Is Sports Betting AP Play?

[kewlJ]

Ah, now I'm remembering again why I had Alan blocked in the past, but un-did it when the rest of the retards stopped posting (Singer, Belly, etc.).

Alan, let's say I'm having a raffle, grand prize is $1,000,000! There are a total of 100 tickets entered in the raffle. Do you think you'd have an advantage if you bought one of those tickets for $10? Nevermind, that's like asking a newborn what's the cube root of 27 -- it doesn't have the slightest idea what words those words mean, let alone any kind of math.

You can't have an advantage if there are elements out of your control. You can't.

Lol, this is comedy gold.

Using Alan "MoneyMan" Mendelson's logic, redeitz can't have an advantage because there are things out of his control -- a player could get hurt at the last second, errmagurdd, no more advantage!

I can't tell if Alan really doesn't understand the concept of playing with an advantage and related positive expected value (+Ev), or if he is once again playing (dumb) with us.

Playing with an advantage, the basis of advantage play does not guarantee a win (in the short term), whether results of the actual play or contest drawing.

In the context of regular play for instance, a card counter will experience some of his bigger losing sessions, when he has his bigger advantage (and bigger bets out). Playing with that advantage does NOT guarantee a win in the short term. Those losses are short-term losses, what is referred to as variance. We CANNOT control what occurs in the short-term and despite playing with an advantage will experience short-term losses (variance). But when you ride out the short-term swings and accumulate enough play to get to the ever so important long-term, the math takes over. You CANNOT experience losses long-term when playing with an advantage! The variance becomes insignificant.

Drawings and contest work the exact same way. To play on Mickey's example, if you have a 1 in 100 chance to win $10,000 in a drawing, that is expected value of $100. You may not win that drawing, so your return is zero. That is variance. You were +ev for that drawing but did not win (short-term), just like the card counter doesn't always win when the count is positive. BUT, enter 1000 of those drawings with a 1 in 100 chance of winning $10,000, and the player is going to win his share and come out on top and pretty close to where he should be. That is the long-term and the math guarantees it.

And therein lies the problem. Alan and Singer before him, either don't understand the math, or refuse to believe it. I suspect it is the later, and as long as that is the case all the explaining in the world will make no difference. Again and again with these guys, it is a case of people living in an alternative universe, believing what they want to believe instead of what is real.

[jbjb]

KJ, your last paragraph sums it up.

[MisterV]

Some would ask "When is the long run actually achieved? How many trials does it take?"

These same folks would say "We only play in the short run, so the long run cannot apply."

[OneHitWonder]

Alan and Singer before him, either don't understand the math, or refuse to believe it.

Both, and then some.

[AxelWolf]

You can't have an advantage if there are elements out of your control. You can't.

That's ONE of the dumbest things you have ever said(there have been many, so it's hard to chose just one).

Let's assume your expected loss was $100 earning tickets(not that it matters, but let's just say you got lucky and won 4k) for a drawing where they pulled 5 names for 1k each

If you have 9995 tickets out of 10,000 tickets are you saying because there are 5 tickets that are out of your control, you don't have an advantage?

NO ONE IS CLAIMING YOU HAD OR WILL HAVE AN ADVANTAGE ON A LOSING MACHINE JUST BY ITS SELF. We are only talking about if the individual has an over all advantage in whatever situation he is playing.

If that's what you are getting at, please say so( at least make it more clear to us), and let's move on.

[kewlJ]

Some would ask "When is the long run actually achieved? How many trials does it take?"

Interesting discussion and one I don't know the answer to. It's different for different games and even different rules and conditions within the same game (blackjack). Oh, the math guys will come up with a mathematical number if you like. I never cared for that.

In one of the two main books about the MIT team (90's/2000 era), there was a term "law of large numbers" and they threw out 50,000 rounds as a number that would be significant enough to qualify as "long-term", where the swings and variance becomes insignificant. I used that for a while....until I had some swing and negative variance that lasted longer than 50,000 rounds.

