# LEDGER RECAP β€” Monday, March 23, 2026 ### *"Grading the Portfolio. Refining the Algorithm."* --- Alex Mercer: Welcome back to the Ledger Recap. I'm Alex Mercer. Across from me, as always, is Marcus Webb. Marcus, we've got a full film room today β€” fourteen contracts, a mixed weekend, and a few things that need to go straight into the Playbook. Marcus Webb: Let's get into it. Alex Mercer: Before we do β€” quick reminder for the desk on how we track. If we buy a contract at 60 cents, we're risking 0.60 units to win 0.40. Pure risk-based accounting. What you paid is what you risked. Simple. --- ## πŸ“Š THE SCORECARD Alex Mercer: Alright. The Scorecard. Weekend session: nine wins, five losses, zero pushes across fourteen contracts. And the PnL? Positive two-point-one units. Marcus Webb: Nine and five. Two-point-one. That's... fine. But it shouldn't be fine. Alex Mercer: Say more. Marcus Webb: A sixty-four percent win rate on fourteen positions and we netted just over two units. That tells me one thing β€” our position sizing is not matching our conviction levels. We're winning the right games and leaving money sitting on the table. Alex Mercer: And the overall ledger doesn't lie either. Two-sixty-six and two-thirty-seven on the season. Total units? Positive one-point-seven. That's a lot of correct calls for a very thin margin. Marcus Webb: Which is the whole conversation we need to have today. --- ## 🎬 THE FILM ROOM Alex Mercer: Let's go to the film. We'll hit three positions β€” two wins that need scrutiny, and one loss that stings. --- ### POSITION ONE: TY JEROME UNDER 19.5 POINTS β€” CELTICS vs. GRIZZLIES βœ… Alex Mercer: First up β€” our Ty Jerome under nineteen-and-a-half points, purchased at fifty-two cents. Jerome finishes with sixteen points, seven assists, one rebound. Contract settles in our favor. Plus forty-eight cents on the unit. Marcus Webb: Clean win. But here's the thing β€” Memphis was running a ten-day contract guy, Tyler Burton, who dropped twenty-three points. Career high. Which means the Grizzlies' offensive engine was running through an unproven player, not a structured system. Alex Mercer: Right. So how does that affect Jerome? Marcus Webb: See, that's the chain. When Memphis is leaning on a journeyman making his statement game, they're not running half-court sets that stress Boston's perimeter defense. They're playing fast, chaotic, live-ball basketball. Celtics responded by switching defensively and keeping Jerome on the ball-handler, not in space. He ends up facilitating β€” seven assists β€” rather than hunting his own shot. The assists went up because the points opportunity dried up. Alex Mercer: The market had him implied at roughly fifty-two percent to go over. We disagreed. Marcus Webb: And we were right. But here's the Alpha Review β€” Jerome finished with sixteen. The line was nineteen-and-a-half. That's a three-and-a-half point cushion. If our conviction was truly high, we should have been looking at an alternate line. Under seventeen-and-a-half, maybe Under sixteen-and-a-half. Those contracts were likely sitting at thirty-five, thirty-eight cents. We buy at thirty-eight cents, we're risking less and the payout is sharper. Alex Mercer: Missed alpha. Marcus Webb: Significant missed alpha. We were right on the thesis. We just didn't press it. --- ### POSITION TWO: GONZAGA -5.5 vs. TEXAS β€” LOSS ❌ Alex Mercer: Okay. The one that hurts. Gonzaga minus-five-and-a-half against Texas, purchased at fifty-four cents. Final score β€” Texas seventy-four, Gonzaga sixty-eight. Texas wins outright. We lose fifty-five cents. Marcus Webb: This one I want to be precise about. This was not a bad beat. This was a thesis problem. Alex Mercer: Walk me through it. Marcus Webb: Gonzaga was a five-and-a-half point favorite against an eleven-seed. On paper, reasonable. But Texas β€” this is a team that came through the First Four. They've been battle-tested for an extra game, extra film sessions, extra time to game-plan. And Camden Heide hits the clutch three to close it out. That's not luck β€” that's a team that's been in pressure situations all week. Alex Mercer: So the systemic issue isβ€” Marcus Webb: Tournament fatigue works in reverse for lower seeds. An eleven-seed that's already played and won is *more* dangerous, not less. Their confidence is elevated. Their coaching staff has had extra prep time. Meanwhile Gonzaga comes in as the favorite, maybe a little flat. Sean Miller β€” tenth coach to take three different schools to the second weekend β€” he had this team ready. We didn't account for that edge. Alex