Professional Sportsbetting

[monet]

lul
Handicapping takes me about 3 minutes per sport.
Even less time if inside information is shared.

[kewlJ]

As deserved.

The difference here is that Reditz is arrogant and dismissive about terminology and definitions used by just about every modern pro sports bettor. He aims it at us because we also use the proper terminlogy while discussing sports with him.

Can I ask how old you are? just a range. You seem like an older curmudgeon type that just looks for reasons to argue, fight and not like someone.

You are not necessarily wrong about Redietz sometimes being arrogant. So what? Aren't we all sometimes? Anybody that participated on the blackjack forums about a decade ago, remember a member that went by Automatic Monkey? Very smart guy! Top AP and he wasn't even a full-time AP. I learned a lot from this guy. He was friendly toward me, a relatively new member and shared some valuable things.

Then one day he found out that I was gay and he turned. That forum had a separate less moderated (or not moderated) area and he called me every name in the book in that area. Couldn't and didn't want to hide his homophobic hate. But in the other areas of the forum, we continued to have decent communications, and I continued to learn things from him. So someone's personality rubs you the wrong way. So what?

Now, this thing you mentioned about terminology is even weirder. You have to conform to the terminology that other's in your profession use? Why? I use many terms that I have never heard other card counters use. One of them is "accumulated EV". That is a running total of my expected value from each day added together to compare to actual results. I have never, EVER heard or seen another card counter or AP use this term. I am sure most that use this, call it something else. So what? That would be a reason not to like someone? Come on man, just stop.

[Half Smoke]

lul
Handicapping takes me about 3 minutes per sport.
Even less time if inside information is shared.

for sure, you're going to get inside info

very often

a lot of pro athletes have you on speed dial

and also many college stars no doubt

.

[accountinquestion]

As deserved.

The difference here is that Reditz is arrogant and dismissive about terminology and definitions used by just about every modern pro sports bettor. He aims it at us because we also use the proper terminlogy while discussing sports with him.

Can I ask how old you are? just a range. You seem like an older curmudgeon type that just looks for reasons to argue, fight and not like someone.

You are not necessarily wrong about Redietz sometimes being arrogant. So what? Aren't we all sometimes? Anybody that participated on the blackjack forums about a decade ago, remember a member that went by Automatic Monkey? Very smart guy! Top AP and he wasn't even a full-time AP. I learned a lot from this guy. He was friendly toward me, a relatively new member and shared some valuable things.

Then one day he found out that I was gay and he turned. That forum had a separate less moderated (or not moderated) area and he called me every name in the book in that area. Couldn't and didn't want to hide his homophobic hate. But in the other areas of the forum, we continued to have decent communications, and I continued to learn things from him. So someone's personality rubs you the wrong way. So what?

Now, this thing you mentioned about terminology is even weirder. You have to conform to the terminology that other's in your profession use? Why? I use many terms that I have never heard other card counters use. One of them is "accumulated EV". That is a running total of my expected value from each day added together to compare to actual results. I have never, EVER heard or seen another card counter or AP use this term. I am sure most that use this, call it something else. So what? That would be a reason not to like someone? Come on man, just stop.

You are such a fool that you are not worth responding to in any in-depth manner. Redietz literally created new threads to specifically ridicule me.

The fact that you're digging this shit up from weeks ago while lecturing me about wanting to argue speaks enough.

No one should give you any credibility on any level.

[accountinquestion]

lul
Handicapping takes me about 3 minutes per sport.
Even less time if inside information is shared.

for sure, you're going to get inside info

very often

a lot of pro athletes have you on speed dial

and also many college stars no doubt

.

There is a kid who played a lot of a certain headsup sport. This kid was a known piece of shit. Some other degenerates buddied up with him. Next thing I hear they've pooled their bankroll to bet big on via this piece of shit kid's bookie on a lock. It lost. hmmm. what happened there

[Don Perignom]

lul
Handicapping takes me about 3 minutes per sport.
Even less time if inside information is shared.

Good?

[monet]

lul
Handicapping takes me about 3 minutes per sport.
Even less time if inside information is shared.

Good?

Anyone else, on this board, beating sports, for over 6 figures, with their own money, in the last 30 months?

[Don Perignom]

Anyone else, on this board, beating sports, for over 6 figures, with their own money, in the last 30 months?

