The sports betting industry is among the fastest-growing industries in the world, with bookies penetrating new markets every day. Fortunately, the century-old anti-gambling stigma in America’s popular culture has dissipated fast, paving the way for a substantial multibillion-dollar legal betting industry to develop.
With sports betting now legal in many jurisdictions, millions of sports fans seek their first taste of the betting industry. However, you need to be familiar with the sports betting basics.
Understanding the Fundamentals of Sports Betting
Sports Betting Mechanics
All sports bets always reduce down to selection, stake, and odds, no matter how you slice them or how intricate you attempt to make them. The selection is what you want to bet on, while the stake is how much you want to wager. The odds represent the possibility of an event happening.
Understanding the Odds
When betting with Asian bookies, odds serve two functions. They’re used in calculating the rewards of the winning wager. When you wager with a bookmaker, you’ll be given odds determining how much you’ll win. The greater they are, the more you stand to win, depending on your stake.
Second, odds show the possibility of any given result occurring. The lower the odds, the more likely the event will occur. That makes great logic since you would expect to gain less when betting on a predictable event than when betting on an unusual one.
Understanding Probability and Value
It’s logical to believe the only way to profit from sports betting is to precisely forecast what will happen in sporting events. While that’s theoretically true, you’ll be shocked to know that merely making accurate forecasts isn’t always enough for continuous success. You’ll sometimes make wrong predictions, no matter how good you are, as sports events have too many variables.
It helps to be correct as often as possible, but the most crucial aspect of betting is finding value. Value is a concept you’ll hear sports bettors use frequently, and it’s one you must grasp if you want to be successful.
Looking for positive value is an excellent way to pick your bets for long-term success, although it doesn’t guarantee victory. That’s because the value is subjective, and you’ll only succeed if your assessment is true.
Sports Betting Types
Moneylines
Moneyline bets are the ideal option for first-time sports gamblers. All you have to do with Moneyline bets is predict who will win a race, game, matchup, etc.
Point spreads
Another prevalent type of sports wager is point spread betting. The wager allows you to use your expertise and root for a team, even when you believe they will lose the game.
Parlays
Parlay bets are among the highest-grossing types of bets but are also among the hardest to win. They combine many single bets, and you’ll need 100% accuracy to win.
Teasers
Teasers are more complex bets, but every novice should learn about them. They’re popular among experienced sports bettors because they offer significant returns on low-risk wagers.
Pleasers
Pleasers are among the most demanding and intricate bets to win. However, expert bettors can profit from some passive rewards when they win.
Futures
A futures bet, also called an outright bet, allows you to wager on an event long before it occurs. That’s ideal for informed sports fans that are skilled at forecasting future events. They also have some very appealing betting odds.
Proposition Bets
Prop bets allow you to wager on parts of a sporting event that is not directly related to the ultimate score or conclusion. The bets may get very detailed and provide excellent potential for huge returns if you’re ready to take the risk. They’re prevalent in the Super Bowl.
Totals
Total bets (over/under bets) allow you to wager on whether you believe a predicted total will be higher or lower than the actual amount of points, runs, or goals scored.
If and Reverse Bets
If and reverse bets are slightly more complicated than other sports bets. However, if you’re familiar with them, you’ll be surprised by how much you can make from them.
Expert Sports Betting Strategies & Tips
Even if luck plays a role in betting, being a long-term winner requires great skill and preparation. Many individuals wager on their favorite teams or players or on long odds hoping to win large. This approach is OK If you’re simply seeking pleasure when betting in Thailand, but you’ll probably lose more than you’ll win.
We may not personally know you, but let’s assume you’re like us and like winning. We’ll teach you how to achieve it with the most effective sports betting techniques and systems like hedging, the zig-zag theory, betting the center and betting against the crowd.
Important sports betting advice for beginners
Beginners must concentrate on the basics before going into more complex bets. Here are some pointers:
Concentrate on One Team
This basic concept has greater power than you’d imagine. Being knowledgeable on one team is far more beneficial than having ordinary knowledge on several teams. The more information you have about a club, the better chances you have in recognizing value when assessing the odds.
If you’re an expert on a team, you’ll know of any crucial news, and you might notice something before bookmakers adjust lines to earn value. That’s especially true in non-major leagues. However, if betting on a single team is too restrictive, limit yourself to one league.
Respect Bankroll management
Bankroll management is essential in any investment opportunity. It’s not only about your betting markets but also about the quantity and regularity you wager.
Good bankroll management protects you from the unavoidable cold streaks that occasionally happen with any gaming activity. You’ll need a separate betting bankroll from your ordinary expenditure money.
With a betting bankroll of $250, your average bet amount should be roughly 2% of your overall roll. Any bankroll less than $250 should have a maximum bet size of $5. These figures may seem meager, but that’s the way to go if you want to increase your rollover time while avoiding bankruptcy.
Shop for Odds
This method is effective, yet many beginners avoid it since it requires effort. If one shop charges you more for coffee than another down the street, you’ll definitely choose the cheaper option. However, you must shop around for the greatest prices. The same is true with sports wagers.
