All relative in terms of odds and price. Took CR at +160 after the first semifinal (JC was favored because he was actually in the final while cal and oneil still had to get into the final).
I mean you couldnt pay someone to bet cal raleigh in this, i heard it all, he’s a fluke, a catchers never won, the price (+250ish most of the day) was too expensive, a youtuber actually wrote off JC and CR in the first 2 minutes of a really “valuable” picks video b/c they were “fat ph u k s”
This was my system - not sophisticated i did it in a notes files on my iphone.
The PA/HR are career numbers for minors and majors and the far right number is career pitches per PA. I also looked at GB/FB rates. My top 3 shots at winning the final were junior, rooker, and cal, but I played mostly long odds bets (JC to reach the finals, JC to hit the most homers in R1, rooker + cal in the final), and this was one hell of a guide, because Cal is the clear leader in PA/HR, and had a GB/FB ratio of like 0.3. For 2025 cal is actually 9 AB/HR. How can you take ANYONE to beat the dude?
I thought it was weird how they eliminated rooker because of 3 inches on first round longest HR because of some Google Cloud robots estimate, no time for a swing off I guess, we had to watch an hour of untimed bonus rounds instead.
It didnt matter, in fact the draw benefitted JC and won my 7:1 ish bet on him to reach the final.
But rooker and cal were separated by 6 inches and jc and cr werent terribly far apart in the final. So my impromptu notes were gold. You can see wood, cruz, etc not really priced right and JC was way too cheap.
I even got the JC to hit the most HR in r1, it didnt pay +1100, but +550 b/c of the tie with cruz. Although i swear one of cruz’s last hr’s was foul. But again, that probably helped me because JC eould’ve been the 1 seed and played Cal in the 2nd rd,
Matt olsen underwhelmed, but thats the story of atl in 2025. Cruz was better than i thought, but my biggest takeaway is that distance decided rooker / cal in round 1. Distance ESTIMATED that was under 1 foot apart. Cal wouldve beaten rooker in a swing off anyway, and he had 9 HR in the first 1 minute, but finished with only 17, so its on him not the system. I love stats as much as anyone, in baseball they matter more than any sport. But robots AI, Google statcast shouldnt be determining a tie when its under a foot apart. The goal is to hit the most homeruns, theres no trophy for distance, so why the fk distance determine advancing in one round but not other rounds?
Generally exit velo, launch angle, etc disgust me. The player who hits balls the hardest doesnt go to the world series, cause that’d be as ridiculous as splitting a tie with 3 inches.
All in all a success,
This was my point about cal raleighs “price” he was gonna win the thing, he coulda been +150 when odds opened, the catchers never won it and masses of ppl i heard of taking jazz chizm or buxton just because they paid more was widespread insanity. We
should be more impressed by CR b/c he’s a catcher not discounting his season because of it. 
