Lance Uppercut

I gamble on politics and events.
DMs open if you want to discuss markets.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

Also LeBron if you deny me I will feel psychic pain.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

LeBron James and the Last Decision

-- LONG THREAD WARNING--

Since we're at the eve of the decision, I figured I would summarize my thinking on this market. It's a pretty difficult one! It's very easy for someone to zero in on one or two points and form that as the single basis for the reason LeBron would pick team A or team B. My goal is not to push people to one option or the other, but just to get my thoughts out there and plant my flag before the announcement drops. I can hopefully look smart, but more likely to end up looking dumb because it does feel very open-ended.

TL;DR I believe LeBron James is most likely to select the Miami Heat.

Below is my long thread explaining, in narrative form, how I arrived at this. I feel Miami satisfies enough clusters of what he needs. But it is not a recommendation to buy or bet Miami at a particular price point -- being most likely might only mean 35%? 40%? I do not know if anyone can get more than 50% confident on a particular option here without inside knowledge. It's interesting to me that Kalshi has surfaced Miami as the leader versus more conventional wisdom about Cleveland or Golden State. If we get it right, it's a cool moment for prediction markets. Hopefully it doesn't mean insider trading but I digress.

Also not me slamming the book buying tons of shares in the 40s and 50s. Unsure who that is or if they know more, I think the decision is probably kept tight enough that there's no inside info ... I don't think any winner would truly surprise me short of Mystery Team XYZ. You can form a case for any winner after-the-fact like "of course he chose Cleveland, its home!" "of course he chose Golden State, its steph! its close!" etc. Uncertainty is very high.

Thread below.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@GaetenD

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@keendawg @EventualNews

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@keendawg @morellifit @BlitzTrades_ its on the chart in the top right

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

"The more things change, the more they stay the same."

[Jim Bianco @biancoresearch]

Way too many people are arguing what the Fed will do by explaining how they USED TO work.

They don’t work that way anymore and now a big “family fight” at the Fed is underway. The repost below is a good read and needs to be understood.

A 35% to 40% probably of a hike is justified. Sure they might raise rates this week, but there is going to be tension and lots of dissents. No hike this week and 50 might be on the table for September.

—-

Years of Trump bashing the Fed has changed them.

Before everything revolved around the Chair and what they wanted. That is why Wall Street parsed every word and framed every decision around the Chair, their personality and what they believed. The other 11 voters did not matter and were expected to go along with the Chair.

This is not the case anymore.

The Fed is now like the Supreme Court, all independent voters and can out vote the Chair. And there is no more Forward Guidance (signaling what they are going to do.) this is why the probability of a hike tomorrow is 35% to 40%, the Chair could get outvoted and we have no “guidance” either way.
——

All of these changes are positive, and should be applauded.

The root of many of the Fed’s problems were centered in too much power vested to one person (causing terrible “groupthink”). Additionally, forward guidance that amounted to promises of future moves encouraged too much speculation and leverage among financial institutions as they perceived lower risks creating moral hazards (Fed bailouts for bad decisions.).

These practices had to end.

In the meantime many of the hot takes about the Fed here should be filed under “historical viewpoints” and not “current monetary policy.”

[DataBasedBets @DataBasedBets]

MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR RINSE: Full single-post summary for people with normal sleep schedules of the most insane rinsing of bond bots I've seen firsthand, in which PM bonders appear to have lost 7 figures🤯

Scene: Last MLB game of the night (Giants vs Angels) bottom of the 10th inning tied 6-6. The time is ~1:15am EDT

