Last week we received a complaint from a player who had placed a wager on Formula 1 racing with SBG Global. The wager in question was on a driver Jenson Button to win the F1 championship. Button, a driver for the Honda team, which withdrew from competition this season, was listed between 60-1 and 70-1 on most US-facing books as late as March 13, when this player put in a bet for $200 to win $14,000.
There is some history that must be reviewed to fully understand what is going on with this future wager.
On March 6, Honda did pass ownership of their team to Ross Brawn, Team Principal of the new Brawn GP Formula One Team, securing the future of their drivers. This made Jenson Button a driver for Brawn GP and on March 12, he had terrific time trial with his new BGP 001 car, beating the next opponent, from Ferrari racing, by over 1 second over 130 laps. Consequently, odds around the world dropped like a stone on Button to win the F1 Championship. But, most US-facing bookmakers left their odds at 50, 60 or 70-1.
We began our investigation by looking at oddschecker.com, which carries an exhaustive line history for almost every wager on the board. According to them, Button opened at BlueSquare and 888 in Europe at 66-1 and at Ladbrokes at 33-1 on the 12th . By the end of the next day, Button’s odds had already dropped to 16-1 and 14-1 at these outlets. Lines were also quickly updated at betting exchanges and players at industry leader Betfair, who were trading at 22-1 on the 12th, were exchanging wagers as low as 15-1 during trading on the 13th.
We then checked the F1 outlets and Jenson Buttons’ own website. With just a quick perusal it was easy to see why the line had moved so much in such a short time. The addition of a world class driver like Button to a new team like Brawn GP would move the line a bit. But, after a fantastic time trial, the odds had nowhere to go but down. Button was listed at 100-1 at Bet365 on March 5 and by March the 10th had already fallen to 50-1. Then, with the news of the time trial, he was at 8-1 within three days.
We have since received several other complaints on the way SBG Global is handling the future wager. They have told players that the odds they are willing to pay out on Button to win are 10 to 1 - the average closing line at the start of the F1 season on March 29th. A more fair line on the 13th would be 20-1, as this is where many EU bookmakers opened that day..
To add fuel to the fire, these wagers were not questioned until AFTER Button had already won the first two races of the season! SBG is saying that they offered a ‘bad line’ and has stopped short of voiding the wagers.
Or did they?
The most recent complainant informed us that his wager was being voided! However, we found out that he was offered the 10-1 but refused those odds.
We spoke with SBG Global management, who has decided to stand fast on their treatment of these wagers. They insist that 70-1 consitutes a 'bad line' and several players opened with them just to jump on this line. SBG management told us that they do not set their own lines for F1 racing; they use one of several line services that cater to US-facing sportsbooks. The fact that they had the 'bad' line out there after many UK bookmakers had dropped it was poor information from the lines service. Thus, the 'bad line' rule is being invoked.
We urge players to take the 10-1 as SBG is drawing a ‘line in the sand’ on this one. Currently, the number for Button stands near even money.
After speaking with SBG, we still feel that this is not a bad line, just poor line management. In fact, the Jenson Button wager caught many of the US-facing bookmakers off guard. Both Bookmaker and The Greek, elite-rated books, were hit with the same play. However, they are honoring the odds posted. We spoke with The Greek and they are certainly not happy about it. But, they admit that thier line manager should have seen the global changes in the odds, regardless of what the line service was telling them. They took the bet, now they will pay the bet.
SBG has committed one of the biggest no-nos in bookmaking - changing odds or voiding a wager after the event has gone off. Yes, they may be in danger of taking a big hit. And yes, the number was off from where the EU bookmakers moved to. BUT, they are the ones at fault here. Perhaps they should not have offered a wager on a sport that they knew little about, taking a third-party line as the gospel. Perhaps they should be watching the lines at the Ladbrokes and BetFairs of the world on EU sporting events.
Does all of this make SBG a bunch of bad guys? It certainly does to players who are looking to take advantage of an 'off line'. What this really does is send a message to players that jumping on off lines at SBG will not fly. Any bad lines will be scrutinized and handled in a similar fashion.
And really, Jenson Button still has to win....and keep winning for 14 more races. He currently leads the standings be a mere 6 points.
