I'd say just report what you think is low quality. The moderators in that section are definitely active, and they'd probably welcome reports in that section. I only see newbie reports there, and they aren't that often, so I'm wondering if it might be the same for higher ranked accounts.
It would take the same amount of effort to report the posts, than to self moderate it yourself. Might be even quicker reporting, since you don't have to go through, and delete every post referencing that, whereas the moderator will.
Obviously, there might be a difference of opinion on certain posts. I can see a lot of subjective views being had on the quality of a post. Although, I do believe that the discussion should be resolved around gambling, and not just talking about a team or player for the sake of talking about sports, which I do believe is used quite a bit. I know that can be related at times, but it has to at least stem from a discussion about gambling, and not generic discussion. That's my view point anyhow. The moderators in that section, might have a different view.
I agree that threads I opened could probably be turned to self-moderated (you named one but I have others also attracting spam) -- I don't mind moderating, though I might be accused of being too harsh, and could be biased to all the users I already know gamble (but that bias is good right?). It was just natural for me to NOT self-moderate to keep the thread censorship free but at this stage, I think the pro (less spam) is preferable to the con (possible censorship).
That doesn't really matter all that much, as it's a self moderated thread. If users don't like the way you're moderating a thread, they can open their own. Although, that does have its own set of problems, especially if we've got two almost identical threads, which are massing replies. Especially, if the spammers then post in both of them to get paid, which I suspect would be the case.
* Is there a way the admin can turn thread to a self- moderated thread and hand it over to another OP who is ready to moderate the thread? I will volunteer I spend 90% of my time there.
Yeah, I do believe it's possible. I believe the Wall Observer thread has been given this treatment in the past.
You've got the right users in Cyrus, and hilariousandco moderating the section. So, they'd likely have the permissions to do something like that. Different matter, whether they deem it appropriate or not, though.