked around with,
he knew several of them. He goes, it's exactly what's going on.
They they're saying we need to do this and that we need to implement
different things, and the bosses above them, all the way up to the
owner are going, no, we know what we're doing. And they film
and have some football NFL football like that. It wast but I mean it's
interesting you look at something like, all right, so Durango opened two weeks
in front of it or ten days in front of it. You know,
Durango has half the size of the of the space on the casino floor,
but they've got something like thirty eight hundred machines. Excuse me, I'm sorry,
twenty eight hundred machines on the floor, whereas the Fountain Blue has a
twelve hundred. You know, I mean, it's less than half of what
the small, much smaller Durango has. And I wasn't. I'll tell you
what, Bob, you probably can comment on this wasn't. I was pretty
shocked at the video poker inventory at Durango. It's the worst I've ever seen
from the station casino. I mean, they don't even have the Lost Leaders
in there. I heard a room or they had a messed up card when
they went in there. Was that true? They had a messed up player
card for you're getting my five x what they intended. I didn't hear that
because I don't know. Why wouldn't be the boarding pass. I mean,
I didn't know you would get a new card there. I don't know.
M What do you think, Bob? I'm sure you checked it out.
How sure are you? Actually? I've in uh in December, I had
a hip replaced, and so I've been spending more time worrying about my recovery
than I have going out and checking every last detail. Plus I'm not Station's
favorite person. I come in and play, but I'm severely restricted, and
so it's just not worth my while to check out. So so you you
weren't hip enough so you had to have that replace. Yeah. Yeah,
the card doesn't wear anything worth anything, so it just goes in and shoots
from the hip. But I'm no mail there too, Bob. But that's
what you mean. I don't get anything out of them. My card's worthless
almost. Well, you mentioned you mentioned, didn't mention MGM grand earlier about
you know, unfriendly and you can certainly throw station casinos in there, jesus,
I mean grows. Say they've turned grow so the past few years,
I hear. And how much can you bet on your sports out there,
Frank, I don't know. I'ven't been in town for a while, and
I don't. I haven't haven't haven't been in there. I'll come in and
whatever's in there, I'll bet it on the props and then yeah it'll be
I'll bet they'll take at least one hundred bucks. Is that it's better than
Baldini? Well take that back, I'm to take that back. I just
get mad because when they have a good line, you can only get so
much. And I got the fourth quarter. I know this is at the
fourth quarter a Curtis guy is when it was it two hundred and fifty bucks,
it was two hundred. Yeah, he was up to right back to
two fourth quarter under fourteen and a half minus a quarter. That's a great
line. But you know, other than going up there, I don't know
how much you get if you can go to though. But yeah, so
like a lot of the app like I got rid of the wind app entirely,
I just couldn't get anything and whatsoever. I just stopped stop some of
them, you just stop trying. Well, the worst part of it when
I bet Beldini's for him and I saw it was only two hundred, and
I go, heck, I can't get any of that done. I mean,
I I don't want to get into all the bitching about the sports here,
but but I don't understand how that isn't bait and switch. Right When
you try to bet a line and they say no, you can't. You
know, here's a price on something, you say, okay, i'll buy
it, and then they go, no, we have a different price.
Now. Well, Richard, you don't understand. Somebody just walked up to
the counter actually at two windows at the counter and bet the same thing just
before you bet it. Yeah, it's not They're not doing anything nefarious.
It's nothing against you. You got what You're on a popular bed. Yeah,
except it happens at the counter too, although I guess they could say
somebody was on the Yeah, Daniell, We've had a lot of fun today.