As you explore the best value for your bets by browsing lines, consider enhancing your strategy by watching Doc’s Sports free picks videos, which can offer valuable insights into making informed decisions. Additionally, opening accounts with different bookies allows you to benefit from various promotional offers at sign-up and initial deposit.
Examine a team’s record against the spread
A popular stat to look for is “ATS,” – against the spread. That’s why understanding how the teams wins or losses and against the bookmaker’s point spread is beneficial. The point spread is basically a supplementary competition for teams.
Teams strive for as many consecutive victories as possible, but it’s also critical to evaluate how they fared compared to the oddsmakers’ predictions, not simply their opponents. That’s known as a team’s ATS stat, and if a team beats the spread 50% of the time on average, it’s a solid bet for you to make.
Follow Winning Streaks
The performance of sports players and teams may be extremely volatile. Some players are in a good form and can’t miss a shot, but others are as frigid as ice. You may profit from hot and cold streaks when betting, and you’ll have a great edge if you identify them faster than the bookies.
Remember that the chances are providing the correct number and that you are appropriately considering all the components. If a club wins a run of lower-level games at home, it might not be the best moment to get onboard when they are away against a top opponent in the next game.
Keep note of your schedule and the elements that might help you maintain your streak. Also, if you want to pick them on the spread rather than the Moneyline, look at how they’ve recently performed against the spread.
Expert Sports Betting Techniques That Work
Now that we’ve reviewed some of the fundamental components of a solid sports betting strategy let’s look at pro wagering tactics that have proven successful when used correctly.
Hedging Your Bets
In sports betting, a punter might place a wager that opposes his previous wager. It may appear strange to wager against your earlier bet, but it may ensure you profit when done correctly.
Hedging is commonly used in future bets where the odds may shift considerably in your favor throughout the season. It’s also common in massive parlays, where you’ve won many bets but have at least a single bet to play. Either way, you can gamble against your original bet and benefit regardless of the outcome.
Hedging allows you to forego a higher possible payoff in exchange for lower risk and guaranteed profits. You may experiment with the amount of risk and profit you wish to accept by increasing or decreasing the size of your hedge bet.
For instance, a St. Louis fan bet $250 on the Cardinals during the World Series at a Las Vegas bookmaker. The wager paid 1000:1 to potentially win $250,000, and his predictions proved true to leave the gambler staring down the barrel of a potentially big reward. However, if they lost the World Series, he’d earn 0 points.
In such a case, it’s an excellent time to hedge as the punter can lock in a profit by betting against the original wager. Let’s say a Texas Rangers win paid out 1:1 and the gambler could raise $125,000 for it, he would be guaranteed a $125,000 profit no matter who won.
Hedging is also wise with a multiple bet parlay after winning most of your bets. When it comes to parlays, it only takes one loss to lose the whole wager. If you only have one game left, you can hedge by wagering against the original parlay bet.
Betting on the Center
When you make an early point spread wager and see the line shift later, that’s known as middling. You may also locate mediocre possibilities when you’re line shopping and uncovering a dramatically different point spread.
You can put an opposing bet to your original wager and occasionally win both by taking advantage of the line shift. For instance, if you place a point spread wager on a club with a -7 spread in an NFL match, the point spread may shift to -11 on the game day once you’ve placed your wager. That happens for various reasons, like too much betting action on the underdog, injuries and other variables.
In this scenario, you may now wager the +11 underdog to wager the center. If the favorite team wins by 9 points, you’ll win both bets. You want to hit the “center” of the two bets. You’re also insured because if the ultimate winning margin isn’t at the “middle” of your wagers, you’ll win one and lose the other thus canceling out each other. However, you’ll incur a modest loss from the sportsbook’s commission.
Bet Against the Public
This technique is known as ‘fading the public,’ meaning betting against the betting public. Remember that oddsmakers don’t set lines and odds solely based on their prediction of the game’s outcome. Sportsbooks also want to promote equal action on both sides of a game to protect them from a potentially massive loss.
Because everyone is betting on their favorite, bookies must shift the line to favor the underdogs and make them more enticing for more people to bet on them. Knowing when other punters are pushing a line gives you an advantage since the line moves proportionately to the amount of money coming in instead of the expected final score. As a result, you can wager the other way and profit from more points on the point spread.
You must pay great attention to line movements to fade the public. When the line shifts in the underdog’s favor, it indicates that most of the public is siding with the favorite. Free internet sites can also inform you how much action is on various bets.
The Zig-Zag Theory
This betting technique is great in the NBA and NHL playoff series. These leagues employ a 2-2-1-1-1 playoff system for home and away matches, where the higher-seeded team hosts the first two matches, the fifth and seventh, if necessary.
The zig-zag theory is based on two ideas. First, home teams are at a distinct advantage. Second, it assumes that a team tends to play harder after a loss and stands a better chance to win. This theory works best when a squad is at home after a loss.
The theory states that if the visitors lose the first two matches, they’re a solid bet to win the third game. That’s particularly true in the NBA, where a team hardly ever comes back from a 0-3 deficit. As such, it’s important to win game three at home to get them to victory.