- With the bases loaded, Devers hits what is normally a ground rule double. The initial final score shown is an 8-6 Giants win (due to an official MLB scorer error). Video below in thread
- Over 13.5 runs, Giants -1.5, and Giants team total o7.5 runs bond to 99c thanks to bots
- MLB rules state that a walk off ground rule double cannot score multiple runs and in this scenario counts as a single instead of a double
- People start to realize this and insane action comes in to unbond the above markets. Prices go absolutely haywire, touching 1c and 99c multiple times
- Kalshi closes and settles the totals & team totals markets while at least one (if not all) of the listed source agencies (MLB / Fox Sports / ESPN) still showed the final score as 8-6. PolyUS does the same for settlement of Giants -1.5
- However, the Kalshi spread (run line) markets remained open longer. Source agencies had then changed the final score to be 7-6. Market volume on the spread balloons from under 12,000 to 5 million (!) between the start of the bottom of the 10th inning and final market settlement
- Despite Kalshi settling the total as over 13.5 based on an 8-6 final score, per their CFTC rules, the spread must now settle Angels +1.5 as a win, and it does
- PolyInt settles Angels +1.5 as a win as well, rinsing botters there too and appearing to make the total losses for traders assuming a 8-6 final score "multi-millions" across all exchanges
- Sportsbooks all appear to have paid out incorrectly initially as well, but it seems all of them have resettled based on the 7-6 final score. CFTC certified exchanges on the other hand don't quite work the same way as sportsbooks.
- I fail to make riches since my 1am brain was staring at just the totals market and didn't notice the spread market had stayed open longer until it was too late
- I'm aware of some of the big winners, but am yet to hear who specifically were the big losers on this score adjustment
- Kalshi volume on the two "incorrectly" settled markets: 1.1mil on o/u 13.5 runs, ~60k on o/u 7.5 Giants team total. No idea or guess on how much was traded on the PolyUS "incorrectly" settled spread market. I would not expect a refund if you had the wrong side of these markets since the settlements appear to have complied with the sites' CFTC rules, but we'll see

TLDR: An official MLB score correction post-game made some grinders rich and rinsed others (mostly botters, I assume). Per the sites' CFTC rules, it appears all markets were settled correctly despite being inconsistent settlements

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@benjamin_horne I think that was more of the YouTube video than anything I did, market price was pretty static at 45c when I tweeted about it. Sadly I don't think I have the influence to move stuff like that.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@grit2019 Yes, up more than pictured because of the Philly outcome. A lot of exposure shorting Golden State and Cleveland

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

Final on this ends up being a lot, but getting the main thrust wrong (Miami) is painful despite planting the flag.

I think a lot of the analysis in my thread holds up and explains LeBron's decision though. The core of all of this is his psychological profile and the longer variance pushes him towards options that are more basketball-centric rather than emotional-centric.

The way Philly wins is him selecting contention and the highest ceiling option for his skill as an organizer on the court. To take the frame of the younger athlete one last time, to "have fun" by stomping in deep playoff runs. They offer enough depth to allow him to take time off to go West and only really need him for playoffs.

Golden State I think got too wrapped up in the mystique of this theoretical AD trade. It's easy to write post-hoc, but much reporting indicated Warriors just weren't that into it.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

Also LeBron if you deny me I will feel psychic pain.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

Yes that's true, the legacy is enhanced most by the ability to win. I think the thesis is most upset by the fact that it's a near full circle move, picking the winning and the champ odds above all. Directly saying family didn't matter here when he said what he did at fanatics, jeez!

I didn't expect someone who was near retirement and would have been fine in middling contention with the Lakers had they compensated him enough in stature and respect to go purely on legacy and contention, and if he did it would be for a more guaranteed role.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

So even Rich Paul thought it was likely to be Miami. We let LeBron think too long!

[Barry Jackson @flasportsbuzz]

ESPN's Ramona Shelburne said Rich Paul told her that "for a lot of the time" Paul thought it would be Miami for LeBron "but when you won in a place before, it might not be the same. You want to leave those memories as they are. This appeal of something new is attractive."

[Barry Jackson @flasportsbuzz]

ESPN's Ramona Shelburne said Rich Paul told her that "for a lot of the time" Paul thought it would be Miami for LeBron "but when you won in a place before, it might not be the same. You want to leave those memories as they are. This appeal of something new is attractive."

