Bookies’ Corner: Finding value at the Oscars

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Introducing the Bookies’ Corner at SBCNews, a new biweekly column wherein betting industry experts give their two cents on topical issues from the worlds of sport, entertainment and politics. 

With the 88th Academy Awards fast approaching we spoke to Harry Lang, Marketing Director at Pinnacle Sports, Anthony Cousins Head of Sportsbook at Unibet and Betway’s Alan Alger to hear their thoughts on this year’s Oscars, dissect the odds and whether the Brit pack stand a chance this time round.

SBC: In regard to the ‘Best Picture’ category, how is it that The Big Short is amongst the bookies’ favourites? The likes of The Revenant in particular has seen much more press and favourable attention yet is not a clear leader.

Harry Lang, Pinnacle Sports

Harry Lang, Pinnacle Sports

 Harry Lang: Though the market seems in no doubt that DiCaprio should finally clear a space on his mantelpiece for a coveted gold statuette (he’s our 1.042 favourite for Best Actor*), the Best Picture odds at Pinnacle Sports reflect divided opinion. 

We opened Spotlight as favourite for Best Picture – just ahead of The Revenant – but a spurt of betting saw The Big Short moving from 9.950* to close to displacing Spotlight as favourite (at the time of writing). Spotlight is favourite once again, but it’s a close run thing.

The Big Short focuses on a small group of investors who bet against the U.S. Housing market – and most of Wall Street – and in this sense, life is imitating art as our bettors contradict the general consensus.

To communicate a complex story Director Adam McKay experimented with ‘straight to camera’ confessionals and threw in some fun cameos, notably pop-princess Selena Gomez, thus successfully humanizing the central (rather boring) theme of collateralised debt obligations.

This unique approach seems to have resonated with the Producers Guild of America who voted The Big Short as Best Picture. There are numerous awards prior to the Oscars that can provide a good steer on the winners, and although the PGA is alone in favouring The Big Short (so far), crucially it has successfully predicted the Best Picture at the Oscars for the past eight years.

SBC: Is it difficult establishing Oscars markets with the closed ballot form of voting? Moreover, how do you gauge public opinion with such markets? 

Anthony Cousins, Unibet

Anthony Cousins, Unibet

Anthony Cousins: With so many awards given on the film circuit it becomes relatively easy to establish Oscar markets as it is so late in the season. This year saw Spotlight as the early frontrunner for Best Picture as it picked up so many awards early on in the circuit and was odds on at one point.

More recently, The Big Short picked up the PGA award (Producers Guild of America) for Best Picture which saw its odds cut from 10/1 to Even money. Whilst ballots may be closed we know that the PGA and Oscars both have 7,000 members, that a huge percentage of the PGA members are Oscar members too and that 19 times in the last 26 years the winner of the PGA Best Picture has also won the Oscar.

In fact it has happened the last 8 years in a row so whilst ballots may be closed there are a lot of clues as to how votes are likely to go.

Whilst large bets may affect the odds, public opinion isn’t a significant barometer when it comes to Oscarbetting, that would be the worst way to make prices.Ultimately it is not what the public think is the best film or who they think the best actress is, but what a small minority of voting members think. 

The media often portray the process as a pre-meditated group decision “We better give Leo an Oscar this year as we keep snubbing him!” but the reality is the votes are cast individually by a small group of mainly male, mainly white, mainly old and generally conservative members whose voting patterns are in evidence in other ceremonies.

SBC: What are the chances for the Britpack looking like at this year’s Academy Awards?

Anthony Cousins: Whilst there are a lot of contenders, there are no red hot British favourites as we have seen in previous years. It is unlikely that Eddie Redmayne will upset Leonardo DiCaprio’s 1/13 odds for Best Actor, whilst surprise nomination Charlotte Rampling is the rank outsider at 30/1 to win Best Actress.

Kate Winslet won the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for “Steve Jobs” but the form is misleading as she did not have Rooney Mara to contend with, who was instead nominated for Best Actress at that ceremony. The Oscars places them both in the Best Supporting Actress category with Mara the odds on favourite. The best chance of a British success comes in the Best Supporting Actor category.

Mark Rylance, Christian Bale and Tom Hardy are all nominated but it won’t be easy for any of them to beat Rocky himself, Sylvester Stallone, who is the current odds on favourite.

The last time a British Actor or Actress won an Oscar in an Even numbered year was 2008 (Daniel Day Lewis & Tilda Swinton) – the omens do not look good for 2016!

SBC: With markets on every category, where is the most value and where are the surprises likely to come from? Does the opinion of critics mean that much…only three times in the past twenty has the best reviewed film won Best Picture after all. 

Alan Alger, Betway

Alan Alger, Betway

Alan Alger: The Academy Awards can be difficult to predict at times, but they don’t come much more certain than Leonardo DiCaprio to win Best Actor at 1/12 for his performance in The Revenant.

It may come as a surprise that he hasn’t won the award before, as he’s been in some of the most popular films of all time. He couldn’t be overlooked again, could he? I think DiCaprio’s time has finally come, but we are seeing a bit of money starting to come in for Eddie Redmayne at 10/1 for Danish Girl. The Academy do love a British accent, so it might be worth a shout.

For Best Actress, Brie Larson is 1/4 to win for her turn in Room, which I think is a bit short. Saoirse Ronan (5/2) and Cate Blanchett (4/1) aren’t far off, but the value must surely be with shock Golden Globes winner Kate Winslet at 9/2. Kate and Leo, sounds about right.

The Best Picture award is always controversial, and I’m sure this year will be no different. The front runners are The Big Short (1/1) and Spotlight (7/4), which I think is a bit harsh on The Revenant (4/1).

There have been shocks before of course – you need only cast your mind back to 10 years ago when Crash beat Brokeback Mountain, Capote, and Munich to claim Best Picture – but I can’t see it happening this year for the likes of Bridge of Spies, Brooklyn or Mad Max: Fury Road.

I wouldn’t be opposed to putting a few quid on Room at 50/1 though, stranger things have happened!


Source: SBC News

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