I showed this to my mom. She said if you had applied yourself, you could have earned 6 figures in 28 months.

[Dan Druff]

Through 88 MLB games, I am 47-41, +4.85 units. I am betting one unit per game, so I'm not artificially fucking around with "unit" sizes in order to falsely portray a winning record, as many touts do. (Of course, I'm also not a tout.)

I have been more active in MLB this year than last year, when I was kinda sporadic with it midseason. I still posted a winning year, 59-62-2, +3.35 units.

So between 2022 and 2023 (so far), I am 106-103-2, +8.20 units. The units are what matters, as MLB picks are often moneyline, so it is easily possible to have a positive W-L record but be down money (if you're a favorite-betting ploppy especially), and also possible to be in the red win-loss-wise, but overall ahead in $.

211 picks isn't enough to be statistically significant, but it's enough to where it weeds out most of the losers.

I have given up on NBA. Can't beat it.

I am looking forward to NFL season, as I had a tremendous record last year, some of which was luck, but I'm hoping was at least somewhat indicative that I knew what I was doing.

[Dan Druff]

The thing to pay attention to in MLB is modern analytics. Fortunately, unlike the old days, others are doing the work for you. Daily fantasy sports are huge now, so there are all kinds of sites analyzing players. One of the current "hot" stats people are talking about these days is CSW, which stands for "called strikes + whiffs".

If you are judging pitchers by just ERA, you are a ploppy.

If you are judging pitchers by just ERA and WHIP, you are a semi-plop who thinks he's sharp.

If you are judging pitchers by ERA, WHIP, CSW, and other metrics such as the ones stated below, then you might be a sharp.

There will be some pitchers who get away with a low CSW rate for awhile, posting good ERA/WHIP numbers. These pitchers are usually ticking time bombs. Look at the link I posted above (CSW is highlighted, click that) if you want to learn all about the technical side of CSW, and why it matters.

CSW is often a good metric to judge pitchers who have mostly pitched well but have bad numbers due to a few mistakes or bad luck, and also to judge "fake good" pitchers who are likely to regress very soon.

K/BB ratio is another important metric, as a pitcher walking a lot of guys tends to be on the verge of a blowup, unless he has a tremendous number of strikeouts to extricate himself from these spots. It's also a general indicator of whether or not a pitcher is "on", or if he's just squeaking by because the batted ball happens to be going to fielders.

Velocity is also important. This, of course can relate to both K/BB ratio and CSW, but not always. A pitcher who has lost velocity compared to previous years/months/weeks is highly likely to regress. Often velocity decline is due to long term fatigue, dead arm, hidden injury, etc. Those are the pitchers you often want to fade. Velocity decline is more important than velocity itself. Thus, a pitcher throwing 93mph fastballs in 2022 who is now throwing 90 is much worse off than a pitcher who was throwing 90 last year, did okay, and is still throwing 90. On the flip side, a pitcher struggling early in the season who is still maintaining good (or even improved) velocity will often improve upon his bad numbers.

It used to be difficult to get stats like CSW or average velocity, but now it is readily available online. Ignore these at your peril if you're betting MLB. Anyone who just fires on games because they "like a team" is sure to be a long term MLB betting loser.

Many MLB ploppy bettors just bet on simple numbers they see -- a particular team has been good lately, a particular pitcher has good ERA/WHIP, a particular pitcher has bad ERA/WHIP, and they don't know (or don't care about) the importance of the numbers behind the numbers.

I hope you enjoyed this MLB betting primer when it comes to pitching. There are other factors into betting games than just pitching, including weather, ballparks, recent team performance, and injuries, but I'll stop here for now.

[Dan Druff]

I believe I've mentioned this before, but perhaps it was on my PFA site, so I'll say it here.

In general, if you are a regular sportsbettor, you need to look at margin of victory.

If your bet beats the line by a razor-thin margin, you may feel like a genius, but it wasn't a great bet. It pretty much went exactly the way the oddsmakers set, and it barely fell on the right side of variance for you. Same thing if you are losing by a razor-thin margin. Wasn't a horrible bet, because again the game went the way the odds predicted, and you lost due to variance.

So basically throw those picks out when assessing your skill as a handicapper in that sport.

