Why a salt is necessary and not a detail

A salt is random data mixed into the text before hashing. Without it, a hash of a short predictable pick can be broken by simply trying every possible pick until one matches.

The space of possible selections on a given day is small — a few hundred teams, a handful of markets. Hashing all of them takes seconds, so an unsalted commitment reveals its own contents to anybody who bothers.

The salt must be long and genuinely random, and it must be revealed afterwards along with the pick, or the hash cannot be recomputed by anybody.

And that is the trap. A commitment scheme without a salt is theatre, and the difference is invisible from the outside unless you specifically look for whether a salt is published at reveal time.

What to do with it. Look for the salt in the reveal. If it is absent, the scheme is decorative regardless of how the hash is presented.