Why the 2025 Colorado Rockies are every bookmaker’s nightmare
During the 2024 season, the Chicago White Sox lost a modern MLB record 121 games — a masterpiece of baseball schadenfreude that no living person had ever seen before. Bettors delighted in regularly fading those White Sox and profited handsomely.
Yet, just one season later, another franchise is giving those White Sox (still near the bottom of the MLB barrel themselves) a run at history. Through 50 games, the Colorado Rockies are an astounding 8-42. That’s a .160 winning percentage that puts them on pace to win only 26 games and lose 136, breaking the modern MLB loss record set less than a year ago.
And as with the 2024 White Sox, bettors are fading the 2025 Rockies en masse and avoiding backing them at all costs.
ESPN BET reports that Colorado has attracted the least moneyline bets of any MLB team this season, while the team playing against the Rockies are a top-three most-bet team on almost any given day. For Colorado’s most recent series with the Philadelphia Phillies, the visiting Phillies were the sportsbook’s most-backed MLB team of the day in three of those four games and the second-most backed in the other.
The Phillies ended up handing the Rockies yet another series sweep, and things may not be getting better for the Denver-based squad anytime soon, as they’ll face a gauntlet of the New York Yankees, Chicago Cubs and New York Mets over their next three series.
“We need the Rockies on a daily basis,” Caesars Sportsbook lead MLB trader Eric Biggio told ESPN. “Especially if they’re in a standalone spot where there’s not much other stuff going on, we have to really push the price out to a good level to get any kind of money on the Rockies.”
Since reaching a major-league-long odds of -400 on May 4 on the road against the San Francisco Giants, bookmakers have routinely handicapped the Rockies’ opponents in the -300 range, but to absolutely no avail.
The fades on Colorado keep flowing and for good reason. Even as the team draws big plus-odds each night, a $100 bettor would still be down $2,701, according to Covers.com. Thus, betting against them each night becomes a viable strategy for bettors and a terror for sportsbooks.
“This becomes a bookmaker’s nightmare if this continues to go on for a complete year, because there’s nothing we can do about it,” DraftKings head of sportsbook Johnny Avello said. “We can raise the price, but that’s not going to stop anyone if the teams are that bad.”
Even on the road, the Yankees are laying -300 on the moneyline and even a very rare -3.5 run line on Friday night, according to ESPN BET lines. Avello notes his book is routinely rising above the standard -1.5 run line given how poor this Rockies team has been. By DraftKings spreads, Colorado is an MLB-worst 16-34 against the run line, even after being underdogs in every single game.
Given the long moneylines, bettors are starting to get creative with how they fade the Rockies. Coors Field has long been a notorious hitter’s park due to Denver’s altitude, making it a clear target for overs on the total. However, with the 2025 Rockies being very lackluster on both sides of the ball, bettors are looking at lots of runs for just the away team.
“The people recognize, ‘Hey, the Rockies aren’t scoring much, the opposing team is,’ so they’re betting the Rockies team total under and the opponent over,” said Biggio. “It’s not rocket science, but it is turning into a kind of big decision on top of the normal markets for baseball.”
This really came to a head on May 10, when the San Diego Padres came to town and defeated Colorado by a ridiculous score of 21-0. Biggio says that the next day, bettors flooded the market, backing the Padres on the moneyline, run line and team total.
However, then something remarkable happened: The Rockies won 9-3, their seventh win of the season. Biggio says it was a huge win for the book, equivalent to an “NFL Sunday kind of decision.”
“Teams playing the Rockies are regularly among the most-bet MLB teams of the day on both the moneyline and run line, so the rare Rockies win is something of a bright spot,” ESPN BET director of North American sports trading Adrian Horton said over email. “However, those wins don’t outweigh the good days for bettors taking whoever is playing against Colorado.”
