❌ Is An XFL Team The Most Reliably Bad In Sports?

It's Saturday and that means it's time for us to strap in and dig into the world of betting and probabilities and see what shakes out. We — allegedly — have one more two week sprint of development and QA until our Probly Beta/MVP is where it needs to be for your consumption. So the end is finally in sight with that process while the work of building a company truly begins.As we continue that march, today I'll break down some of our key differentiators from our competitors and then take a jaunt through the markets for NBA playoffs, MLB, Spring football!, and whatever else jumps out. Let's get going with your Probly email for April 22nd, 2023! - @ChrisSpags

• 👑 The most probable bets from the NBA playoffs, MLB, Spring football, and other items of note!

• 🔓 Probly Beta updates - Why Probly over other betting products?

The old rule of the Probly email remains true, the true Most Likely champion lies abroad, this time in the world of Slovakian women's hoops. This weekend, a Piestanske Cajky win over archrival Banska Bystrica is the most likely outcome with a 96% probability. The WNBA needs to recruit more women from these Eastern European leagues based upon how dominant they seem to sometimes be, at least against each other.But of course, you're not likely to get the latest antics of Piestanske Cajky in your local sportsbook. So we head to the XFL once again for the week's highest Most Likely winner. And that comes in the form of St. Louis's beloved Battlehawks with a home Battlehawks win at a 77.3% probability over the basement dwelling Orlando Guardians, who continue to be one of the lowest probability winners across all sports every single week. The launch of the USFL has meant even less people are watching both leagues' games but the home of Nelly will I'm sure be lit as they spitefully support an XFL team to taunt their ex, the Rams.❌ For the rest of the XFL's top five most probable: a Sea Dragons win at a 75% probability, a Defenders win at a 56.3% probability, an Arlington Renegades win at a 51.9% probability, and Brahmas +3 with a 50.7% probability. So if you want one potentially competitive/fun game this wekeend, it seems like it'd be Defenders-Brahmas.🏉 While we're wallowing in Spring football, let's hit the USFL's top five: A Birmingham Stallions win leads the league with a 73.9% probability, a New Jersey Generals win comes with a 68.7% probability, a New Orleans Breakers win has a 68.3% probability, a Philadelphia Stars win has a 59.9% probability, and a Memphis Showboats +7 closes out the top five with a 53.9% probability. Nothing says Showboating like praying you lose by a touchdown or less.🏀 The NBA is still in playoff mode, even with star players being ruled out like it's the regular season. The top five: A Warriors win has a 74.8% probability as their series with the Kings may draw even at 2-2, a Suns win on Sunday over a Kawhi-less Clippers squad has a 73.7% probability, a Suns moneyline (1st half) has a 67.2% probability, a Warriors moneyline (1st half) has a 66.9% probability, and a Celtics win on Sunday over Atlanta has a 66.4% probability. If I had to guess, I think Warriors-Kings goes 7, the Suns give the Clippers a gentleman's sweep with no Kawhi, while the Hawks extend the Celtics series to six games before Boston moves on.⚾️ As we know by now, the MLB top five remains the weirdest of them all but here it is: Twins +1 (1st half) at an 84% probability, Tigers/Orioles over 4.5 runs at an 82.6% probability, White Sox/Rays under 11.5 runs at a 82.4% probability, Cards/Mariners over 4.5 runs at an 81.5% probability, and in Game 2 of their doubleheader it's Marlins/Guardians under 11.5 runs at an 81.5% probability. That Twins game versus Washington is also MLB's highest probability winner of the day with a Twins win at a 72.6% probability. How far the Nationals have fallen since that magical 2019 win.🥊 UFC has an interesting fight headlining tonight that could portend the next heavyweight title contender between Sergei Pavlovich and Curtis Blaydes. That particular fight's highest probability is the fight going under 1.5 rounds at a 59% probability with a Blaydes win just behind at a 56.9% probability. Neither of these make the top five for the event, which includes: A Montel Jackson win at an 83.4% probability, a Iasmin Lucindo win at a 76.5% probability, Karol Rosa & Norma Dumon over 2.5 rounds at a 74.8% probability, a Caio Borralho win at a 72.2% probability, and a Stephanie Egger win at a 72.2% probability.

