The pari-mutuel program for the highly popular Magic City Fronton Pelota games is now available and can be found on the Magic City Casino website under “Jai-Alai.” Fall opening day is the day after Labor Day on Tuesday, September 5th with a 1:30-pm EST start time.
Robin is back and playing in singles games 3 & 4 along with appearances in the first Fall Doubles Tournament games 5 & 7. SayHiLi wishes him the best in this Fall opening week debut after his long recovery. Bueno is back in action too for Pelota games; he did play in the USNJAC tourney in August and was playing well. Cool Fitness is not in the program for opening week and we hear he is still recovering from his wrist injury but is cleared to practice. Kubala has a long road to recovery with the torn ACL and is not expected to return this year. SayHiLi wishes all of the sidelined Magic City Fronton professionals the best in their road to recovery from their injuries. Spinner had decided to discontinue with the Pelota games last fall and focus on Battle Court after he found a lucrative job offer.
Check out the program for all of the new teams for the first Fall Doubles Tournament. Juice is paired with Goixerri and Tennessee is paired with Douglas. A few other teams are El Barba-Manu, Jairo-Bradley and Bueno-Nicolas. Aratz, who is not showing up in the doubles entries, will be partnered with Cool Fitness when he returns to action.
The “Jai-ly” popular Jai-5 wager is back with the $2,000 guarantee to a single winning ticket holder for the Pick 5 sequence from games 3-7 along with the Mighty Ocho which has a $5,000 guarantee to a single winning ticket holder of this Pick 8 wager for games 1-8. These are both structured after the popular horse racing Pick 6 Jackpot wagers where there can be ONLY one winning ticket for the entire jackpot to be paid out. The record Jai-5 payout at Magic City is a whopping $27,348! The Magic City Fronton Jai-5 and Mighty Ocho wagers are both $1 minimum wagers.
The Fall Pelota schedule is Monday thru Wednesday at 1:30-pm EST. The Live Jai-Alai day is currently scheduled for Mondays, and this is subject to change. Doors open at 1-pm for the Live Monday performances.
Be sure to sign-up for watchandwager.com for on-line wagering capability if you haven’t already to take advantage of the attractive sign-up bonus and cash incentives.
Details for the MC 2023 World Super Court Tournament Aug. 26-27
Here are the details for the upcoming 2023 2nd Annual World Super Court at Magic City Fronton in Miami, Florida on Saturday and Sunday, August 26-27.
The 2023 WSC is a 2-day Invitational Tournament this year. The following is information received from Andrew Blechman of Magic City Fronton.
Instead of a bracket there will be a group of play round similar to the World Cup in soccer. There will be two groups (A and B), each with 5-teams. Each team will play (4) qualifying matches against each of the other teams in their group on Saturday, August 26th, the first day of the WSC. The top two teams in each group will advance to the semi-finals on Sunday. The first-place team in group A will play the second-place team in Group B, and vice versa. The winners will play each other for the finals for the 1st and 2nd place prize money.
Saturday features (20) total matches to 8-points each, with 10-matches for each of group A and B. Sunday’s final matches will be like the Battle Court matches with 3-sets to 6-points each, with the first team to win 2-sets advancing in the tourney.
Saturday matches start at 11-am EST
Sunday finale matches start at 1-pm EST
Additional info added 8/22 am:
Here are the 10–teams for this invitational tourney. Last year’s first and second place finishers Goixerri-Aratz and Inaki-Julen. Plus, these 8-additional teams: Alex-Douglas, Bixente-Tambour, Carballo-Ubilla, Hormaetxea-Urbieta, Iturbide-Nicolas, Patxi-Manu, Urriesti-Manci and Zulaika-Benny.
The Lifestyle Miami Chargers stunned the Wall Warriors last Friday night at the Magic City Fronton Battle Court Spring Championship in Miami, Florida before a packed house. There were (5) doubles matches slated for the finals and the first team to win 3-matches would be named the Championship Winner Spring 2023. Should a team secure the Championship victory before the 5th match, the remaining matches would be cancelled.
The first doubles match featured the level-1 teams of Zulaika-Benny for the Chargers versus Inaki-Nicolas of the Warriors. BetRivers had Inaki-Nicolas favored to win the match. Zulaika-Benny appeared well on their way to victory in set three with a 5-2 lead, needing only one more point to secure the first match win for the Chargers. Four straight errors by Zulaika allowed Inaki-Nicolas to steal the 3rd set win and the first match of the Championship Final (Match 1 set scores, Warriors: 6-3, 3-6, 6-5).
