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bet footballAs the NFL season prepares to kick off, we look at the resources available to the smart football bettor.
If time is money to you and you'd rather spend your time making money than reading this article through to its conclusion, I'll sum things up in a single word for you: Sasquatch!! Just kidding...it's actually "INTERNET". For everyone still reading, here's the detailed scoop:
Before the days of the World Wide Web, bettors lived in isolation. People would get together in bars (well, my friends and I were in the parking lot at the local high school... the only place we could hang out until we hit the magic "18") or cafeterias, lunchrooms and diners, comparing notes on the upcoming weekend games. You'd read the newspaper, and if you were lucky you got ESPN or something like it. Maybe grab a magazine. That, friends, was it.
The utterly devoted were always looking for edges. I'm reminded of an older friend scouring Logan Airport in Boston for out-of-town sports sections of newspapers before he caught his flight home for weekends. Now and then he'd find crumpled papers that let him read what the beat writers in other cities said about their teams. If he won big the week before, he'd blow $5 at the airport kiosk on whole, brand new papers.
Another guy I knew was trying to develop a primitive form of power rating on his computer, a Radio Shack machine he affectionately called his "Trash 80".
Today these people would just seem a little quaint. The Internet and new, sophisticated spreadsheets can do all this work for us. Check out the following:
MEDIA PAGES
Almost every major newspaper in the US has gone online. Further there are collected lists of links of online addresses (BWORLD has such at list...it's at "The Newsstand" off Handicapping Central which is off the front page). Here, in an hour or two, you can read what every beat writer is saying about every team. No lurking around airports either!
There are also many good sites that cover the NFL as a whole. The NFL's official website, nfl , has official injury lists as they become available – but don't expect a weekly column from Mr. Tagliabue saying he "really likes the Eagles plus the points this week". The NFL still officially dislikes gambling, even if that's the reason the TV ratings are so high.
DEVOTED NETWORK PAGES
Of somewhat more use are the dedicated NFL pages off the main pages of the networks that carry the NFL. The best is espn , but foxsports and cbssportsline are also good. ABC, which only covers Monday Night Football and a couple wildcard games, has a ho-hum information site of its own off ESPN.
Where ABC is the equal or the better of its rivals is in its college coverage, particularly in relation to any team with even a remote shot at appearing in a BCS game. ABC "owns" the BCS for the next while, and they cover, in depth, the games for all the marbles (well, last year, it was for all the Tostitos). Find it off abcsports . Fox isn't involved in broadcasting the college game nationally at all.
HANDICAPPING PAGES AND FORUMS
Better still are the web pages devoted to winning money at betting football. These of course vary widely in quality-- from the joker who's eating up perfectly good bandwidth that rightfully belongs to fans of the TV show "Webster", to top notch handicappers and handicapping forums.
BWORLD's "Handicapping Central", "Bookies Hell" posting forum, is a great places to look for all the dirt. These information pages and forums, and pages and forums like them elsewhere, are great resources for overall betting strategy (which we'll start discussing next week) and specific info on specific games.
As with anything else on the Internet, be careful about evaluating the information you read. Like picking stocks or forecasting the weather, nobody's right all the time...and some handicappers are far superior to others. (If you think somebody knows his stuff, track his picks.) Even in the better forums, thanks to the democracy that is the Internet, each season without fail a few schmucks will appear and promise to hit 65%, 70%, 80% of their picks against the spread. Well, you know how in "Romeo and Juliet", amongst all the killing and warring, the minstrels or the wet-nurse and Mercutio would show up intermittently to lighten the mood and give everyone a few laughs? Well, this is sort of the same deal. Nobody hits 80% consistently, period.
Which brings us to a related matter: We'll discuss this in-depth later, but for now just take my word for it: DON'T pay for picks. Some pages and many phone services require a fee to get their "information". Leave these scamdicappers to feast on suckers...don't you become one! (There are a few "touts" who do try hard for their clients; there are a few that are not crooks. I respect a couple, but these folks are few and far between.)
