When it comes to making odds on NFL games, Las Vegas sports books are facing a new, high-tech challenger.
The Crowd’s Line — a New York-based startup — sources its football forecasts from thousands of online participants, it said in a recent interview.
In fact, the company claims its spreads this season have been noticeably more accurate than those coming out of Vegas. How much better?
Anywhere from 10 to 20 percent, according to Anthony Lage, the former Wall Street trader who founded the company last year to try and tap into the $400 billion a year bet on sports globally every year.
That is, The Crowd’s Line spread on NFL games this season is 10 percent to 20 percent more accurate than Vegas, Lage said.
“We’re going to be right, and we’re going to be wrong, but we’re going to be right more than we’re wrong,” Lage said.
Lage said his company’s stellar record is the result of it being immune from the wild swings that large bets can have on Vegas odds.
Instead, Lage’s line is crowd-sourced from individuals who are motivated by rankings to provide expert advice.
Lage’s business model is different from Vegas as well. He doesn’t take a piece of every bet, but rather sells his lines to publishers and broadcasters.
You can’t place bets with The Crowd’s Line. It merely provides predicted scores of games to help bettors make smarter wagers.
Down the line, Lage aims to build an online marketplace for stats-obsessed sports fans.
But for now, The Crowd’s Line is embedding widgets carrying game predictions on sites like Fox Sports, CBS Sports and SB Nation.
The widgets, in addition to game lines, will feature the rankings of the top individual predictors. The public rankings will add prestige to what the linemakers do, Lage said, and increase competition among them.
Those incentives will likely be monetary within the next year or two, with star forecasters getting the chance to market their skills, Lage says.
In the meantime, The Crowd’s Line is compiling reams of valuable new stats each weekend on fan sentiment — for example, whether a team’s home base tends to be overly optimistic, and by how much.
“Every time fans predicted against their team, they’ve been absolutely right,” Lage says.
Except once, he said.
Fans in Kansas City didn’t think much of their Chiefs’ chances last week of beating the Pittsburgh Steelers — until they did.
