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Edge & Closing Line Value

Edge

EdgeThe gap between the model's win probability and the market-implied probability at bet time. Positive edge means the model thinks the outcome is more likely than the price implies.is the gap between what the model thinks and what the market is pricing. If the model gives the Cardinals a 58% chance to win and DraftKings has them at −130 (implying 56.5%), the edge is 1.5 percentage points in the Cardinals' favor.

Only picks with meaningful positive edge (≥3%) are published. Below that threshold, line movement, odds variance, and sportsbook margins can easily erase any theoretical advantage.

Closing Line Value (CLV)

CLVClosing Line Value. The difference between the close-price implied probability and your bet-price implied probability. Positive CLV means you got a better price than where the market settled — the best predictor of long-run edge.measures whether you got a better price than where the market settled at game time (the "closing line").

CLV = implied_prob(close_odds) − implied_prob(bet_odds)

Positive CLV means the closing line was shorter (more confident) than where you bet — the market agreed with your direction and moved toward it. That is the strongest available evidence of real edge.

Negative CLV means the market moved away from your side after you bet. Even if the pick wins, negative CLV suggests luck played a role.

Why CLV beats win rate

Win rate fluctuates heavily over small samples — a skilled bettor can have a losing month purely from variance. CLV is a leading indicator: consistently beating the close means your model finds edges the market agrees with on most games, even before results are known.

The hit rateWin rate: wins divided by decided bets (pushes and voids excluded). Break-even hit rate depends on the odds — at -110 you need ~52.4% to break even. is still published (it is what most bettors look at first), but CLV mean and CLV beat %The percentage of picks where CLV > 0, meaning we got a better price than closing. Consistently beating the close is strong evidence of real edge. are the metrics that determine whether SharpSDA has real edge over time.

Close odds source

SharpSDA uses DraftKings as the canonical CLV book. Close odds = the last DraftKings moneyline snapshot before first pitch. Picks with no DraftKings close snapshot are excluded from CLV calculations and marked accordingly.