Option Sports

[Fraidy Cat]

What's the deal with this place? Good? Bad? How in the world do they deal a 5 cent line when places like Olympic have a 20 cent line? Is Olympic ripping us off? Or is Option Sports giving the house away? They both can't be right.

[Blowfish]

I'd say Option Sports is giving the house away, I don't see them touting this offer all over the place and are probably hoping not to attract a lot of smart action. Never hear a word about them payment wise, so either their players never read the forums or there are no problems.

Although the players hate it, a 20 cent line helps cover the growing overhead associated with operating a large sportsbook. The margins in baseball are so slim, that a rough football/basketball season going into an already slow, low margin baseball season can make things tough. Pile on bonuses and other attractive offers to keep people playing through football, and you've got yourself breaking even--barely. Olympic is probably just playing on the conservative side of things.

[bruce1972]

Wow what a stupid post. Olympic is a great book and I recommend them highly but certainly not for baseball. Most books deal at least a 10C line and any player that plays into a 20C line is an idiot. You can't win that way. As for Option, they are under the Cris umbrella so you will get paid but I have heard bad things about their customer service. For baseball, the best places to play IMO are Pinnacle with an 8C line and Bet365 with a graduated 10C line but the best customer service in the business.

[Jeff]

I love the 10 cent 20 cent argument. Happens all the time. You can't really suggest to someone not to play into a 20 cent line, UNLESS it's the only place they are going to be playing.

I can't tell you how many times Carib for example, (20 cents) has had a better price on the dog than all of the 10 cent books.

So, yeah, if you're only going to open with one or two books for baseball, 20 cents isn't a good idea.

But if you're a serious player, some of the 20 cent books are just as useful and necessary as the 10 cent books.

Plus, they all deal totals the same........

[Fraidy Cat]

bruce1972 = LAME REPLY

I asked a question. Is Olympic ripping us off? Or is Option giving the house away?

YOU say, "any player that plays into a 20C line is an idiot. You can't win that way."

So in otherwords, OLYMPIC is a great book. But if I play baseball there, I'm an idiot.

So the question remains, how can these two books offer such drastically different baseball lines? One of them must be doing something wrong.

Also, what the hell does it mean to be under the CRIS umbrella? Is option sports OPTION SPORTS or is Option Sports CRIS? Is CRIS responsible for all of Options accounts? If Option goes bust bu dealing a nickel baseball line, does CRIS pay me?

[bruce1972]

Let me put it to you this way. For every bet you make at Olympic, go to Pinnacle and see what price you could have had. And then at the end of the year add up what you would have saved by playing there. Just look at tomorrow's game for example. Bet the favorite at Olympic and lay -155. Bet it elsewhere at a top notch book and lay -145-150. If you lose that's 10 bucks. That sure adds up during a whole year every day!. You will be amazed.
Jeff is right, some books like Carib with 20C lines do offer good value on a dog, but not on a favorite. If you play a favorite at a book offering a 20C line you are tossing money into the street. Of course as Jeff says, you can play totals there. Olympic is a great book and it is a shame they are in the minority and deal a 20C line. But they are so good at everything else so you can't complain about this too much. As for Option, I understand Cris owns them. If they fold you will get paid. I am not recommending them though as to me customer service is very important and I have heard the service there is not very good, unlike Cris. But you won't get stiffed.

[brink]

I could be wrong, but it seems to me that Option is run by locals. The customer service does suck. No one has a clue when you call. You're taking your life in your hands if you try to make a phone wager there.

[LoboLoco]

A lot of books that use the facilities of a bigger book are run by other staff. Heritage used to be with CRIS and they had their own employees but were using a lot of the CRIS services. Option is probably like this. I don't know if that maks CRIS financially responsible or not.

[The Prophet]

nickle, dime and .20 cent lines

Jeff makes a very good point....if you're playing at one book obviously you're better off playing at a book dealing a dime line. You shouldn't dismiss out of hand playing bases at a .20 cent book if you're using multiple outs. There are a few other factors, however, that you need to consider such as "How high does the dime line go? -150? -175? higher?"

The fact remains that the "best" price is dependent on what position I'm taking on an individual game. If I'm playing the Braves, and all the dime line books have Atlanta -120 and a .20 line book has 'em at -115 I'm better off playing at the .20 line book. That's pretty obvious in theory, but as Jeff noted you'd be surprised how often books that aren't perceived as good baseball books due to the fact they deal 20 cent lines have the best price on an individual game. This doesn't disuade from the fact that over the long term you're better off paying as little vig as possible, but catagorically dime line books (and nickle line books in the case of Option) don't always have the best price.

I also wouldn't be so quick to assume that Option is giving away the store or otherwise being financially irresponsible by booking a nickle line. Maybe they're just doing it for publicity (which appears to be working) and in the hopes that they'll get more clients on board without spending a ton for marketing. Once they get 'em in the door there's a good chance that these clients will stick around for football season when Option's profit margins will be more favorable and the volume will be higher. So they could lose money shortterm by dealing a nickle line and end up with a net prophet..er...profit....out of the whole thing. Given the fact that Option is trying to rebuild a client base after their acquisition by CRIS, it makes it more likely they'd do something like this to get some buzz.

You'll even see books in Nevada offering a nickle line from time to time (though it was a lot more common "back in the day"). I remember that Barbary Coast used to deal one, as did other books occasionally. They did this for obvious reasons--to get people in the door and, to a lesser extent, in response to what the other books were doing. Granted, Nevada casinos have other ways to make money once you're inside but the same premise applies here. If an online book is just looking to scam would-be clients there's a lot better ways to do it than dealing a nickle line, like offering 100% bonuses, 50% rebate on losses, etc.

JRM
THE PROPHET
www.netprophetsports.com

[Jeff]

In Vegas, Caesars had a nickel baseball line one year. What are Option Sports baseball limits? Online they only take a nickel, so it's not as if anyone can come in and load up.

[ShiftySheik]

They take 3000 on the phones, 1000 online.

[sportshobby]

So what's up with their website? Go to the homepage and click on "limits" and they clearly advertise $10,000 on baseball sides and $5,000 on baseball totals. Is that all just for show?

[Blowfish]

$500, $1000, $5000? That's quite a range. Are they dealing different limits for different players?

[sportshobby]

I was hoping someone could shed some light on this one

[Dragon]

For what it's worth I did a transfer with them a few days ago. From them to another book. Went very smoothly. No customer service peoblems at all.