Then I sort of went to a time period. I have had 4 different down swings that lasted 6 months or better. So obviously 6 months isn't long enough (for me). So I went to a year. A year (playing very frequently and often) should be enough to overcome short-term variance and qualify as long-term, right? And then a had a year, that while not a losing year, was significantly below expectation (way under-performed). So maybe a year (80,000 rounds for me) isn't long enough. AND I know card counters that have had losing years!

So what is long-term as far as card counting....I don't know. 2 years? 120,000, 150,000 rounds? Again, I don't know. I can tell you that if I take any 2 year period, about 150,000 / 160,000 rounds for me, my results are very close to expectation for that two year period. And that includes my worst 12 month period. If I stretch that worst 12 month period out with the 12 months before or prior, the total results come out pretty close to expectation. So, until I experience a two or three year period that is significantly below expectation, I am currently going with a year and a half to 2 years or 120,000 round to 160,000 rounds as "my longterm", where unusual losing periods are overcome to get back to or very close to expectation.

These same folks would say "We only play in the short run, so the long run cannot apply."

These folks are wrong. The "long run" is made up of many "short runs". If you play every short run, every opportunity as +ev as you can, you will end up with a long run of +ev play, that is very close to expectation. The math Guarantees it! Advantage Play and life is math. Believe in the math!

[kewlJ]

That's one of the dumbest things you have ever said.

Are you SURE about this? I think a couple things Alan said in this thread probably qualify as top (or bottom) 10 dumbest things he has said, but there is such a large list to choose from, I don't know if you can really find an absolute "dumbest" thing he said.

And if you do....just wait until tomorrow.

[AxelWolf]

That's one of the dumbest things you have ever said.

Are you SURE about this? I think a couple things Alan said in this thread probably qualify as top (or bottom) 10 dumbest things he has said, but there is such a large list to choose from, I don't know if you can really find an absolute "dumbest" thing he said.

And if you do....just wait until tomorrow.

No fear, as you were typing that, I was actually editing my post to reflect how most of us feel when it comes to Alan.

[AxelWolf]

[QUOTE=Alan Mendelson;55447]

[OneHitWonder]

Some would ask "When is the long run actually achieved? How many trials does it take?"

What other types of long run are there?

These same folks would say "We only play in the short run, so the long run cannot apply."

Perhaps, there is a way to play in the short run over and over again without it becoming a matter of one long run.

[tableplay]

The Mcgregor/Mayweather fight was a rare sports betting opportunity IMHO. Give up 5 to 1 for a 50 to 1 favorite (Mayweather=favorite).

That seems like a reasonable way to look at it. Occasionally something comes my way, but it's not some ongoing crutch. For example, about 25 years ago, someone I trust told me that the Kentucky hoops team doctor had made a large wager on the team they were playing against early in the season. It was an easy W. But those are once-a-season situations, at best.

It is interesting that looking at things this way, what some people consider an edge, I'd call a crutch.

[tableplay]

Regardless of whether or not DC exists, casino management is concerned about it or they would not have swapped out less bouncy craps tables for more bouncy ones.

V-that goes back to dice control which you do not believe in. And that is fine. But for those that do believe, table conditions are of the utmost importance. Last time I was at Caesars, there was only one table left that was not too bouncy. Some other casinos have none. In my local area, there is only one casino that has tables that are usable. So whether intentionally or not, the casinos have pretty much stopped dice control, at least the casinos that I used to frequent. I have no knowledge of other casinos around the country other than Caesars AC which was ok last time I was there. That was several years ago, however.

[redietz]

The Mcgregor/Mayweather fight was a rare sports betting opportunity IMHO. Give up 5 to 1 for a 50 to 1 favorite (Mayweather=favorite).

