No team is really too high or too low. These aren't predictions but rather betting lines intended to get a maximum amount wagered while limiting the risk to the book maker. These type of futures wagers are the surest money makers for Vegas every year. Obviously only one team can win so the great majority of bettors lose. It is actually funny hearing announcers during an upset claim that Vegas must hate that. Nope. Vegas loves upsets since even at 150/1 odds the Nationals would pay out less $ than NYY, BOS, etc.

I disagree with you that these aren't predictions. Betting odds are actually pretty good predictors of things. You're combining the wisdom of many people into a single number. That's why futures markets are such a good indicator of where prices are going.

I'd bet the Indians, Twins and D'backs at those odds, and short the Cubs and Jays. Except of course that I won't, because these are the ultimate sucker bet, as LargeBill notes. Odds on specific games may be decent predictors, but WS (or Super Bowl) odds are just designed to coax the impulse bettor into blow a little dough on his favorite team.

I know James was speaking from a purely statistical point of view...but to be fair, the Nats have a chance to have one of the absolute worst rotations in history. Right now their depth chart only includes 3 starting pitchers, one of whom was hurt last year (Patterson) and the other two have 26 starts between them (Shawn Hill and Mike O'Connor). They weren't particularly good starts, either. They really do look like a 100-120 loss team; I know people thought the Fish would be awful last year, but at least they had clear upside.

Betting odds like these also take the number of fans a given team has into account as well as their actual probablity of winning. So in terms of predictions, they are probably not that good.

Does anyone think that the White Sox are 2.5X more likely to win the World Series than the Twins or Indians? And 20% more likely to win it than the Tigers?

Or is it just that there are more White Sox fans.

Ivan

i agree with largebill on this one. I'm a cub fan and you know how we are. there are a lot of cub fans that throw money on them to win no matter what. that's why their odds are better than they should.
so, if they are actually 25-1, they know their getting bets no matter what, so they jack it to 12-1 so in the off chance it happens, they don't lose as much.