ANY OTHER IDEAS?
Well, I do have one non-Internet (but somewhat technological) one that melds nicely with the "guys just sitting around comparing notes" theme:
A group of friends I know have invested in expanded college FB coverage and "NFL Sunday Ticket". Each armed with two VCR's (some are top-loading, 40-pound stone-age machines), they divvy up bunches of games to tape. They then watch and analyze the games on Tues./Wed nights. With remote clicker in hand ready to hit fast-forward between plays, the boys can watch a whole NFL game in 40-50 minutes and a college game in 45-60 minutes...less if it's a blowout and the first string leaves.
This whole exercise lets them see, with their own eyes, if a team really did stuff the run last weekend or the other team just chose (or was forced) to be pass-happy. Is the O-line that good or was the defense always dropping eight guys into coverage? These guys know.
(Incidentally, these lads hit 61% in 1996, 53% in 1997, and 59% in 1998...enough to pay the TV bill, buy a drink on Thursdays after making the upcoming week's picks, and take their strangely understanding spouses out to dinner on Fridays.)
ONE FINAL ITEM..."THE SCREEN"
Maybe you've seen the ads on this site or elsewhere for the Don Best Line Service screen. What is this thing, and do you want it?
The Don Best Feed gives your computer live line updates from sportsbooks in Las Vegas, the Caribbean, and Central America. The premium service costs $500 US/mo. While the scaled-back "Island Express" service, which features fewer books, is $99/mo.
This lets you compare odds on the same game at different shops at a quick glance. Like the Giants this weekend and see that WWTS has them at -2.5 where everyone else has them at -3? I know where you're betting! (To take advantage of this, obviously you need accounts at as many of the screen books as you can get.)
It also lets you watch lines move as big action ("steam") on a single game hits the books within a short time period. This is most dramatic in baseball and in hoops totals, a little less so in hoops sides and in college FB, and least in the NFL. But you don't even need accounts at the screen shops to cash in on this:
Suppose you opened this morning's paper, reviewed the lines, and liked the Cornhuskers this Saturday at -2, and you've got a local guy that lets you bet the newspaper line. Well, if you see the line go from 2 to 2.5 to 3 to 3.5 at every shop on Don Best this afternoon, you better get that bet in TODAY before tomorrow's paper shows it to be 3, 3.5, or even 4 points.
Is the steam always "right"? Of course not. Sure, maybe the Cornhuskers will win by 14. They could lose by 7. But in the instance they won by 3, you cashed in largely because of the screen. Similarly, even though you like a team, you could watch the steam come down on the other team–so you'd know to let things settle down before you bet to get the best line possible.
[Check out the Oddswiz Rants & Raves forum and do a search for more detailed discussion of steam. I could go on about it for pages. Weather at ball yards in the first half of ‘99, for instance, was "steamyIn the 21st Century, long hours and hard work have gone out the windows and everybody is looking for the get-rich-quick scheme. Slot machines have taken over casinos and lottery tickets are selling at the highest rate ever. People are hoping against hope that they will be the one-in-a-billion person to beat the system and wind up with a boatload of money. Parlays fit this mold, as they allow people to invest a minimal amount of money with the chance of a huge payday if they can correctly pick a certain number of winners without any losers. The problem is that one loss is all that it takes to kill a fine looking parlay card. The following examines the best ways to beat the books playing parlays.
Sign-up with Bodog Sportsbook today and earn a 10% cash bonus on your first deposit with no maximum limitClick Here One does not need to say any more then what is better to play, straight bets or parlays. The following chart should answer that question for you.
# of plays Standard Odds True Odds 2 plays 13-5 3-1 3 plays 6-1 7-1 4 plays 10-1 15-1 5 plays 20-1 31-1 6 plays 40-1 63-1 7 plays 80-1 127-1
As one can see playing each game individually would result in a greater profit for the gambler. But this is not always an option, as games may be going on at the same time and one does not have the ability of reinvesting the money. The keys to look for in winning a parlay card are as follows.