Match 2 was a level 2 doubles match featuring Iturbide-Spinner for the Chargers versus Ikeda-Julen of the Warriors. BetRivers had Iturbide-Spinner favored to win. After a nail-biting first set win of 6-5 by the Chargers, they rattled the Warriors with a 6-0 shutout in set two, clinching the match for the Charger’s Iturbide-Spinner, thus offsetting the Charger’s match-1 loss (Match 2 set scores, Chargers: 6-5, 6-0).
Match 3 was a level 3 doubles match featuring Zulaika-Iriondo for the Chargers versus Bueno-Nicolas of the Warriors. BetRivers had this match as a toss-up (-117 for both teams). As expected, this was a close match, but was won by Zulaika-Iriondo in two-sets by scores of 6-4 and 6-5.
Leading 2-1, the Chargers needed only one more match win to take home the trophy, 1st place prize money and the bragging rights. The Chargers did not disappoint their fans and secured the victory in 2-sets 6-4 and 6-1 in the 4th match with the Charger’s Iturbide-Iriondo picking off Inaki-Roque of the Warriors. BetRivers had the Warriors favored to win this match (Warriors -200 and Chargers +145). Had the Warriors won the 4th match, the 5th match would have been played with the Charger’s Williams-Benny duo versus the Warrior’s Bueno-Julen.
SayHiLi congratulates the winning Lifestyle Miami Charger team owners and the team members Zulaika, Iturbide, Benny, Spinner, Iriondo and Williams. Three of the Charger’s team members are new to the Magic City Fronton Battle Court roster for 2023; Zulaika, Iturbide and Iriondo. Also, compliments are in order for the Magic City Fronton owners, management and support team for all their hard work in promoting the game of Jai-Alai. Also, recently another sports betting partner, DraftKings, has started taking wagers on Battle Court matches too, so this expansion is exciting news for the Magic City Fronton short-court Jai-Alai program!
The Battle Court Fall Season 2023 kicks off on Friday, September 8th and runs through Friday, December 15th. There will be a Fall Battle Court draft in late August. Be sure to support the Magic City Fronton Pelota games (pari-mutuel games) which are played on Sunday through Tuesday at 1:30-pm now through June 27th. Fans can attend the live games on Sundays. The USNJAC and WSC (World Super Court) tournaments are played in August this year so don’t miss out on these great events too! Pelota games also return in September and run into early December this year with a Monday thru Wednesday schedule.
Magic City Fronton in Miami debuts its 6th Season of pari-mutuel games (called pelota games) on Monday, February 13th at 1:30-pm. According to Stu Neiman, there will be no changes to the Pelota format for 2023. Thus, there will continue to be 8-games with the Spec 7 format (games to 7-points) and no changes to wagers being offered.
The 2023 pari-mutuel season does come with roster changes; (2) players have left the roster and there are (3) roster additions. Players Diaz and RonRon have left the roster. Diaz, who had a late-year injury in 2022, moved with his long-time girlfriend to Colorado while RonRon and his family moved back to California. Note that Diaz has since recovered from his back injury. Diaz exited Magic City in winning-style when he won his last game played at the Magic City Fronton on September 19th where he and partner Douglas won a hotly-contested match against the favored Flores-Manu team in 3-sets with scores of 6-5, 1-6, 6-5. RonRon leaves a legacy of having the 3rd best Win % for Pelota singles games in 2023. RonRon was also a member of the Rebote Renegades who won the Battle Court II Championship finals in November of 2022. Adios Diaz & RonRon and we wish you the best in your future endeavors!
The three new Pelota roster additions are Jairo, Manny and Iriondo. Jairo and cesta-maker, Manny, are not new to the Magic City Fronton as they have previously competed in Battle Court matches and will continue to compete in Battle Court. Iriondo on the other hand is new to Jai-Alai and made his pro career debut just last week as a Charger at the first night of 2023 Battle Court matches. Iriondo made US Jai-Alai history by being the first Jai-Alai player ever to make their professional debut in front of a national TV audience on ESPN3. Iriondo is a US citizen born in New Haven, CT who had been living in Spain. His father played professional Jai-Alai as a back-court player at both Milford and Miami under the name Retrolaza.
Robin who was injured last season will be out through May of this year (last played on 10/4/2022). Robin has been undergoing some intensive rehab on his left knee in place of surgery. Bradley who had been out due to injury last year restarted Battle Court matches in late 2022 and will be competing only in Battle Court matches for the first part of 2023. Also, late breaking news is Inaki’s wrist fracture, side-lining him while he recovers.