What you need to look at is how often you're crushing the line, and how often the line is crushing you. That, of course, also has variance, and you can't read too much into such results. Still, it's a good rough indicator of how well you are seeing things.

Let's say you have 10 spread NBA picks, and you go 6-4 in that stretch. That's pretty good, and if you could maintain that 6-4 pace, you would be an EXCELLENT NBA handicapper. However, not only is 10 games a tiny sample, but you also need to look at how you were winning and losing in those games. If you had 6 close wins and 4 blowout losses, your 10 picks were not very good. It means that, had things gone just a bit differently, you could have been something like 2-8 in that same stretch.

You are not likely to be a winning handicapper if you are mostly scoring close wins, and get few blowout wins.

On the flip side, you can feel confident if you are routinely picking games which blow the line away in your favor, and most of your losses being close or hard-luck. Over time, that will work itself out, and you will eventually get lucky/close wins to make up for the bad luck and bad variance.

I have seen in my own picks when I start to scuffle, and it seems every win is a huge sweat, while every loss is a disgusting beatdown. That's when I take a break and reassess my strategy.

The one exception to the above involves dog moneyline picks. Dog moneylines, aside from very small dogs like +107, are by nature going to lose more often than they win, even for great handicappers. Thus, you will have a lot of close victories in those when you do win, and for that you shouldn't feel bad. If you've bet on a +170 MLB team and you lose in the 10th inning, it was a good pick, even though you're in the L column. The fact that it was competitive enough to go to extras means that you were correct in taking the fairly big dog. So if your dog picks are squeaking it out, but winning at a high enough clip to be profitable, that's okay. If your favorite picks are mostly squeaking it out (even small favorites), that's when it's time to reassess.

There's also the time to throw up your hands and admit defeat. That's what I've done with NBA. I kept losing there, but kept making adjustments and trying to get back to my winning ways of years ago. Hasn't been happening. Eventually I fall into the red. Last year the NBA ate a lot of my profits from NFL, MLB, and NCAAF.

I am human and subject to the same degenerate whims as the rest of you. I like gambling and sometimes can't admit that I'm not +EV. The NBA was one of those spots, so I'm quitting it. I might or might not give up on NCAAB, but I only have one season of that under my belt (a bad one), so I might or might not try again. Possibly basketball just isn't my thing, when it comes to betting.

I'm not a pro sportsbettor. I am a rec who is just trying to do it for some action, who also is making a real effort to do it +EV, especially since most who attempt this fail. In fact, beating the spread/moneyline is considered unbeatable these days by many. I'm trying to show that's not true in some sports. The real money in sportsbetting comes from props, non-major sports, and other lightly traveled areas. I have some friends who are killing it in these areas. The problem is getting action down, whereas spread/moneyline bets it is not tough to get action down, but the edge is lower.

[kewlJ]

I think you have done and are doing very well Druff. Especially for a stated recreational type bettor. I have been fortunate enough to piggyback on probably 2/3's of your picks.

just a couple of my thoughts:

Pro Basketball is incredibly hard to pick sides with points. Sometimes there is a ton of points scored in the last 4 minutes, of a game that mean nothing as far as who wins, but does flip the point wager. Like a team favored by 8 or 9, winning by 15-16 at the 3 or 4 minute mark and wins by 6. betting with the spreads is just too difficult. I think you can do a little something with point totals, but even that can get hairy with a ton of points scored at the end of the game that means nothing. One thing I have has some success with is betting the total for one team. Like a lakers over 114. That kind of trend seems to hold true to form a little more.

And while you do fairly well in baseball, Dan Druff, I have always thought you put too much emphasis on the starting pitchers, both betting with a hot pitcher and fading a pitcher that is struggling. Starting pitchers just don't pitch deep anymore. 5, 6 innings at most. There is a lot that happens in the later innings. I am sure you consider each teams bullpen strengths and weaknesses, but in this day and age, that might be as important as the starting pitchers. If you are going to put so much emphasis on starting pitchers, both backing and fading, you might want to consider the 5 inning lines more than you do.

Again, I have had some success playing just one teams total run amounts for both games and 5 inning lines. A little better with the games. Like the Texas Rangers. I will take the Rangers over 4.5, even over 5, every chance I get. They average over 6 runs a game. That kind of thing.

But again, you are doing great. And I appreciate your picks.