Mercer: So the Playbook note here is: when an underdog has already played in the First Four, their implied probability of covering may be systematically underpriced. Marcus Webb: That's the hypothesis. We need to track it. --- ### POSITION THREE: WIZARDS +21.5 vs. THUNDER βœ… Alex Mercer: Alright, let's flip to a win β€” Washington Wizards plus twenty-one-and-a-half, purchased at fifty-two cents. Final score β€” Thunder one-thirty-two, Wizards one-eleven. Margin of twenty-one. Contract settles. Plus forty-seven cents. Marcus Webb: We won by one point of margin. One point. Alex Mercer: Tell me about the cash-out conversation here. Marcus Webb: This is the educational moment of the weekend. Mid-game, Oklahoma City is up β€” at one point it's a thirty-point game. Our Wizards plus twenty-one-and-a-half contract is sitting at maybe eight, nine cents. It looks dead. Alex Mercer: In traditional sports bettingβ€” Marcus Webb: You're trapped. The ticket is worthless, you're watching the clock, there's nothing you can do. In prediction markets, that contract is still trading. If you believe Washington will tighten the game late β€” and Washington, even on a fourteen-game losing streak, has been competitive in fourth quarters β€” you can sell at nine cents, recover some of your risk, and move on. Alex Mercer: Or you hold, and it settles at a dollar. Marcus Webb: Which is what happened. But the lesson isn't "hold everything." The lesson is: you have a *choice*. That optionality is the structural advantage of prediction markets. Use it deliberately. Alex Mercer: Now β€” Alpha Review on this one? Marcus Webb: This is where I get frustrated with us. The Wizards are on a fourteen-game skid. The Thunder are defending champions. The market set this line at twenty-one-and-a-half. We bought the Wizards to cover at fifty-two cents β€” essentially a coin flip. But if our model said the Wizards were competitive in fourth quarters and OKC tends to coast late in blowoutsβ€” Alex Mercer: We should have been at a tighter line. Marcus Webb: Plus-seventeen-and-a-half. Plus-fifteen. Those contracts were likely priced in the high thirties, low forties. We take more risk per unit, but our expected value per contract is higher if our thesis is correct. Instead we took the safe number and nearly sweated it out for forty-seven cents. --- ## πŸ“š STRATEGIC EVOLUTION Alex Mercer: Alright. What did we learn for the Playbook this weekend? Because I keep coming back to the same number β€” nine and five, two-point-one units. That gap is telling us something. Marcus Webb: Two things. First β€” the Gonzaga loss gives us a new hypothesis: **First Four survivors are systematically underpriced as underdogs in the Round of 64.** They've played under tournament pressure, they have extra prep time, and the market is still treating them like a cold eleven-seed. We need to track this going forward. Alex Mercer: And the second thing? Marcus Webb: Conviction-to-aggression calibration. This is the big one. Look at our props β€” the Ty Jerome under, the Amen Thompson assists under, the Wembanyama under. All three hit. All three were purchased within a few cents of fifty cents, which means the market basically thought it was a coin flip. Alex Mercer: But we had a thesis on all three. Marcus Webb: Right. If we genuinely believed Jerome was going to finish with sixteen points, that's not a fifty-two cent contract. That's a sixty-five, seventy cent conviction. The way you express that in prediction markets isn't just buying more shares at fifty-two β€” it's finding the alternate line that reflects your true model. Under seventeen instead of Under nineteen-and-a-half. Under four assists instead of Under five-and-a-half. Alex Mercer: So the rule is: when the research gives you a specific mechanism β€” not just a gut feeling, an actual causal chain β€” the position size and the line selection need to reflect that conviction. Marcus Webb: Exactly. We've been right. We haven't been aggressive enough when we're right. That's the only thing keeping this ledger at plus one-point-seven on the season. Alex Mercer: Iron sharpens iron. Marcus Webb: Every session. --- ## πŸŽ™οΈ OUTRO Alex Mercer: Nine and five on the weekend. Two-point-one units. The wins are real, the thesis work is getting sharper β€” but the Playbook is clear. Match your aggression to your conviction, track the First Four hypothesis, and remember: in prediction markets, you can always trade your way out of a bad spot. Before we go, remember β€” opinions expressed are for informational purposes only. Bet responsibly. --- **