Long Ball

What is Long Ball?

When Spain captain Rodri lifted the Fifa World Cup trophy at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey in July, a nation celebrated its team’s return to the summit of world football. Across five weeks and eight matches, Spain had proved itself the best team on the planet, overcoming its strongest rivals to claim the trophy for a second time.

As Spain celebrated the successful end of their campaign, Kambi was reflecting on a significant achievement of its own. For the sports betting technology provider, the tournament represented a major technological milestone: its first World Cup traded entirely by AI.

Across 104 matches and more than 100 million bets, AI handled every stage of the pricing lifecycle – from ingesting data and creating the offering to managing liabilities and settling bets. The platform recorded zero downtime, delivered an operator trading margin of 18% and, during the final alone, processed more than one million unique bet combinations.

How to play Long Ball

Since returning its prediction market to the US, Polymarket has regularly engaged in nonconforming advertising. Painting a water tower in the company’s blue and branding the structure with its logo is the firm’s latest marketing ploy.

In March, Polymarket opened The Situation Room, a pop-up “newsbar” in Washington, DC. The bar and lounge’s televisions played various content related to prediction markets, like Bloomberg Terminals, cable news, and live social media feeds that were “dedicated to monitoring the situation.”

A month earlier, Polymarket opened a free grocery store in New York City. The promotion ran Feb. 12-16, with shoppers allowed to gather up to $50 per person in free groceries.   

What is Long Ball?

The book enjoyed a steady diet of low-scoring primetime games in Week 1, but Week 2 began with an all-you-can-eat touchdown buffet for bettors on Thursday night,” Feazel said. “Seven of the eight most popular touchdown scorers cashed, and the only player who failed to score, DJ Moore, was refunded under Injury Protection.”

The biggest game for bettors at Caesars Sportsbook was Lions-Bills, while the most favorable for the house was Vikings-Bears—a 9-3 defensive battle won by Minnesota.

“Sunday early games brought a sharp reversal,” Feazel said. “Underdogs and defenses came out swinging, offenses went quiet, and touchdowns were much harder to locate. In Week 1, it felt like everyone with a jersey found the end zone. This Sunday, even the end zone required a reservation.”