Despite Baseballs Best Records, Vegas Sees Giants And A's As World Series Underdogs
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) - It's hard to know exactly how Las Vegas odds-makers come up with their postseason favorites, but it appears that it may have more to do with payroll than performance.
As of Wednesday, the San Francisco Giants had the best record in Major League Baseball at 33-19. The second-best Oakland A's were just ahead of the Brewers and Blue Jays with a 31-21 mark. The A's were a game and a half up on the Los Angeles Angels and the Giants and were 4.5 ahead of the Los Angeles Dodgers entering action. So Vegas is betting on a Bay Bridge World Series, right? Nope.
This week's futures lines from Vegas.com have the A's edging out the Giants as World Series odds at 8 to 1. The 10 to 1 Giants trail the Cardinals (8/1) and Dodgers (6/1) and are even with Washington (10/1). The A's trail only Detroit (5/1) as American League favorites. Both Bay Area teams are lumped in a pack of potential playoff squads including the Yankees (12/1), Angels (14/1), Atlanta (14/1) and, Boston (14/1).
Similarly, Gaming website Bovada.com sets the Dodgers (13/2) and Tigers (6/1) as the favorites to be celebrating a title this Fall. They actually give peg the Giants as the 3rd option at 9/1, tied with the St. Louis Cardinals, the A's (10/1) are ranked 5th.
Vegasinsider.com has the Giants in fourth and the A's in 5th, again trailing Detroit, Los Angeles and St. Louis.
The list of favorites, is a who's who of the highest paid teams in the League, with the Cardinals (with the 13th highest payroll) the only team besides the A's (25th highest paid) given much of a shot to win it all.
The Giants and A's are getting a little more love from the CBS Local sports crew, where they ranked number 1 and 3 respectively in this week's Power Rankings.
