I have taken in all the facts on this case and have taken my time to voice my opinion and gather my thoughts on what has transpired here. I have not made any comments in any public forum. This is the first one. Like I said, I have only gathered the facts which were presented to me in all the various forums on the internet and have not had any direct contact with the parties involved so view my ruling with a grain of salt if you so desire.
As most of you know, I have been betting offshore basically since its inception and am with... or have been with over 100 sportsbooks to date. What many of you may not know, is that I worked in various sporstbooks in Las Vegas as a managerial/supervisor/oddsmaker/writer/cashier/computor admin/etc/etc for over 9 years as well as placing a wager in every sportsbook in Vegas known to man. Having said all of that, I feel that I owe the people at this site my opinion.
Well, first off let me say that I am a player at BetCBS currently but in a much smaller capacity than awhile back. Not for any reason, just have found my money works better for me at other books currently. I have found BetCBS to be an outstanding book while I have played with them. I have always rated them very highly in my mind and their 5% rebates each week on wins AND loses is fantastic. Never even close to having any problems there and have recommended their book to others on several occasions.
Let me get this out of the way. I got into the business in Las Vegas when legendary Sonny Reizner hired my off the street in the early 80'S. For all of you that know Sonny, you know the wasnt a fairer man in the business than Sonny. I remember the first day Sonny had me in his office at the Castaways for the first time interviewing me for a job. Anybody that has ever worked for Sonny, learned one thing quickly.....TREAT THE CUSTOMER LIKE HE IS ALWAYS RIGHT!. What this meant was treat the customer with respect ALWAYS. Handle the situation in a professional matter. With them thoughts in mind, on to my thoughts on this case.
As is the case in Las Vegas, a BAD LINE that a sportsbook accidently puts up and takes action on, HAS THE RIGHT TO VOID THAT TICKET EVEN THOUGH THE CUSTOMER WALKS OUT THE DOOR WITH TICKET IN HAND! However, this line has to be without question an improper line. For example, if a customer took +9 on a game when they were in reality -9, this ticket would be voided as NO ACTION. This is cut and dry. Each case is different and obviously some cases are very hard to distinguish whether it was a bad line put up a by a sportsbook or a case of a sportsbook being out of whack on an event and thus a completely different line than what other books are offering. Probably the hardest ones to come to a conclusion on this is bets offering MONEYLINES....especially on events that garnish LITTLE action that can cause HEAVY ONE-SIDED action. This is obvioulsly why you will RARELY ever see a sportsbook more than 2 points off on a football game. There is just to many sharps taking back the bad number. I remember once booking a particular Heavyweight Title fight that was not that popular. Most of the city of Vegas had the fight in the -330 come back +270 range. At my particualar place of work we were getting NO DOG ACTION. I could have made the fight -1000 and they would still bet the favorite for limit. I believe at one time I was actually at -520 come back +420 on the fight!....although I was then starting to get small action on the underdog, there were still players laying more on the favorite right up to fight time.
Sportsbooks offshore have big differences quite often in obscure sporting events with high moneylines. It can very difficult at times to determine what is a BAD LINE. In the case of the CBS situation, they obviously had put up a line that they did not want. Was it completely and 100% out of line?? I would venture that most people would say YES. I agree, but one can never know what could prompt a sportsbook to be at on a certain line. On to my personal thoughts. It is the obvious to me that the player involved was taking advantage of a strong line in his favor. One can say that he did a good job shopping and found a good line and bet into a weak number. I agree. To me the player took a nice shot at CBS for putting up a bad number.....a number that wasnt totally out of the realm of possiblity by the way. I believe whole heartedly the statements made by Dave at CBS but feel that he possibly could have handled the situation better. Maybe thinking more along the lines of SONNY would have serverd him better......THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT thinking. For whatever reason, CBS put up a line that they did not want up that was NOT TOTALLY out of the realm of being a possiblity in todays offshore world. They took the wagers (not large ones at that) and then refused to pay the customer. I strongly feel a sportsbook can refuse service to anyone just like any small business in America. In this case, if I were the manager of CBS, I would have smiled at the customer and gave him kudos for beating us to the punch and pay him off accordingly and admit to him that he got his good. But if Dave felt so unnerved by the betting patterns of this customer, just tell him in a polite and sincere matter that we care not to book your business here at CBS and thank him for his prior play here and wish him nothing but success in his gambling ventures elsewhere. All this after I mentioned to him politely and point out to him exactly why he was able to get such a good line and let him know that we had made a mistake somewhere in putting up this line. I think this is HOW DAVE SHOULD HAVE HANDLED IT because he strongly feels that he doesnt want these type of players at his book. For me personally, I would just try and make sure I stay on top of things and put up solid lines and have someway of curtailing anybody double-triple-etc, popping us on a bad line or any line for that matter.
My conclusion in all of this is that after taking in all the facts is that CBS should have paid the customer in FULL and then take whatever actions Dave felt appropriate. Although I disagree with how Dave handled this particular case, I came away with a CBS garnishing a lot more respect from me in the way DAVE at least tried to do what he felt was right. Just reading his long statement on this issue to me showed an individual that has a lot of passion for this industry and is willing to take the MUCH necessary time to at least explain the situation in a respectful way. Do not mean to sound wishy-washy here but although I think Dave made a somewhat bad decision here, it would certainly not keep me from playing at this book. Take care batheads.
