Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Right idea, wrong bet

Many times while betting on a horse race, I will figure out how the winning horse in a race will run as far as its position on the track but the horse I believe will be in that position doesn't end up there and another one wins.

In January 2013, I realized that the Back to the Future 2 scene on Oct 21, 2015 could be interpreted with the Chicago Cubs sweeping Miami to win the National League Championship Series on or just before that date. I called it Zemekis Theory and posted to this blog about it then.

In January this year, I made a bet on the Cubs to win the pennant and thought I had a chance but the Mets pitching staff and one previously unknown player overcame the Cubs lineup. I then realized the error in the theory which others in the previous 2 1/2 years mentioned to me.

It involves the Chicago Cubs winning a championship.

Knowing that a 4 game sweep would potentially finish on Oct 21, 2015 and that Vegas was flooded with bets on the Cubs, the correct bet that applied the Zemeskis Theory would have been on the Mets to sweep the 4 game series which would have been at least 12-1 odds and probably higher.

Anyway, now that the Chicago Cubs have again failed to win a meaningful championship (unlike the two playoff wins the team and its fans celebrated earlier this month) I decided to update the chart I made in 2009 showing the mathematical odds of the Cubs winning a World Series or National League title:


New mathematical odds of the Cubs not winning a World Series since 1908: 238.76-1
New mathematical odds of the Cubs not winning the NL pennant since 1945: 571.66-1