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

Line shopping is the play. I was being careful to say this isn't a rec to buy here; I certainly wasn't buying Miami in the 40s and 50s. I think 50% is the maximum confidence you can have and that is a LOT. Because any decision makes sense after the fact. I lost a bunch of Denver and Minnesota shares I am also still holding.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

There is also one predictive pattern here that was hard to shake off: LeBron camp signals have been indicative of prior winners. But the form of the camp signal is hard to see in the moment; phone call with the big 3 in 2010, private meeting with Gilbert in 2014, meeting with Magic Johnson in 2018. We didn't have meetings this go around, but we did have these persistent quotes from Shams, Stein, related reporters that LeBron was "taking the Sixers seriously" that read differently from the usual "sources around the league think...". So I suppose the camp signal about "sources close to LeBron thinking" was right all along showing the Sixers.

I think this decision was made today, he landed on it and felt it would minimize his regret.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

Wow! Ended up more on this market because of this outcome with Philly always being so cheap. Really an all-timer, and a total surprise from the King.

[Shams Charania @ShamsCharania]

BREAKING: LeBron James is signing with the Philadelphia 76ers on a two-year, $8 million deal with a player option, Klutch Sports Group and Klutch CEO and Game Over show host Rich Paul tells ESPN.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

1. lebron secrecy on his reveals usually has the teams finding out as soon as he tells his agent what he wants, so I doubt the heat could sit on that for the ~9 hours the stream had been listed without it eventually getting to someone like Shams

2. i would be STUNNED if lebron did a press conference for this. maybe he would at heat media day, but he just doesn't sit and answer questions in this format that often.

3. has the usual hallmarks of a thing like an article pre-print; to be ready in case event happens. just had this happen with Alito retirement last month when the NPR preprint of his departure went live

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@aprater3223 no disagreement on anything you said, but viewing best choice in different ways; is it abt maximizing winning or maximizing utility? i still have 5c Sixers but I don't expect it to win vs the Miami I am holding for reasons outlaid

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

LeBron James and the Last Decision

-- LONG THREAD WARNING--

Since we're at the eve of the decision, I figured I would summarize my thinking on this market. It's a pretty difficult one! It's very easy for someone to zero in on one or two points and form that as the single basis for the reason LeBron would pick team A or team B. My goal is not to push people to one option or the other, but just to get my thoughts out there and plant my flag before the announcement drops. I can hopefully look smart, but more likely to end up looking dumb because it does feel very open-ended.

TL;DR I believe LeBron James is most likely to select the Miami Heat.

Below is my long thread explaining, in narrative form, how I arrived at this. I feel Miami satisfies enough clusters of what he needs. But it is not a recommendation to buy or bet Miami at a particular price point -- being most likely might only mean 35%? 40%? I do not know if anyone can get more than 50% confident on a particular option here without inside knowledge. It's interesting to me that Kalshi has surfaced Miami as the leader versus more conventional wisdom about Cleveland or Golden State. If we get it right, it's a cool moment for prediction markets. Hopefully it doesn't mean insider trading but I digress.

Also not me slamming the book buying tons of shares in the 40s and 50s. Unsure who that is or if they know more, I think the decision is probably kept tight enough that there's no inside info ... I don't think any winner would truly surprise me short of Mystery Team XYZ. You can form a case for any winner after-the-fact like "of course he chose Cleveland, its home!" "of course he chose Golden State, its steph! its close!" etc. Uncertainty is very high.

Thread below.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@FoaznPoker tl;dr heat culture

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@carnitastaco yeah and thats the second part. the history of lacob and the warriors means you have to be stanced to not trust them. i also can see the reason why he wouldn't want to do those trades -- he was willing to go big on giannis in the spring but doesn't feel that fire for AD

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

@ucf_problems took way too long to write it and was getting spooked the decision would come out! let's hope its miami.

[Lance Uppercut @LanceupperPI]

yeah i think the key here is i am downranking the basketball fit and appearance as more of a lesser to these other LA issues that I believe are what's causing this. if that thesis is wrong then we break entirely.

i think lebron at this age now with the lakers front office circus might actually appreciate the heat culture rigor and determination, fanatics fest was sort of a clue there