As most of you know, I have been betting offshore basically since its inception and am with... or have been with over 100 sportsbooks to date. What many of you may not know, is that I worked in various sporstbooks in Las Vegas as a managerial/supervisor/oddsmaker/writer/cashier/computor admin/etc/etc for over 9 years as well as placing a wager in every sportsbook in Vegas known to man. Having said all of that, I feel that I owe the people at this site my opinion.
Well, first off let me say that I am a player at BetCBS currently but in a much smaller capacity than awhile back. Not for any reason, just have found my money works better for me at other books currently. I have found BetCBS to be an outstanding book while I have played with them. I have always rated them very highly in my mind and their 5% rebates each week on wins AND loses is fantastic. Never even close to having any problems there and have recommended their book to others on several occasions.
Let me get this out of the way. I got into the business in Las Vegas when legendary Sonny Reizner hired my off the street in the early 80'S. For all of you that know Sonny, you know the wasnt a fairer man in the business than Sonny. I remember the first day Sonny had me in his office at the Castaways for the first time interviewing me for a job. Anybody that has ever worked for Sonny, learned one thing quickly.....TREAT THE CUSTOMER LIKE HE IS ALWAYS RIGHT!. What this meant was treat the customer with respect ALWAYS. Handle the situation in a professional matter. With them thoughts in mind, on to my thoughts on this case.
As is the case in Las Vegas, a BAD LINE that a sportsbook accidently puts up and takes action on, HAS THE RIGHT TO VOID THAT TICKET EVEN THOUGH THE CUSTOMER WALKS OUT THE DOOR WITH TICKET IN HAND! However, this line has to be without question an improper line. For example, if a customer took +9 on a game when they were in reality -9, this ticket would be voided as NO ACTION. This is cut and dry. Each case is different and obviously some cases are very hard to distinguish whether it was a bad line put up a by a sportsbook or a case of a sportsbook being out of whack on an event and thus a completely different line than what other books are offering. Probably the hardest ones to come to a conclusion on this is bets offering MONEYLINES....especially on events that garnish LITTLE action that can cause HEAVY ONE-SIDED action. This is obvioulsly why you will RARELY ever see a sportsbook more than 2 points off on a football game. There is just to many sharps taking back the bad number. I remember once booking a particular Heavyweight Title fight that was not that popular. Most of the city of Vegas had the fight in the -330 come back +270 range. At my particualar place of work we were getting NO DOG ACTION. I could have made the fight -1000 and they would still bet the favorite for limit. I believe at one time I was actually at -520 come back +420 on the fight!....although I was then starting to get small action on the underdog, there were still players laying more on the favorite right up to fight time.
Sportsbooks offshore have big differences quite often in obscure sporting events with high moneylines. It can very difficult at times to determine what is a BAD LINE. In the case of the CBS situation, they obviously had put up a line that they did not want. Was it completely and 100% out of line?? I would venture that most people would say YES. I agree, but one can never know what could prompt a sportsbook to be at on a certain line. On to my personal thoughts. It is the obvious to me that the player involved was taking advantage of a strong line in his favor. One can say that he did a good job shopping and found a good line and bet into a weak number. I agree. To me the player took a nice shot at CBS for putting up a bad number.....a number that wasnt totally out of the realm of possiblity by the way. I believe whole heartedly the statements made by Dave at CBS but feel that he possibly could have handled the situation better. Maybe thinking more along the lines of SONNY would have serverd him better......THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT thinking. For whatever reason, CBS put up a line that they did not want up that was NOT TOTALLY out of the realm of being a possiblity in todays offshore world. They took the wagers (not large ones at that) and then refused to pay the customer. I strongly feel a sportsbook can refuse service to anyone just like any small business in America. In this case, if I were the manager of CBS, I would have smiled at the customer and gave him kudos for beating us to the punch and pay him off accordingly and admit to him that he got his good. But if Dave felt so unnerved by the betting patterns of this customer, just tell him in a polite and sincere matter that we care not to book your business here at CBS and thank him for his prior play here and wish him nothing but success in his gambling ventures elsewhere. All this after I mentioned to him politely and point out to him exactly why he was able to get such a good line and let him know that we had made a mistake somewhere in putting up this line. I think this is HOW DAVE SHOULD HAVE HANDLED IT because he strongly feels that he doesnt want these type of players at his book. For me personally, I would just try and make sure I stay on top of things and put up solid lines and have someway of curtailing anybody double-triple-etc, popping us on a bad line or any line for that matter.
My conclusion in all of this is that after taking in all the facts is that CBS should have paid the customer in FULL and then take whatever actions Dave felt appropriate. Although I disagree with how Dave handled this particular case, I came away with a CBS garnishing a lot more respect from me in the way DAVE at least tried to do what he felt was right. Just reading his long statement on this issue to me showed an individual that has a lot of passion for this industry and is willing to take the MUCH necessary time to at least explain the situation in a respectful way. Do not mean to sound wishy-washy here but although I think Dave made a somewhat bad decision here, it would certainly not keep me from playing at this book. Take care batheads.