[monet]

You guys really hit a nerve with Druff lol.
I never seen him post so much on this site.
That must be rough putting in all that work for 80 some odd bets to win 5 units.
I guess if one unit is 20k, that's good, but we all know that 1 unit is most likely 100 bucks or something like that.
You literally cannot beat sports betting without BALLS.

[Half Smoke]

You guys really hit a nerve with Druff lol.
I never seen him post so much on this site.
That must be rough putting in all that work for 80 some odd bets to win 5 units.
I guess if one unit is 20k, that's good, but we all know that 1 unit is most likely 100 bucks or something like that.
You literally cannot beat sports betting without BALLS.

Anyone else, on this board, beating sports, for over 6 figures, with their own money, in the last 30 months?

Handicapping takes me about 3 minutes per sport.
Even less time if INSIDE INFORMATION is shared.

when this dude makes his big ballsy bets after getting a call from the Yankees Manager - he wins almost every time

the dude never even one time had a bad losing streak

and that's the scrip for crushing sports - big ballsy bets with very few losses -

I've been taking very careful notes

everybody here is so very lucky to get educated by this superstar

for sure for sure

.

[Ozzy]

Proof that Druff is a sports degenerate, is the fact he keeps betting the games that old man Singer pitches! I mean come on Druff, he should have hung up his ball cap and glove 35 years ago!

[AxelWolf]

T

I am looking forward to NFL season, as I had a tremendous record last year, some of which was luck, but I'm hoping was at least somewhat indicative that I knew what I was doing.

" knew what you were doing "

That's what I'm wondering, what is it that you are doing? What factors and criteria are going into your picks? Why do you think you have +EV. Can you walk us thought your process. What tools ans stats you use what things you are looking for etc.

[redietz]

T

I am looking forward to NFL season, as I had a tremendous record last year, some of which was luck, but I'm hoping was at least somewhat indicative that I knew what I was doing.

" knew what you were doing "

That's what I'm wondering, what is it that you are doing? What factors and criteria are going into your picks? Why do you think you have +EV. Can you walk us thought your process. What tools ans stats you use what things you are looking for etc.

Why would anyone share proprietary information? It would be beyond idiotic to do that.

One of the issues with competing in public contests is that people will run your plays through every algorithm imaginable to discover what it is you are doing and what subsets at which you are most effective. You will be data mined up, down, and sideways. This has been going on since the "70's, when a wealthy person would subscribe to dozens of handicapping services, then re-sell those picks as a "Consensus Service" that enabled clients to pick and choose whose plays they wanted. In the meantime, the Consensus Service owner would data mine all of the plays, including checking correlations between services for effectiveness.

When Billy Walters assembled roundtables of experts in individual sports (late 1990's and onward), he would have access to individual savants and data mine their plays while basically setting them up to compete with each other, while (of course) doing his best to not have them working with each other without his oversight.

Why would anyone who actually wins tell you how they are actually winning? Are sports handicappers supposed to be mentally challenged as opposed to most "APs?"

It's such a bizarre request, Axelwolf. What the hell are you thinking? Or do you believe people are just brain dead in general? I mean, can you imagine someone publicly asking you to lay out the specifics of what you are doing? LOL. What would your response be?

Evidently, the theory is that anyone not an "AP" is dumb as a rock.

[accountinquestion]

Why would anyone share proprietary information? It would be beyond idiotic to do that.

One of the issues with competing in public contests is that people will run your plays through every algorithm imaginable to discover what it is you are doing and what subsets at which you are most effective. You will be data mined up, down, and sideways. This has been going on since the "70's, when a wealthy person would subscribe to dozens of handicapping services, then re-sell those picks as a "Consensus Service" that enabled clients to pick and choose whose plays they wanted. In the meantime, the Consensus Service owner would data mine all of the plays, including checking correlations between services for effectiveness.

When Billy Walters assembled roundtables of experts in individual sports (late 1990's and onward), he would have access to individual savants and data mine their plays while basically setting them up to compete with each other, while (of course) doing his best to not have them working with each other without his oversight.

Why would anyone who actually wins tell you how they are actually winning? Are sports handicappers supposed to be mentally challenged as opposed to most "APs?"

It's such a bizarre request, Axelwolf. What the hell are you thinking? Or do you believe people are just brain dead in general? I mean, can you imagine someone publicly asking you to lay out the specifics of what you are doing? LOL. What would your response be?

