DraftKings might have themselves a case of the Mexicali Blues.
This coming Saturday at 3:05 p.m. Pacific Time, the San Francisco Giants are the visiting team against the San Diego Padres. Lefty Sean Manaea toes the rubber for the visitors, with Joe Musgrove taking the ball for the home Padres.
DraftKings was first to open among the major sportsbooks, and hung a reasonable over/under of 9 on the game. It even ticked down to 8.5 for a spell.
One problem, though: The game is being played in Mexico City at Estadio Alfredo Harp Helu (home of the Diablos Rojas), where it’s 325 feet down the lines at an altitude of 7,320 feet — or nearly a half-a-mile higher than in the Mile High City -– and the weather is going to be about 70 degrees and sunny.
It’ll make Coors Field seem like the Polo Grounds, in other words.
Oops 286r6t
Some folks noticed.
/THREAD The #SFGiants and #BringTheGold play in Mexico City this weekend and holy shit it's going to be Coors Field on steroids
Here's everything you need to know about the park and the HIGHEST RUN TOTAL THE BAT X HAS EVER PROJECTED… pic.twitter.com/LAezWiCNbE
— Derek Carty (@DerekCarty) April 28, 2023
And the sharps smelled blood in the water, immediately hammering the over. They took a sledgehammer to it. Repeatedly.
Opened at 9. Bounced around. The operator then realized the game was being played in Mexico City in a band box. Then sharps said "that's a bridge too far" and then some other operators got involved repeating the same mistakes. Settling back now. Likely closes around 14-14.5. pic.twitter.com/Si0Bn9fKrr
— Captain Jack Andrews (@capjack2000) April 28, 2023
While one might think the other sportsbooks would notice, that wasn’t necessarily the case. Caesars had an over/under of 11.5 for a few minutes, and it might have been lower (send screenshots). The number at DraftKings bounced around for a bit, coming back down to 12.5, though it appears to have settled — for the time being — at 15.
Two years ago, the Yankees and Red Sox did battle in London, scored 30 runs, and then the over/under for the next game opened at 15.5, the highest in over seven years.
And for those keeping score at home, the most runs scored ever in a Major League game is 49, a record that has held for over 100 years. In that slugfest, the Phillies lost to the Cubs, 26-23.
