Betting Beyond Baseball
By Bodog.com
Are you an inveterate seamhead? Does the end of baseball season leave you a little empty inside? You?re not alone. Baseball may be No. 3 on the online sports gambling scene, but that?s like saying George Harrison was the third most important Beatle. We?re still talking about millions of fans in either case. For some people, MLB is the only league they follow ? and it?s easy to get absorbed when you?re hitting the pay window as often as the sharper fans who bet on baseball.
But what if you don?t want to stop making money just because it?s November? There are other sports out there, each with something to offer in terms of betting value and entertainment value. You?re not likely to rake in as much cash betting outside your area of expertise, but you can still pull in a profit by applying many of the same strategies to these other sports that you would use to handicap baseball.
From a pure earnings perspective, college basketball is the next best thing to baseball on the sports betting calendar. There are 350 NCAA teams in Division I basketball, and about 250 of those teams draw enough action that betting lines get posted for all of their games. That?s 250 different betting options for you to consider. Most of those programs you probably don?t know, like the South Alabama Jaguars or the Centenary Gentlemen. But that?s okay ? how many people really know anything about the San Diego Padres? Small-market teams are just as ripe for the picking in college hoops.
Basketball is also a very friendly sport for the statistically minded. Dedicated fans have taken sabermetrics and applied them to hoops ? APBRmetrics are the result, with APBR standing for the Association for Professional Basketball Research. These statistics have been compiled religiously year after year by people like Ken Pomeroy, whose website is an absolute must-have in your bookmarks. In about 15 seconds, you can arm yourself with the knowledge that Centenary was one of the poorest defensive teams ? and one of the shortest ? in Division I last year.
The NBA is limited to 30 teams, just like the major leagues, but you can still find value in small market clubs like the New Orleans Hornets, who started the season on fire at 6-0 SU and ATS. That?s short for ?Straight Up? and ?Against The Spread? in your betting glossary. You can use the moneyline to bet on the NBA, but most bettors prefer the pointspread format. It?s similar to the run line in baseball, but instead of spotting a team 1.5 runs, the book will generally set the spread at however many points it takes to balance out the action on both sides. Here?s an example from Monday?s NBA schedule:
Boston Celtics +3
Dallas Mavericks ?3
If you were playing the moneyline for this game, you would have taken the Mavericks at ?150 or the visiting Celtics at +130. But with a standard pointspread, the juice is ?110 for either team. Sometimes the book will fine tune the juice to ?105 on one side and ?115 on the other, rather than move the spread a half-point. Either way, these lines are prone to move as game time approaches, so shop with the same discerning eye that you use for baseball.
The pointspread bet is also the standard piece of business in football, and football is by far the most popular gambling sport in North America. But we?re mentioning it second here because it?s a more competitive market. A sharp college hoops handicapper can realistically aim for a 60-percent success rate and be happy; in college football and especially the NFL, anything above 55 percent is a worthy goal. The break-even point when paying the standard ?110 juice is 52.4 percent.
Advanced football stats are a step behind those in basketball when it comes to predictive power, but they?re still a step in the right direction. Football Outsiders is the leading website for both pro and college stats ? think of it as the football equivalent of Baseball Prospectus or The Hardball Times. And of course, we?ve got a world of betting information and analysis right here at Bodog Sports. Whatever your sport of choice, the more you know, the more your bankroll will grow.
By Bodog.com
Are you an inveterate seamhead? Does the end of baseball season leave you a little empty inside? You?re not alone. Baseball may be No. 3 on the online sports gambling scene, but that?s like saying George Harrison was the third most important Beatle. We?re still talking about millions of fans in either case. For some people, MLB is the only league they follow ? and it?s easy to get absorbed when you?re hitting the pay window as often as the sharper fans who bet on baseball.
But what if you don?t want to stop making money just because it?s November? There are other sports out there, each with something to offer in terms of betting value and entertainment value. You?re not likely to rake in as much cash betting outside your area of expertise, but you can still pull in a profit by applying many of the same strategies to these other sports that you would use to handicap baseball.
From a pure earnings perspective, college basketball is the next best thing to baseball on the sports betting calendar. There are 350 NCAA teams in Division I basketball, and about 250 of those teams draw enough action that betting lines get posted for all of their games. That?s 250 different betting options for you to consider. Most of those programs you probably don?t know, like the South Alabama Jaguars or the Centenary Gentlemen. But that?s okay ? how many people really know anything about the San Diego Padres? Small-market teams are just as ripe for the picking in college hoops.
Basketball is also a very friendly sport for the statistically minded. Dedicated fans have taken sabermetrics and applied them to hoops ? APBRmetrics are the result, with APBR standing for the Association for Professional Basketball Research. These statistics have been compiled religiously year after year by people like Ken Pomeroy, whose website is an absolute must-have in your bookmarks. In about 15 seconds, you can arm yourself with the knowledge that Centenary was one of the poorest defensive teams ? and one of the shortest ? in Division I last year.
The NBA is limited to 30 teams, just like the major leagues, but you can still find value in small market clubs like the New Orleans Hornets, who started the season on fire at 6-0 SU and ATS. That?s short for ?Straight Up? and ?Against The Spread? in your betting glossary. You can use the moneyline to bet on the NBA, but most bettors prefer the pointspread format. It?s similar to the run line in baseball, but instead of spotting a team 1.5 runs, the book will generally set the spread at however many points it takes to balance out the action on both sides. Here?s an example from Monday?s NBA schedule:
Boston Celtics +3
Dallas Mavericks ?3
If you were playing the moneyline for this game, you would have taken the Mavericks at ?150 or the visiting Celtics at +130. But with a standard pointspread, the juice is ?110 for either team. Sometimes the book will fine tune the juice to ?105 on one side and ?115 on the other, rather than move the spread a half-point. Either way, these lines are prone to move as game time approaches, so shop with the same discerning eye that you use for baseball.
The pointspread bet is also the standard piece of business in football, and football is by far the most popular gambling sport in North America. But we?re mentioning it second here because it?s a more competitive market. A sharp college hoops handicapper can realistically aim for a 60-percent success rate and be happy; in college football and especially the NFL, anything above 55 percent is a worthy goal. The break-even point when paying the standard ?110 juice is 52.4 percent.
Advanced football stats are a step behind those in basketball when it comes to predictive power, but they?re still a step in the right direction. Football Outsiders is the leading website for both pro and college stats ? think of it as the football equivalent of Baseball Prospectus or The Hardball Times. And of course, we?ve got a world of betting information and analysis right here at Bodog Sports. Whatever your sport of choice, the more you know, the more your bankroll will grow.
