The Odds: One Season, Three Gamblers, and the Death of Their Las Vegas [Hardcover]

Chad Millman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 12, 2001

Chad Millman takes readers inside Las Vegas's high-stakes gambling machine where even the unlikeliest characters find something in common. . Chad Millman takes readers inside Las Vegas's high-stakes gambling machine where even the unlikeliest characters find something in common. There's the intense high roller with the shaved head who morphed from cocaine addict to vegan bodybuilder without missing a bet. There's the college dropout whose parents kicked him out of the house when he decided betting would be his way of life. And there's the bookmaker who wonders what could have been if he had the guts to take the same risks as the bettors he despises. Between them and glory was the 19992000 NCAA basketball season, with its thousands of games, hundreds of teams, and "March Madness. " The bets were big-sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars in a single day-but the stakes were even larger. For the bookmaker, the need for the thrill would put his whole career at risk. For the high roller, the need for a big win kept his demons churning. And for the kid, what was at stake was quite possibly his soul. Millman paints a vivid portrait of Las Vegas in light and shadow as he follows the three players throughout the NCAA season, taking readers behind the scenes and into their lives as they win, lose and eventually risk everything.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

For sports gamblers in Las Vegas, nobody cares who wins; it's by how much that matters. In The Odds, Chad Millman follows three professional gamblers through a year of college basketball, where meticulous research, betting discipline, and instinct clash with addiction, and no one relaxes until they've lost it all.

The three colorful gamblers Millman expertly portrays are a high-rolling career "wiseguy," a slacker wannabe, and a bookmaker who sets the lines on games (for example, Iowa over Indiana by 4-1/2 points, meaning if you bet on Iowa, you win only if Iowa wins by five points or more). The idea behind the betting line is to lure bets (hopefully, losing ones) and make a profit for his casino from the action, but more importantly to stay ahead of those who pounce on a weak line like hungry wolves. Millman provides the answer to what makes these wiseguys tick: "While the casual bettor weighs common sense and financial realities with every bet, the wiseguy pushes those aside... [his] battle isn't with what makes sense; his battle is with anyone who gets in the way of making his bet a euphoric experience."

Along with lurid details of what these gamblers do to feed their frenzy, Millman enriches us on gambling's history and sobering statistics, on Vegas's decline and the rise of offshore casinos, and on the effects of media coverage and politics on sports and gambling. While you won't learn how to get rich off the next office pool, you will get an inside look at those who make or lose money on some kid's buzzer-beater or a garbage-time lay-up. --Michael Ferch

From Library Journal

To some, sports betting is good clean fun it adds spice to the game to put a little down on your alma mater. To others, it's big business federal agents estimated that before the 2000 Super Bowl that nearly $5 billion would be bet both legally and illegally, and the 2000 NCAA basketball tournament drew nearly $80 million in legal Nevada bets and estimates running from $2.5 to $7 billion in illegal action. Here, sports reporter Chad Millman goes to Las Vegas, the legal gambling mecca threatened by recent legislation and offshore Internet betting sites, and follows the men who make the odds and those who try to beat them. This is not a Reefer Madness-style expos designed to scare gamblers straight, but its depiction of the lives of a young bookmaker, a big player, and a rookie gambling professional still might make bettors consider dialing 1-800-BETS-OFF. Recommended for larger public libraries. Jim Burns, Ottumwa P.L., IA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: PublicAffairs; 1St Edition edition (March 12, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1891620231
• ISBN-13: 978-1891620232
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #414,472 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #18 in Books > Sports & Outdoors > Basketball > College & University

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A masterful documentary of the sports gambling culture, March 27, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: The Odds: One Season, Three Gamblers, and the Death of Their Las Vegas (Hardcover)

Chad Millman has written the book I had always dreamed of writing since my days in the Stardust sports book sharing nachos and hotdogs with the homeless, deadbroke souls who made it their home. I could not put this book down and read it in one night. It hit home with enormous impact since I knew in person or by reputation most of the main characters in book. I grieve for Joe Lupo and Alan Boston for their soon to be lost way of life. I have witnessed first hand the death of the Las Vegas Millman so touchingly pays tribute to and am grateful that Millman captured the last battle in the war in Vegas between Wiseguys and Bookmakers across the counter.

Even if one is not familiar with the subject matter, the book is still a must read. It is a roadmap of what pumps blood in the veins of young college educated affluent Americans in their spare time. An entire generation has become obssessed with gambling on the stock market and on sports and Millman interweaves the book with psychological insights on why people gamble and why risk takers who win are so revered in American pop culture. Lastly, Millman takes a shot at the hypocrisy of Congress and the NCAA. Reading about their attempts at stemming the tide of young sports bettors with legislation outlawing college gambling in Las Vegas (which accounts for less than 1% of the total wagering handle on sports betting) leaves one with the distinct impression that lawmakers are bumbling into a "New Prohibition" where government should be regulating and making taxes from sports gambling, instead of only protecting lotteries and casino gambling which gives gamblers no mathematical chance at ever beating the house.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just SUPER....., April 30, 2001

By 

The Thriller (Cleveland, Oh) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Odds: One Season, Three Gamblers, and the Death of Their Las Vegas (Hardcover)

The Odds is a first hand look at what is going on in the sportsbook environment. Whether you want a view from the bookmaker's perspective, the wiseguy's perspective, or the casual sports bettor's perspective, this book is terrfic. The bookmaker, Joe Lupo of The Stardust is one cool customer. He is under constant pressure to get it right as the manager of The Stardust sports book. Traditionally, the line comes out first from The Stardust, hence, the added pressure of being the focus of attention in Las Vegas sports gambling circles. He knows the details of every game from his collective sources of sports oddsmakers. This would make one cool movie...

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Fast Food, June 19, 2003

By 

Voracious reader (New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Odds: One Season, Three Gamblers, and the Death of Their Las Vegas (Hardcover)

It's an engaging read, but in the end it comes across as a frustratingly superficial write. As a tale of three diverse role-players in the Vegas sports betting scene, it gives us little in the way of character depth or development. As a tale of how one season pans out for these guys, we learn only the outline of their cumulative performance - some occasional snapshots. As a primer in how to make sports bets, only a tempting morsel is briefly revealed. As a history of sports betting in a crucial transition period -just a glimpse. Yet it still has a journalistic pull on our attention...almost despite ourseves, we really get involved in how two college basketball teams we'd hardly blinked an eye at in our lives fare head-to-head on a random night, and we do end up wanting our featured bettors to go home winners. Yet it's hard not to feel this could have been so much better had the research been more thorough, the characters more closely followed, the history less skimpy. I read it in two sittings - goes down smooth as a Dove bar.