Barring a huge turnaround for Colorado, the books are likely making some money back on season win total. Before the campaign, sportsbooks set the Rockies’ win total at a consensus 59.5. That’s low, but notably higher than the White Sox’ historically low 53.5. Caesars and DraftKings both report that a majority of money was on the over, citing preseason optimism and general bettor behavior that gravitates to the over.
Since then, books have been consistently dropping that total throughout the season, and it currently stands at 39.5 headed into the weekend series with the Yankees. Biggio says it’s the lowest in-season win total he’s ever seen.
During the current monster stretch of the Rockies’ schedule, sportsbooks aren’t likely to get much respite from the beatings they’re taking on a daily basis. However, there is possibly some relief on the horizon. Following this tough section, Colorado gets the NL East bottom-dwelling Miami Marlins and, for July 4th weekend, the Rockies will take on the White Sox in what has to be one of the most strangely anticipated matchups of the season.
“These prices are already out of control as far as what you have to lay to win to win a dollar, so that won’t stop betters from either betting [their opponents] straight or parlaying them,” said Avello. “We have to just weather this storm, though. We can adjust prices, but we just have to wait for a time when maybe they get on track a little bit and win a few games.”
All signs pointed to the Florida Panthers finishing off the Carolina Hurricanes in Game 4, but the Canes kept the series rolling with a 3-0 win on Monday.
Will the Panthers finish the story in Game 5? Or will the Hurricanes send the festivities back to South Florida again?
Here are matchup notes heading into Wednesday’s Game 5 from ESPN Research, as well as betting intel from ESPN BET:
More on Game 4: Recap | Grades
Matchup notes
Florida Panthers at Carolina Hurricanes
Game 5 | 8 p.m. ET | TNT
The Panthers’ odds to win the series are now -1600, adjusted from -5000 heading into Game 4. The Hurricanes’ odds have shifted to +750 (adjusted from +1500) after their win. The Panthers’ odds to win the Cup are now +105 (previously -110), while the Canes’ are now +1800. Sergei Bobrovsky is the leading Conn Smythe candidate in this series at +200, followed by Aleksander Barkov (+800).
Game 4 was the Canes’ first win in the round since Game 7 of the 2006 Eastern Conference finals against the Buffalo Sabres, snapping a 15-game conference finals losing streak. It was the longest losing streak in NHL playoff history for a team in the round preceding the Stanley Cup Final. The Hurricanes are now 4-4 all-time in Game 4s when trailing 3-0 in a best-of-seven series.
Frederik Andersen made 20 saves for his fifth career playoff shutout, his second with the Hurricanes. He joins Cam Ward (four), Kevin Weekes (two) and Petr Mrazek (two) as goaltenders with multiple playoff shutouts in Whalers/Hurricanes Stanley Cup playoffs history.
Carolina’s Logan Stankoven scored playoff goal No. 5 in the second period. He joins Erik Cole (six in 2002) and Warren Foegele (five in 2019) as the only rookies in Whalers/Hurricanes history to score at least five goals in a single Stanley Cup playoffs year.
Sebastian Aho scored an empty-net goal in the third period, his 32nd career playoff tally. That extends his own franchise record for career goals in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
The Panthers were shut out for the second time this postseason; both games were at home — the other instance was Game 6 of the second-round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs.
Florida went 0-4 on the power play in Game 4, and the team is now 0-8 with the man advantage in the last two games of this series after going 4-for-5 in Games 1 and 2.
Though he hasn’t scored a goal in the past two games, Sam Bennett has a team-leading nine this postseason. That is two shy of the franchise record in a single playoff year, currently held by Matthew Tkachuk (2023) and Carter Verhaeghe (2024).
Scoring leaders
GP: 16 | G: 6 | A: 9
GP: 14 | G: 5 | A: 9
Houston Astros right-hander Ronel Blanco will have surgery on his right elbow and will miss the remainder of the 2025 season, the team announced Wednesday.
The starter had sought a second opinion after being placed on the injured list last week with inflammation in the elbow.