If you've missed the previous weeks of write-ups as we get to our product release home stretch, check our our previous emails on 1) the core functionalities on our Stories page 2) Our Explore page with power users, myself included, in mind 3) How the concept of Mathematical Probability powers everything we do at Probly (and should be how you approach everything in betting and fantasy sports).Today, let's talk about why I think you should be locked in with our product, whether you've been on this list since day one or just joined. We've had this mailing list going for a while, pretty much since we started our UX development in the Fall so hopefully you can see each week the effort, knowledge accumulation, and deliberate (admittedly sometimes too deliberate!) process we've had to put this together into a product we are proud of.Besides that, there are a lot of key differentiators between us and other places that I'd hope will earn us an opportunity with the larger sports world:

• This isn't just "picks" — I give my personal leans within the email and will in other content but what I've learned since my Stokastic days is to build reputable data and trust it above all else. That is what our product will provide to every user, whether they subscribe or not. There are a lot of places you can be spoonfed someone's personal takes or model. There are even more where you can be Cost Per Acquisition'd to death as you shop for odds. For us, you can find a best bet for anything you care to wager on using the same Expected Value math that we price our own bets for. If you want more, we will spoonfeed you the best and most profitable options with a swipe of a finger if you are a paying customer. And if you just want to see "What are the odds the Bucks win tonight", you'll see it as simply as possible along with the likelihood of everything else you want to know.

• We have community top of mind — At launch, you'll have the ability to comment on bets and share bets (with us welcoming every and all feedback, especially in our initial free-for-everyone period). In a future release, you'll be able to track your on-platform picks and compete in leagues with friends or with the overall user base or do things like cut your own video takes on bets. There is no tool with the depth of ours that also has a focus on embracing our own community and the betting community overall as we will (with little tolerance for the toxic portions of things as well).

• This product is built with a unique level of domain expertise — I always try to keep it real here, even if I've learned to not bash people or other things just for the sake of it. But I will say this: For every one site out there with true knowledge and data or content that adds value to users, there are five more that lack the ability to do that adeptly or, worse, are total carpetbaggers with no real knowledge of the products they're bringing to people. And, in some of these cases, they may have the betting side or data and UX side down but completely lack the consumer knowledge or know-how. I have won money. I have done my 10,000 hours on YouTube during the Stokastic days as well as on Splash Play now and heard real people and what they want. I have had success with the frothing masses at Barstool and learned a lot about how to reach those mainstream audiences. My co-founder and best friend Edgar has worked as a developer or engineer at high-end, billion dollar tech companies and brings real rigor and technical skill to it all. This is not a desperation pivot to a trendy industry because our previous startup was failing, like some press-happy companies out there may be. it's a real product built with real knowledge meant for real people.

• This is being built for people, not money — Of course our goal for Probly is to be worth a billion dollars, have our information featured on sports networks and in arenas around the country, and be a mainstream lever for a daunting industry. We'd also be happy to have a profitable product that provides us our own company and jobs that make a loyal fanbase of users delighted and more likely to win money. But the thing that matters most to me, personally, is that this helps people and makes them happy. Yes, maybe we could help people more by revolutionizing medical care or local advocacy but, let's be real here, I know jack sh*t about that. I do know betting and I do know how to delight people with content. So that's the goal. If we can help claw back potential sportsbook losses for users (Americans lose roughly $10 billion annually in bets) and help them have fun along the way, then we'll have done our job. And I truly believe if we prioritize that from the jump and work to always achieve that end, we'll achieve it all.

These are the kinds of things you have to soapbox on in a mailing list while you wait for the product to be done. But I hope that does continue to paint the picture of why Probly is not the other companies beating down your door for a scrap of your betting budget.

There it is, another one in the books. I'm sure you've read more than enough from me at this point but I appreciate each and every one of you who clicks open each week and follows along with our journey here at Probly.Let's pray that our development team sprints faster than expected to get our Probly Beta to the finish line and I'll see you guys with more next week!