Don’t miss out on the hot Pelota and Battle Court action in 2023. Be sure to open and/or fund that BetRivers sports betting account for Battle Court and explore the pari-mutuel wagering account options offered by watchandwager.com and mywinners.com. If your state doesn’t allow Jai-Alai pari-mutuel wagers at this time, it’s NOT game-over. Be sure to partner with a good friend or family member who resides in a state where Jai-Alai wagers are allowed. Check with customer service to see if they allow wagers from your state as the lists change periodically. Here are the contact numbers:
Watch & Wager: (888) 204-9150, on-line wagers only
MyWinners: (800) 468-2260, on-line and/or phone wager options, Note: Connecticut residents’ only option is MyWinners.
Retrolaza #54 History at Milford, Father of New Magic City Player Iriondo #45
Retolaza was born in 1964 and debuted professionally in 1984 at Durango Spain. He was Rookie of the Year at Miami Jai Alai (1986) and played there until the players’ strike in 1988, when he returned to Spain for the next 8 years, competing in tournaments partnering with the likes of Bolivar, Alberdi, Cachin, Remen and other top talent. He returned to the US in 1995 where he was a top backcourter at Milford until his retirement in 2000. Info provided by Mark Kaminsky, historian of the National Jai-Alai Association.
Here is some season record history for Retrolaza (#54) from Milford programs. The info is mostly mid-season stats. Milford had year-round games from 1996 to 2001 since Bridgeport closed in 1995.
Note that 1997 GP for other players ranged from 127-260 so this program info was early in the meet. The 1998 stats provided show GP of 105 for Retrolaza while other players had GP ranging from 382-829 at the time, so assuming he started later in the meet or was dealing with an injury. The 2000 stats show 455 GP while some players had up to 830 GP at that point; this was Retrolaza’s retirement year.
The Milford season record history for Retrolaza was provided from programs owned by Alecs Smith, another well-known Jai-Alai historian and Jai-Alai artist. Alecs designed an Orlando Jai-Alai program cover for their Citrus Tournament one year and also created the logo for the SayHiLi site. He is also a pretty darn good amateur player according to several reliable sources.
Retrolaza’s son, Iriondo (#45), takes to the short-court for his Magic City professional career debut representing the Chula Chargers against the Rebote Renegades on Friday night Battle Court this week at 7-pm. Iriondo is partnered with Zulaika in the 2nd match of the night versus the Renegade’s team of Goixerri-Ben. The 4th match of the night features Iriondo vs Ben in a singles match.
SayHiLi wishes Iriondo the best in his professional debut. Iriondo will also be playing in the Magic City Pelota games which start on Monday, February 13th at 1:30-pm EST.
Final qualifying statistics for the Dania Beach Invitational are shown in the charts below. Qualifying period was from December 1 through December 31 for the 2022-2023 Invitational. Points were awarded for Wins (5-pts), Place (3-pts) and Show (1-pt). The top (8) FC players and top (8) BC players qualified for the Doubles Partido Tournament in January 2023. The #1 point FC player is teamed with the #1 point BC player (Zulaika & Manci)……all the way down to 8th FC player paired with the 8th BC player (Etcheberry & Portet). See the brackets for the Doubles Partido Tournament on the SayHiLi homepage, which includes up-to-date match scores and the schedule for the remainder of the matches. Partido matches are after game 9 on Thursday & Friday nights and YOU CAN WAGER ON THEM (Game 10 Win Bets)!! If you can’t attend the live matches or watch from a simulcast site, you may be able to wager on them through watchandwager.com or mywinners.com if your state is approved for Jai-Alai wagering. Contact customer support for these on-line wagering services for latest info on state Jai-Alai wagering approvals.
Benny Bueno Selections for 1st Round of Partido Tournament and Straymar Selections
Benny Bueno gave his picks for the first round of the Dania Partido Tournament which starts Thursday night, January 5 at the Dania fronton after the 9th pari-mutuel singles game. Anyone can hear the complete discussion on the tourney picks scoop by going to Dania’s YouTube Channel for the Sunday, January 1st games for the between games banter between Benny and announcer Dave LaMont. Note that Benny claims he’s really bad at picking winners and has given up on making predictions, however, here’s the summary of Benny’s first round partido picks along with supporting info.
