@AgainstAllOdds do you actively bet on sports? Nice writeup!
I did some sports betting years ago but was only clearing bonuses or looking for arbitrage plays.
Oh and good luck in Vegas @MJ DeMarco
I used to be really good at chess for my age, realized there was no money in it, and at 14 quit chess and started gambling and investing in sports tickets. That was thirteen years ago, and I did that for around 7 years as my primary source of income. Sports tickets made me a lot of money. Gambling was also great money, but betting day to day wasn't for me. Day to day betting has too much variance, and requires a lot of mental fortitude. Your goal is to make money over the course of a season, and not every single day. However, if you're putting a significant portion of your bankroll on the line, those days are not fun.
I stopped day to day betting once it stopped being enjoyable.
When I won, I felt nothing. When I lost, I felt depressed. There was no emotional upside, only downside.
I remember at 17 staring at myself in the bathroom mirror, seeing my face, and wondering why the hell I was sad. The logical part of my brain was justifying all my bets. The emotional part hated the thousand dollar swings.
So then I went 100% into sports tickets and betting futures as far as gambling goes. Predicting how well a team will do over the course of a season is 10x easier than predicting the outcome of an individual game.
Betting futures (who wins the conference, how many over/under wins a team has) is something I'm really good at, however, it is something that's capped by the sportsbooks. Vegas limits the amount of money that you can put on a team, and adjusts its odds accordingly. Therefore, you're limited to how much money you can make over the course of a season. Basketball was my sport for the course of a season. On a season, the profits are capped at around $20,000. That's the upside. Usually I'd just make $5k to $10k a season as a hobby bettor. Whenever you place a bet, the odds also change. So if you're limited to $500 lets say on a future, after you place the first bet, the odds change, your EV changes, and your ability to bet more changes. In essence - futures betting is good money, but it's small money that's limited. You don't want to make a career out of it. Cashflow wise it's also horrible because you're tying up your bankroll for 8 months. Not worth it.
Now, I just bet for fun when I go to a casino, or when there's something really stupid that happens.
Every 1-2 years there's a "Bet of the Year", and I bet big. It's mostly for fun, but also free money. An example of this are the recent McGregor fights.
Last big bet I did was a year and a half ago... $10k on Mayweather against McGregor to get $2,500 profit. Those are the bets I like to do. When the entire public is irrationally on one side and placing bets for no reason, skewing the odds, that's when you want to bet big. You look at the fundamentals (I crunch a lot of data), and then compare it to the odds. If the media is hyping someone up like McGregor, but you look at the fundamentals and realize that Mayweather is undefeated, and McGregor is not a boxer, then you bet big and thank the media and irrationality for your winnings.
Some quick tips:
- Bet against "hype", and you'll usually do better than if you follow the hype. Betting against the Yankees has historically been positive EV, as is betting against big trades, etc.
- Psychology is huge. Playoffs is different from regular season. How much does a player believe that they can win the game? What impact does that have? How does his face look after the first quarter, etc?
- What are the incentives? A lot of sports are rigged. Who does the league want to push through? Who's the ref? What's the story that they want to play out?
- Manage your bankroll.
- Don't get emotionally attached. It's a number, and not real until the end of the season.
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