The Astros said Blanco — who is 3-4 with a 4.10 ERA, 48 strikeouts and 20 walks in nine starts this season — is anticipated to return at some point during the 2026 season.
Blanco, 31, is among a long list of starting pitchers on the injured list for the Astros. Right-hander Hayden Wesneski underwent season-ending Tommy John surgery last week, while right-hander Spencer Arrighetti has been out since April after breaking his right thumb in a batting practice mishap.
Houston is also without right-handers Luis Garcia and Cristian Javier, who are both still recovering from Tommy John surgery.
Blanco is in his fourth major league season, all with the Astros. In 2024, he finished 13-6 with a 2.80 ERA in 30 games (29 starts). He threw his only career complete game in his season debut on April 1, no-hitting the Toronto Blue Jays in a 10-0 win.
The Associated Press and Field Level Media contributed to this report.
The Breeders’ Cup world championships are returning to New York in 2027 at the rebuilt Belmont Park, following a massive renovation project to revitalize one of the most important horse racing tracks in the country.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, along with officials from the Breeders’ Cup and the New York Racing Association, announced Wednesday that the track on the edge of Queens and Nassau County on Long Island will stage the event in the fall two years from now.
“We wrote the governor of New York a letter in 2023 that simply said, ‘If you build it, we will come,'” Breeders’ Cup Limited president and CEO Drew Fleming said in a phone interview with The Associated Press. “And so we’re very honored to keep our word and have a wonderful Breeders’ Cup world championship here in 2027 to showcase the new development and investment in Belmont Park to our fans from across the globe.”
Keeneland in Lexington was revealed as the 2026 host.
Belmont Park was last home to the Breeders’ Cup in 2005, the fourth time in two decades after also being there in 1990, 1995 and 2001. A goal of the $455 million teardown and reconstruction was to attract the major event.
“It was always part of the plan: We weren’t going to redevelop Belmont Park without Breeders’ Cup in mind, so it was always part of the initial goals,” NYRA president and CEO David O’Rourke told the AP by phone. “Getting the championships back to New York is big from an economic point of view and probably one of the most important [things], if not the most important. It gives our trainers and horsemen a chance to compete on their home tracks. I think it’s great. It’s been over 20 years.”
Hochul said in a statement that the redevelopment is bringing thousands of jobs and $1 billion in long-term economic activity to Long Island.
“Thanks to the investments we are making at Belmont Park, the long held dream of bringing the prestigious Breeders’ Cup back to New York will soon be a reality,” Hochul said.
The Breeders’ Cup has been at a Kentucky or California track every year since 2008. Del Mar outside San Diego has it this year as a back-to-back host and for the fourth time since 2017.
Santa Anita outside Los Angeles, Keeneland and Churchill Downs in Louisville — home of the Kentucky Derby — have become the regular sites for the two-day festival featuring the best thoroughbreds in the world and tens of millions of dollars’ worth of races. It’s shifting back to the Eastern time zone for the next two years.
“California is and has always been a wonderful spot to have the Breeders’ Cup with Santa Anita Park and Del Mar, but one of the missions of the Breeders’ Cup is to grow the sport, and one of the ways we do this is hosting world championships at various venues across the United States,” Fleming said, adding that he expects the event to generate $100 million for the New York economy.
While NYRA has not announced a location for the 2026 Belmont Stakes, the third leg of the Triple Crown is set to return to its old home by 2027, after a multiyear stint at historic Saratoga Race Course in upstate New York during renovations.
With the Belmont at Belmont Park shifting back to an annual occurrence, it is possible the track known for greats like Secretariat and Seattle Slew rumbling down the stretch to the finish line with fans roaring might get back in a regular rotation.
“The best part about working for the Breeders’ Cup is that nothing is off the table,” Fleming said. “New York City has some of the finest accommodations and restaurants and entertainment in the world, so it’d be a natural fit that we would be at Belmont Park frequently.”
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