Match 1, Thursday January 5, #1 Zulaika-Manci vs #8 Etcheberry-Portet
Benny’s Pick: Zulaika-Manci
Why: Zulaika is positive, optimistic and has kill-shots, when Jai-Alai takes the next step Zulaika will be part of the solution
Match 2: Friday January 6, #4 Iturbide-Oyhenard vs #5 Aaron-Laborde
Benny’s Pick: Iturbide-Oyhenard
Why: Iturbide is very positive, good on the court and aggressive, Benny doesn’t see Aaron as an aggressive kill-shot guy, players from Aaron’s hometown are “volley players”
Match 3: Thursday January 12, #3 Laduche-Atain II vs #6 Benetrix-Urbieta
Benny’s Pick: Laduche-Atain II
Why: Laduche is the hottest of the 4-players and Attain II is a perfect partido partner, Benny says that Benetrix is a bit outmatched by Laduche
Match 4: Friday January 13, #2 Bixente-Bailo vs #7 Urrutia-Mandiola
Benny’s Pick: Bixente-Bailo
Why: Bailo gives it everything he has, also notes that Bixente is a quiet guy off and on the court (guessing this means he won’t let his emotions get the best of him)
SayHiLi Team Assessments
Here are the team records by post position for the (8) partido tourney teams from the start of the meet (Dec 1) through January 1.
Now, here’s the money chart, showing the Post-Position Adjusted (PPA) Weighted Factor for each of the double’s teams. This special Straymar Player/Team assessment tool evaluated the limited team statistical data for how teams should have done based on the posts they had compared to how they performed from those posts and also has a weighting for WPS finishes which is similar to the 5-3-1 tourney points, but not exactly, however it’s an optimized weighting based on experience. You need a special security clearance for any more details on how Straymar’s exact PPA method is calculated, and those are harder to get than a government security clearance these days….ha-ha.
So, based on the above actual team data Team PPA Factors (last column), here are Straymar’s predictions:
Match 1: Seed 1 vs 8, Zulaika-Manci the clear advantage 24.2 to 11.6
Match 2: Seed 4 vs 5, Iturbide-Oyenhard the clear advantage 23.1 to 15.4
Match 3: Seed 3 vs 6, Laduche-Atain II the clear advantage 13.8 to 3.4
Match 4: Seed 2 vs 7, Bixente-Bailo the clear advantage 25.9 to 13.7
Note these selections are the top-seeded selections in each partido match as were Benny Bueno’s picks for these four first-round partido matches. Note however, with only 1-month of team data available, there are some issues here with limited data ranging from only 6-13 team pairings for pari-mutuel doubles games. Low data samples can result in flawed team assessments, and one would wonder about the Benetrix-Urbieta team rating of 3.4, which appears to be suspect.
There is another Straymar team evaluation technique which is based on the use of more available data. This involves the Individual Doubles PPA Weighted Method for the Front Court and Back Court player and averages their individual assessments/factors to get an Estimated Team Factor (ETF) or rating. Straymar performs this ETF (2) different ways; for ALL performances of doubles data to-date and for ONLY recent data (the last 12-performances of doubles data, the equivalent of 2-weeks of Dania performances).
Using only the last 12-performances of data for the team estimated assessment makes the Benetrix-Urbieta team a slight favorite over Laduche-Atain II so this could be a very interesting matchup and toss-up scenario for the wagering fans. This is mostly due to the much improved play by Benetrix in the last 12-performances compared to his season average performance in doubles games. Some additional notes of interest on Benetrix are two-fold. Benny mentioned in his between-game sessions on Dania’s YouTube Channel that Benetrix wanted really badly to play at Dania but the slots were filled, thus he was highly motivated. Johan was originally scheduled to play and backed-out from playing the Dania Invitational as he wanted to compete in a tourney in Guernica. Only minutes later after Benny hung up on the cancellation call from Johan, Benetrix called Benny to ask once more about possible openings and thus secured his position on the roster (it was like Benetrix was at Johan’s side when he called Benny to cancel from the Invitational). Also, the improved play by Benetrix in the second half of the meet is probably heavily related to breaking his cesta very early in the meet. Benny has given more details on the Benetrix cesta story several times during the YouTube banter with the announcers. Be sure you don’t miss out on the entertaining YouTube scoop from Benny twice a week (Fridays and Sundays) before the games start and in-between many of the games!
So, in conclusion, the FINAL SELECTIONS by Straymar are the top-seeded teams for Matches 1, 2 and 4 (based on 3-different methods), however Straymar is taking the Benetrix-Urbieta team in Match 3 on Thursday, January 12 based on recent last 12-performances.
Be sure to support both short-court and long-court Jai-Alai options in the USA to help keep this great sport alive and have a Happy New Year! Be sure to catch Magic City’s Battle Court Draft which is slated for Monday, January 9th (check jaialaiworld.com and social media for the draft start time, likely to be 7-pm like the last draft event).