1) Bet more and keep the teams low. I recommend keeping parlays to 2, 3, or 4 teams. If you go over four teams the advantage shirts greatly to the house, as they hold all of the advantage. Instead of playing a 5-team parlay for $10, play a 3-team parlay for $30. More often then not, you will be happier and winning more.
2) Check the rules of the parlay. Offshore is the best place to play a parlay, as the majority of books push down on all ties. Local parlay cards that can be found at most sports bars do not offer the same benefits. Some allow for one tie, while other cards consider a tie a loss. With the accuracy of the Las Vegas lines, these are great disadvantages to the gambler and need to be avoided if at all possible. If you play cards with this type of format, do your homework when making selections. Avoid selecting a team where the line is 3, since this number decides most football games. Try and select games where the spread has a ½ involved, as this will guarantee you a win or a loss.
3) Hedge your bet whenever possible for large parlays. Say one had an outstanding weekend in football and has hit six selections of your seven-team parlay with the only remaining game taking place on Monday night. One invested $10, and has a chance to win $800 if the Monday night goes as planned. I would take the suspense out of the Monday night game and make a side bet of $418 on the other side. This will guarantee you a profit of $392 if you hit your 7-team parlay. If you would happen to lose the game, you would collect $380 on your side bet. This is the smart move, as you are ensuring yourself a substantial profit and can just enjoy Monday Night Football. However, this should only be applied when you are one game away from winning the parlay, as the odds decrease when you have two or more games left to win.
These are the techniques that I would recommend when betting parlays. Parlays are a fun way to get started in this form of gambling, as they allow one to keep the amount risked low. Unfortunately, one will suffer more losing day then winning days when betting parlays. 's is your place for consistent winners, as we have been in the sports information business for over 35 years. Right here every day you will find free picks in all sports including; NCAA & NFL Football, MLB Baseball, NCAA & NBAHow to win at sports betting-- Step #1: learn what matters
"To uncover the secrets of NFL betting success, TwoMinuteWarning has correlated teams' statistics in key categories with their overall records." -- New York Times (Nov. 28th, 2004)
Obviously the majority of people who bet on sports lose money in the long term. This however is a reflection of too much betting being done without any 'due diligence.' In other words, bets are made without any understanding of what actually determines winning and losing in a given sport. To overcome the vigorish on a bet (typically laying 11 to win 10) you must be:
- informed about the gambling realities of your sport (for us, NFL football)- have handicapping tools with proven predictive value for sports betting- use a disciplined money management approach
You may think because you follow football and know the names of NFL players that you can win at sports betting. This unfortunately is a common mistake. Being a fan and being a successful sports gambler are two different things. On the other hand, if you do research into what wins, you find methods like these:
using the NFL injury report to pick winners (64% lifetime record)
betting underdogs with a Drive Chart stats overlay (62%)
'Full Story' game simulations (61%)
Falcon Past Performance Sheets (64% in testing)
...and that's just for starters. We constantly publish new research into winning sports betting methods. At TwoMinuteWarning we encourage you to learn how to handicap. People who make their own sports betting picks, whether for NFL football, baseball, basketball, or whatever, will derive more enjoyment and satisfaction out of the activity, and frequently be more successful than if they simply follow a random tout's overly hyped picks.
Step #2: find the true experts and listen to their advice
Of course, many people don't want to put in the effort to learn how to handicap games themselves. If you fall into this camp but still intend to be sports betting this season, then we strongly urge you to consider turning to the best source for sports betting picks.
Forecasting the outcome of NFL football games is a demanding task, requiring intensive statistical analysis that covers a wide range of factors. Injuries, motivation, efficiency on a play by play basis, drive success rates, trends, red zone performance...you name it and we've researched whether it has any bearing on making wise NFL wagers.
Our subscriber content is designed to provide a comprehensive take on the upcoming games, allowing users to both come to their own conclusions as well as rely on our group of experts to find the true sports betting opportunities available against the current lines.