Columnist Jeff Haney: LVSC’s White embraces challenge of battling big bettors

Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2004 | 10:10 a.m.

Jeff Haney's sports betting column appears Wednesday. Reach him at (702) 259-4041 or haney@lasvegassun.com.

GETTING THE BEST OF IT: Making a bet that has a positive expectation for profit. The opposite is "taking the worst of it," which is when the other side, whoever you are betting against, has the advantage.

LAY: To give up a certain number of points when betting a favorite.

PUBLIC: Unsophisticated, recreational sports bettors. Also used to describe a team that draws a lot of money from those bettors: "The Dallas Cowboys are traditionally a public team."

WISE GUY: A sophisticated, informed, often professional sports bettor.

July 7 -- Future books for the World Series.

July 14 -- Games of the year in football.

July 21 -- Over/unders on wins in NFL season.

July 28 -- Larry Grossman's gambling show returns.

Aug. 4 -- Handicappers convene at Mandalay Bay.

Today -- Kenny White of LV Sports Consultants.

Next week -- Pro sports bettor bullish on Seattle.

Kenny White, the leading oddsmaker in Las Vegas, is dropping a not-so-subtle hint to college football bettors: If you lay points with Southern Cal this season, you'll likely be taking the worst of it.

"Our line is going to be inflated a couple of points on USC," White said the other day at the offices of Las Vegas Sports Consultants, the oddsmaking firm that serves 90 percent of Nevada's sports books.

The Trojans, ranked No. 1 in the preseason polls and favored to win the Bowl Championship Series title game, are expected to be the darlings of the betting public this fall -- to the extent that money wagered by casual gamblers could influence the betting line more than so-called "wise guys," or sophisticated professional gamblers.

With the possible exception of the Super Bowl, that situation rarely occurs, White said.

"There will definitely be value in going against USC," said White, who has been busy preparing for his first football season as co-owner and chief operating officer of LVSC. "They're a very good team and everybody knows it."

In fact, White said he expects wise guys to place some bets on USC themselves as soon as the line is released -- "to give it a kick start, let the public get on it, try to inflate the line even more" -- before swinging for the fences with much larger bets against the Trojans later in the week.

"They do things like that," White said. "They're smart. That's why they're called wise guys."

And Kenny White knows from wise guys.

The son of a professional sports bettor, White has been going mano a mano with sharp gamblers in Las Vegas for 20 years -- both as a handicapper competing in high-level football contests around town and as an independent oddsmaking consultant. Nevada Sports Executives, the company White founded in 1989 and ran for nearly 15 years, once provided odds to 10 sports books.

Last November, a group of local investors that included White, Ellen Whittemore and her husband Jeff Patterson, and David and Lesa Whittemore acquired LVSC.

As the company's leading oddsmaker, White says his primary responsibility is to provide accurate odds and up-to-the-second betting information to his casino clients.

As a public face in the city's sports gambling industry, however, White has more far-reaching plans as well: He hopes to establish an ongoing dialogue on sports betting issues with Washington, D.C. politicos and NCAA officials.

"Right now, they think we're the bad guys," White said, referring to efforts in Washington to outlaw betting on college sports in Nevada casinos. "In reality, we're the ones policing (potential) scams by monitoring movements in the (betting) line. If they outlawed betting in Las Vegas there would 10 times as many fixed games, because there wouldn't be anyone policing the line movement."

Likewise, a closer relationship between Las Vegas and the NCAA would serve as an insurance policy against point-shaving scandals and other chicanery, White said.

"I'd love to be able to send (the NCAA) reports each week, saying here's where the line opened, here's where it closed, and whether teams are playing up to expectations," White said. "If something didn't look right, then they would have the option of sending an official out to snoop around.

"I'd like to educate the NCAA a litte bit that we're the good guys."

As he and his team of eight oddsmakers work to create those opening lines each week, White said sharp professional bettors are never far from his mind.

At times, it sounds almost personal.

"The professional gamblers are out there, and they're good," White said. "They may be ahead of us right now in certain areas, such as technology and crunching numbers.

"But I've always been a very competitive person, and I look at this as a challenge. We're going to pass them. I want to make a stronger line for the casinos."

Veteran sports handicapper Marc Lawrence said recently that any bettor who underestimates White's talent does so at his peril.

"Kenny White is not only a sharp oddsmaker, but he is a tremendous handicapper in his own right," Lawrence said.

White, a lifelong student of the sports betting game, recalled an anecdote from the 1980s to illustrate the challenge of making lines on "public" teams such as USC. It seems the head coach of a college football powerhouse in the heartland said something to the effect of, "There's a guy in Las Vegas who's making my job harder and harder every week."

In other words, the coach felt pressure, perhaps from high-rolling school boosters, to not only win but to cover the point spread each week. (Of course, the more he covered, the more inflated the spread became.)

The lesson: Having a few extra points working for you in the betting line is nice, but it does not guarantee you'll cash a ticket.

Southern Cal, for example, might keep covering this season even against an inflated line. Or it could have a "choppy" year, covering at a 50-50 rate.

Either outcome could be costly for the wise guys.

Each football season, White said, a small group of teams fares well against the point spread; another small group fares poorly.

"The rest," White said, "are the ones that make the books money."

Nugget contest

The Golden Nugget has announced the biggest football handicapping contest any casino has offered in years.

The entry fee is $5,000, with a guaranteed prize pool of $500,000 and $250,000 going to the winner, according to Chris Andrews, director of race and sports book operations at the Golden Nugget. All entry fees will be returned as prize money.

Contestants pick five pro football games against the spread each week, including one "best bet" that is double-weighted for scoring purposes.

PGA Championship

Ernie Els and Tiger Woods are 6 1/2-1 co-favorites to win the year's final golf major, this week's PGA Championship at Haven, Wis., according to Las Vegas Hilton odds.

Among the propositions are an over/under on the winning score (283 1/2) at the par-72, 7,514-yard course, and an over/under on Woods' finish on the leader board (6 1/2).

Shaq vs. Kobe

Station Casinos sports books have posted a couple of props matching up Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant:

Bryant is a 3-point favorite against O'Neal to finish with a higher scoring average in the 2004-05 regular season.

O'Neal's Miami Heat is favored by 5 1/2 wins against Bryant's Los Angeles Lakers to finish with more regular-season victories.