Sports Betting Strategies for Beginners

SPORTS BETTING STRATEGIES FOR BEGINNERS Created by Diane Chambers

1 – START WITH SMALL BETS It takes a long time to learn how to beat the sports books. Of course, some gamblers pick up winning strategies faster than others, but there’s a learning curve for even the best sports bettors. You only have a limited amount of money you can use to bet on sports, so don’t make the mistake of betting too much per contest when you’re learning how to win.

2 – FOCUS ON A SMALL AREA Most sports bettors get started by betting on their favorite teams and betting on big games, like the super bowl or NCAA basketball tournament. I cover betting on your favorite teams in another section, but the mistake beginning sports bettors make when they bet on big games is they usually bet on something they don’t know a great deal about.

3 – MAKE MONEYLINE WAGERS Most sporting events have at least two different lines. One of the lines is an against the spread bet. An against the spread bet has a point spread, where one team gets points and the other team gives points. The other common type of betting line is a moneyline. With a moneyline wager, you just have to pick the team that wins the game to win the bet.

4 – UNDERSTAND HOME TEAM BIAS In sports of all kinds, the home team wins more than the visiting team. The exact percentages vary from sport to sport and from season to season, but you can see it across all sports. Most people know this from watching games, but few understand how this biases the sports betting public. You need to understand what home team bias is and how it can hurt your sports betting results.

5 – LINE SHOPPING IS PROFITABLE When you only have one choice when you want to bet on a sporting event you have decide which side of the bet is most likely to win. But when you have multiple choices of where to bet you can compare the lines offered at different places.

6 – DON’T BET ON YOUR FAVORITE TEAM The odds are good that the first bet you placed on a sporting event involved your favorite team. Many sports bettors continue betting on their favorite team because they root for the team and want to enjoy winning some money when their team wins.

7 – UNDERSTAND THE SPORTS BETTING PROFIT MODEL In order to make the best decisions when you bet on sports you need to understand how the sportsbooks make money. Once you understand how they make a profit, you can use this information to help you in your quest for profit.

8 – LEARN THE KEY POSITIONS BY SPORT In some sports certain positions are more important than others. Once you learn which positions are the most important you can spend more time evaluating players at those positions to improve your chances to win. In baseball, the starting pitchers for each team are the most important positions. This has been true since baseball was invented, but in recent years starting pitchers have been throwing fewer innings and the bullpen has been gaining in importance.

THANK YOU!