Why would they give away their picks?

Maybe they are successful people who can win at sports betting without it being important to them or even any sort of significant income. Maybe it is more for funnsies.

The beyond idiotic portion comes from not understanding this. The person who can't understand this simple concept is the mentally challenged one.

I lol at this idea people reverse engineering contest picks. If they're running these picks under every algorithm available I'd have to wonder why they don't just use that on the ACTUAL games. You'd find far better correlations than trying to reverse engineer someone's picks without even knowing what stats they use. Doubtful you'd have anywhere near enough data but I won't bother asking why because I know the answer.

<crickets>

[redietz]

Why would anyone share proprietary information? It would be beyond idiotic to do that.

One of the issues with competing in public contests is that people will run your plays through every algorithm imaginable to discover what it is you are doing and what subsets at which you are most effective. You will be data mined up, down, and sideways. This has been going on since the "70's, when a wealthy person would subscribe to dozens of handicapping services, then re-sell those picks as a "Consensus Service" that enabled clients to pick and choose whose plays they wanted. In the meantime, the Consensus Service owner would data mine all of the plays, including checking correlations between services for effectiveness.

When Billy Walters assembled roundtables of experts in individual sports (late 1990's and onward), he would have access to individual savants and data mine their plays while basically setting them up to compete with each other, while (of course) doing his best to not have them working with each other without his oversight.

Why would anyone who actually wins tell you how they are actually winning? Are sports handicappers supposed to be mentally challenged as opposed to most "APs?"

It's such a bizarre request, Axelwolf. What the hell are you thinking? Or do you believe people are just brain dead in general? I mean, can you imagine someone publicly asking you to lay out the specifics of what you are doing? LOL. What would your response be?

Why would they give away their picks?

Maybe they are successful people who can win at sports betting without it being important to them or even any sort of significant income. Maybe it is more for funnsies.

The beyond idiotic portion comes from not understanding this. The person who can't understand this simple concept is the mentally challenged one.

I lol at this idea people reverse engineering contest picks. If they're running these picks under every algorithm available I'd have to wonder why they don't just use that on the ACTUAL games. You'd find far better correlations than trying to reverse engineer someone's picks without even knowing what stats they use. Doubtful you'd have anywhere near enough data but I won't bother asking why because I know the answer.

<crickets>

See. this is what I mean about people not knowing what they're talking about. As in not knowing what they are talking about AT ALL.

Obviously, genius, people HAVE BEEN data mining actual results for decades. Pull up a Playbook magazine from 1990. I mean, holy hell, do some research or work or something. Learn to read. Holy fucking christ. You've had multi-millionaires running every imaginable data mining program on results forever. And not just from the good old USA. Half the Playbook staff was running these programs for 30 years.

If you don't know this, why would you even comment at all? It's doofus city with you and sports betting.

Jesus, you are out of your depth. It's okay to be out of your depth. But you don't acknowledge you're out of your depth. It is truly un-fucking-believable what you don't know.

[monet]

Why would anyone share proprietary information? It would be beyond idiotic to do that.

One of the issues with competing in public contests is that people will run your plays through every algorithm imaginable to discover what it is you are doing and what subsets at which you are most effective. You will be data mined up, down, and sideways. This has been going on since the "70's, when a wealthy person would subscribe to dozens of handicapping services, then re-sell those picks as a "Consensus Service" that enabled clients to pick and choose whose plays they wanted. In the meantime, the Consensus Service owner would data mine all of the plays, including checking correlations between services for effectiveness.

When Billy Walters assembled roundtables of experts in individual sports (late 1990's and onward), he would have access to individual savants and data mine their plays while basically setting them up to compete with each other, while (of course) doing his best to not have them working with each other without his oversight.

Why would anyone who actually wins tell you how they are actually winning? Are sports handicappers supposed to be mentally challenged as opposed to most "APs?"

It's such a bizarre request, Axelwolf. What the hell are you thinking? Or do you believe people are just brain dead in general? I mean, can you imagine someone publicly asking you to lay out the specifics of what you are doing? LOL. What would your response be?

Evidently, the theory is that anyone not an "AP" is dumb as a rock.

There you go making perfect sense again.
Stop that shit.
Not Entertaining at all!