That seems like a reasonable way to look at it. Occasionally something comes my way, but it's not some ongoing crutch. For example, about 25 years ago, someone I trust told me that the Kentucky hoops team doctor had made a large wager on the team they were playing against early in the season. It was an easy W. But those are once-a-season situations, at best.

It is interesting that looking at things this way, what some people consider an edge, I'd call a crutch.

Agreed. We had long debates about why we should or should not load a truck with money and drive to Las Vegas. The bottom line is that we didn't trust the process of deciphering how certain anomalous outcomes (ear chewing, for one) would affect payouts. I remember a Tyson fight at the MGM that caused a riot because different sports books scored it differently and paid differently. It was the "cocoon of horror" fight, as I recall. I didn't attend, but I was in the MGM after the fight. Anyway, we thought there was a reasonable probability that the fight would have some kind of anomalous outcome.

Instead, it had the clear and obvious outcome. What stunned me was that the odds came down at the end. We thought the fight's opening odds would go up. We were dead wrong.

[Alan Mendelson]

According to this long term math that kewlj speaks about, we will all win the lottery if we live long enough.

[jbjb]

According to this long term math that kewlj speaks about, we will all win the lottery if we live long enough.

Sure. Problem is, you'll still be in the hole 99.9999999999999999999999999....% of the time!

[OneHitWonder]

According to this long term math that kewlj speaks about, we will all win the lottery if we live long enough.

Sure. Problem is, you'll still be in the hole 99.9999999999999999999999999....% of the time!

The most depressing thing about lotteries is when you have lost more than the bigger prizes to come. Even if you win, then you are still behind. But there is still the chance of the the biggest prizes, unless you're in the game hypothetically long enough to have already lost that much. So, you will always be in the hole because even the biggest winners have already lost it, or will lose it all back (in the continued attempt to win it all).

[Dan Druff]

Sportsbetting is only an AP play if it involves more than just selecting the game you think is going to win.

It's an AP play if you have found a way to do it where you have a legitimate edge.

Examples of this:

- Prop bets with wrongly set lines
- Betting based upon information the book does not have yet
- Taking advantage of stale lines which haven't been updated at a book, allowing you to bet both sides (at different books) and guarantee a profit

You can also be a winning sportsbettor by just being better at handicapping than the books (and enough to beat their juice), but that's not what would traditionally be referred to as an advantage play.

[Dan Druff]

In a non-sports context, here how you define an advantage play:

If I could do this play 1 billion times under identical conditions, would I be ahead or behind when it's all over?

If the answer is "Ahead", then it's an advantage play.

Otherwise it's not.

Advantage players don't always win. They sometimes lose due to bad luck, poor bankroll management, or failed application of the play (such as a VP player pr BJ card counter who makes too many mistakes).

But as long as you're playing with a statistical ADVANTAGE, and as long as you make a practice of doing this regularly, you are an AP.

[AxelWolf]

I think what people like Alan don't understand, you don't need billions, millions, hundreds of thousands, 10's of thousands or even thousands of hands/spins/games or whatever to see a profit from your advantage. It all depends on the situation and how you play it. There are some rare situations where you will see a guaranteed profit in just a few hands/spins/games or whatever(excluding some kind of outside interference). Nowadays, I generally try to avoid anything that takes hundreds of thousands or more to have a reasonable chance at being ahead.

You may very well need millions of hands/spins/games/whatever to get close to the exact expected value of something. That doesn't mean you won't make a profit long before that. It just won't be exactly what the math says it should be. You may make less or more than your EV. Some plays you lose on and some plays you make way over your EV.

If I have a 10% advantage on something, I don't really care if only make 7%. The next time I might make 20%++.

[Alan Mendelson]

The only thing I don't understand is where you find these advantage plays with a 10% edge?

Do card counters have this edge?
Do video poker players have this edge?
Do table game players who see exposed hole cards have this edge?

Where does this 10% edge come from and how do you know it's worth 10 percent?