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#1
In Nevada sportsbooks, there’s a name for diehard gamblers who occupy lumpy chairs until the wee hours, sweating out that last college football game when most of us already have called it a day.
They are known as “Hawaii hanger-ons,” and their action has been known to have an impact on their own bankrolls as well as the book’s bottom line.
They aren’t a whole lot different than the types you see who, almost invariably, try to recoup a weekend’s losses by betting whatever they have left on the chalk in the Monday Night Football game.
Some Hawaii hanger-ons are the compulsive types who need to have a dollar on every game, but the club’s members use a revolving door. Most are temporary who see that last game, usually with 9 or 10 p.m. kickoff local time, as a potential means by which to avoid waiting until Sunday morning to get back some of what they lost during the Saturday slate.
Most people who bet college football seriously likely have visited the Hawaii hanger-on club a time or two, and I’m no exception. But I’ve long since kicked the habit.
Even so, the alleged point-shaving scandal that hit Hawaii this week brought to light a dynamic I’ve been witnessing for years. That is, the sportsbook needing Louisiana Tech or Idaho to cover 20-odd points in order to take the cash from the hanger-ons, who gladly sweat out games that inevitably seem to last about 6 hours, in hopes the Warriors can bring them some needed cash.
Also, as a media member who lives in Reno, the home of a WAC team in Nevada, I am privy to – and sometimes take part in – coverage of the conference. For better or worse, I end up seeing all or parts of just about every Hawaii game, every season.
I’m no longer a card-carrying member of the hanger-ons, but I often live vicariously through them as I watch the games and finalize my NFL plays for Sunday morning.
So, it’s with this background and pedigree that I’ll offer the Hawaii administration a chance to stop wasting their time and effort, and follow my analysis about whether Hawaii players shaved points.
Not a chance.
Because, if they did, the hanger-ons would have burned down the sportsbook by now. Believe me, if you’ve got your last $200 riding on the Warriors -20 against some other WAC team, the book would hear about it if there was any funny business.
Moreover, I’ve watched enough of them over the past couple of years to conclude it’s highly unlikely. This would be tantamount to you accusing me of being an inept heart surgeon – I’ve never been to medical school. You have to have some sort of mastery of craft in order to manipulate or be actively incompetent at it, and the Warriors don’t qualify.
Hawaii football long has been a different animal, both on the field and in the sportsbook. We all know every college team performs better at home and worse on the road, but this club historically takes it to extremes both ways.
Why? Well over the past couple of seasons, their talent has been marginal, which only has amplified this long standing hot-and-cold trait.
But by and large, the reason I most commonly hear -- and the one that makes the most practical sense -- is the immense impact travel has on Hawaii teams.
It’s a minimum 6-hour flight and two time-zone switch for the nearest WAC road game. Try flying across the country for day then seeing how fast you can run a mile – the travel just naturally fatigues humans.
Teams that travel to Hawaii rarely have such an experience, so it hits them harder. Not to mention the potential distractions for college players who likely have never witnessed such paradise, and it’s no wonder Hawaii has such a definitive home-field advantage.
A lot of the Hawaii buzz has died down since the June Jones era but, to some degree, the team’s traits haven’t changed. The Warriors last year handed a loss to a Nevada team that went 13-1 and eventually beat Boise State. The Warriors went on the road a few weeks later and lost 42-7 to the Broncos. They also lost to a woefully inept Colorado team 31-13 last year.
Even in their BCS dream season of 2007-08, Hawaii needed a field goal at the buzzer to top a mediocre Nevada team 28-26. The Jekyll & Hyde show has gone on like this for years.
So to see an injury-struck, talent-thin Hawaii club lose to teams like UNLV and San Jose State didn’t really catch me by surprise at all. The only difference is that some hanger-ons decided to cry about a bad beat.
They are known as “Hawaii hanger-ons,” and their action has been known to have an impact on their own bankrolls as well as the book’s bottom line.
They aren’t a whole lot different than the types you see who, almost invariably, try to recoup a weekend’s losses by betting whatever they have left on the chalk in the Monday Night Football game.
Some Hawaii hanger-ons are the compulsive types who need to have a dollar on every game, but the club’s members use a revolving door. Most are temporary who see that last game, usually with 9 or 10 p.m. kickoff local time, as a potential means by which to avoid waiting until Sunday morning to get back some of what they lost during the Saturday slate.
Most people who bet college football seriously likely have visited the Hawaii hanger-on club a time or two, and I’m no exception. But I’ve long since kicked the habit.
Even so, the alleged point-shaving scandal that hit Hawaii this week brought to light a dynamic I’ve been witnessing for years. That is, the sportsbook needing Louisiana Tech or Idaho to cover 20-odd points in order to take the cash from the hanger-ons, who gladly sweat out games that inevitably seem to last about 6 hours, in hopes the Warriors can bring them some needed cash.
Also, as a media member who lives in Reno, the home of a WAC team in Nevada, I am privy to – and sometimes take part in – coverage of the conference. For better or worse, I end up seeing all or parts of just about every Hawaii game, every season.
I’m no longer a card-carrying member of the hanger-ons, but I often live vicariously through them as I watch the games and finalize my NFL plays for Sunday morning.
So, it’s with this background and pedigree that I’ll offer the Hawaii administration a chance to stop wasting their time and effort, and follow my analysis about whether Hawaii players shaved points.
Not a chance.
Because, if they did, the hanger-ons would have burned down the sportsbook by now. Believe me, if you’ve got your last $200 riding on the Warriors -20 against some other WAC team, the book would hear about it if there was any funny business.
Moreover, I’ve watched enough of them over the past couple of years to conclude it’s highly unlikely. This would be tantamount to you accusing me of being an inept heart surgeon – I’ve never been to medical school. You have to have some sort of mastery of craft in order to manipulate or be actively incompetent at it, and the Warriors don’t qualify.
Hawaii football long has been a different animal, both on the field and in the sportsbook. We all know every college team performs better at home and worse on the road, but this club historically takes it to extremes both ways.
Why? Well over the past couple of seasons, their talent has been marginal, which only has amplified this long standing hot-and-cold trait.
But by and large, the reason I most commonly hear -- and the one that makes the most practical sense -- is the immense impact travel has on Hawaii teams.
It’s a minimum 6-hour flight and two time-zone switch for the nearest WAC road game. Try flying across the country for day then seeing how fast you can run a mile – the travel just naturally fatigues humans.
Teams that travel to Hawaii rarely have such an experience, so it hits them harder. Not to mention the potential distractions for college players who likely have never witnessed such paradise, and it’s no wonder Hawaii has such a definitive home-field advantage.
A lot of the Hawaii buzz has died down since the June Jones era but, to some degree, the team’s traits haven’t changed. The Warriors last year handed a loss to a Nevada team that went 13-1 and eventually beat Boise State. The Warriors went on the road a few weeks later and lost 42-7 to the Broncos. They also lost to a woefully inept Colorado team 31-13 last year.
Even in their BCS dream season of 2007-08, Hawaii needed a field goal at the buzzer to top a mediocre Nevada team 28-26. The Jekyll & Hyde show has gone on like this for years.
So to see an injury-struck, talent-thin Hawaii club lose to teams like UNLV and San Jose State didn’t really catch me by surprise at all. The only difference is that some hanger-ons decided to cry about a bad beat.
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