We've spent well more than an hour and I want to the end of
our shows. In the past, we had a recommended section. Now I
have nothing to recommend. I've been spending more times listening to hip jokes and
I've been worrying about what's recommended. So Richard, do you have a recommended
for our audience today? Yeah, I do, because we were talking about
Durango. I mentioned on the show a few years ago this great noodle place
called Zang Noodle that is on Flamingo and Decatur and it's it's this fantastic Chinese
noodle place, but it's really small and when you go there, you almost
always have to stand in line. But they now have a Jang Noodle in
Durango, so you know, maybe an extra reason for you to go out
there and check out Durango if you if you're a fan, of Chinese food
and noodles, and you know, and they make them by hand in front
of you. You can see the guy back there, you know, spinning
the dough and making the noodles and great food. All right, Yeah,
well Anthony can speak way more on because I'm looking for someplace to actually watch
the game, which we haven't decided yet, but you know, my basic
strategy definitely is going to be to you know, for the whole Super Bowl.
Several days leading up to the superow's kind of work around the edges of
towns, away from the hotspots, the crowded places at the crowded times,
and you know, partake of the of the local establishments. And when it
comes for the game, I'm sure we're going to have a lengthy discussion about
where the game is going to be watched. But you know, don't make
the assumption that, you know what, maybe it won't be that bad there.
You know, it's going to be multiple times worse than you imagine most
likely. So you know, take the path of least resistance and you know,
find yourself a comfortable place that you're you know, it's it's not going
to be a New Year's Eve for you watching the Super Bowl. You're better
off in some local place or at a friend's house. So that's definitely what
piece. I have made that mistake multiple years. I said I'm gonna go
here, and then it just is, yeah, you can't watch the game,
and I'm just I'm going. I knew it. I knew it.
I knew it, And every now and then a couple of them I bailed
out. At halftime he said, I'm going somebody meet Curtis at the bar
or something. So yeah, my my best bet is follow Anthony wherever he
goes to watch the game. Probably the place. Yeah, And I would
stay away from the southwest part of town by Allegiance Stadium, nowhere near you
don't want to be stay away with you. That very good? What about
Anthony, Anthony, do you have anything you recommend? Well, first of
all, I agree saying our is a new right. I mean, that
is a great place, the Flamingo one, for sure. And they have
something called beef pancake there, which it sounds weird, but it's not a
pancake. It's like it's like a soup dumpling. And they got the best
spicy wants. But that's not my soul I'm with you on that one.
Mine. I just this. I just heard of this yesterday. Now,
first of all, I'm always looking for oysters. Love oysters, love to
you know, look for the deal on oysters. They used to have dollar
oysters all over town. They just don't have it anymore. Finally I hear
of an oyster place that's doing two dollar oysters. It's way up across from
Durango, in a place called Uncommons, and it's a place called bar Oyster
at two dollar oysters. I go up there, No three dollars, right,
you want? I have dozens eighteen bucks. I'm like, oh,
man, okay whatever. So I get a call yesterday, I just finished
the advisor. I get a call from Blair Rodman, author of Kill Phil,
good friend of mine, and he goes, you ever hear of a
place called Captain Louis up on the West Side. And I go, and
that's some sort of a chain. He's like, well, I guess they've
got them all over the country. But he goes on Tuesdays and they have
dollar raw oysters. So it's called Captain Louis. It is on the West
Side. I haven't done it yet. I'm going off of Rodman's recommendation.
But any place that's got dollar oysters, I'm gonna stick my nose in there.
Well you can let us know how it turns out. I will.
You're gonna get there and it'll they'll be out. We changed is three dollars.
Now. Well, you know what, this happened twice because Aria was
believe it or not, Aria was promoting dollar oysters in the evenings like from
five to six only in their their food court area. Another place that replaced
the buffet with the food court. And I got there and it was two
dollar oysters, right, And I'm like, you know, I guess that's
the way they do it now, is they bump it up a dollar everywhere.
Two bucks ain't bad for Ario oysters. They were nice. But the
other one three bucks. No, I'm not going way up there again for
that one. But this one sounds good. Dollar oysters on Tuesdays. Very
good. Thank you, Anthony, Thank you, Frank, thank you Richard.
Go out and hit lots of royal flushes, everybody. Good day.