|
How
to Bet against the Point Spreads
by
Jim Campbell of Footballforecastor.com
Most
novice gamblers end up losing their proverbial shirts year in and
year out, most failures can be directly attributed to poor money
management practices but many more failures are also due to a
complete lack of knowledge with regard to how to handicap that
particular sport and the factors/situations that come into play
week in and week out.
First
of all a “Point Spread” is
defined as a number placed on an event for wagering purposes and
is often expressed in terms of the amount of points one side must
spot the other side as a means of evening the playing field for
both the favorite and underdog, in most cases a money-line is also
attached to the same event so that one may simply wager on either
the favorite or underdog to win without having to lay points, keep
in mind that its usually football and basketball games that have
point spreads.
If
there is only one bit of advice that you take from this article, I
hope it is this…Keep your eyes and ears open!! I bet you’re
wondering “huh” right about now aren’t you? When I say keep
your eyes and ears open I am referring to the radio, the TV, and
the local newspapers in your area, often local team beat writers
glean information from team players or team sources and use that
same information for their local radio or TV shows or for the
articles that they write for the local newspapers, this same
information can be very valuable to you as a gambler if you are
able to dissect what is important and what is not and then act
upon the important information before the rest of the world does,
this gives you what is referred to as an “edge”.
Get
in the habit of having the local sports talk shows on the radio
when you are driving or working at home on your computer, know
what time the local nightly sports show comes on television in
your area, pay special attention to the sports section of the
local newspaper each morning over coffee or breakfast. The idea is
to absorb as much information as you can through out the week and
prior to game time, know who is returning from an injury or who is
nursing a nagging knee or ankle injury that may slow them down,
know if there are any “cluster” injuries along the offensive
or defensive lines which can impact the upcoming game, know if
your local team is playing at home and if there are any possible
weather concerns.
The
point of the matter is that you have a wealth of information at
your fingertips with regard to the local college and professional
teams in your area and in most cases this information can be
accessed by you before the rest of the betting public learns about
it and you can use this to your advantage, by no means am I saying
to disregard the rest of the teams in the league and not care what
is going on with them, what I am saying is that if you want to
defeat the posted point spread you have to look for edges and
often an edge can be found by concentrating on local information
about local teams.
I
advocate using multiple “outs” for placing wagers as a means
of garnering the best possible point spread on any game you intend
wagering on, in this day and age a gambler has access to many off
shore sports books and it’s a good idea to utilize at least
three or four of these for line shopping purposes, but remember to
do your homework before simply signing up with just any off shore
sports book, most are reputable but some are not.
However
it is also a good idea to have a local book that you can place
wagers with for the express purpose of wagering against local
teams, remember that local teams are also generally popular teams
to wager on for the local run of the mill gamblers in your area,
meaning that you must usually lay a higher point spread number if
wagering on a local team thru a local book, thus the rule of thumb
is to use off shore books when wagering ON local teams but use
local books when wagering AGAINST local teams.
If
you want to defeat the point spread you have to remain ahead of
the proverbial curve, this means that you must out-work other
gamblers with regard to having and acting on information before
they do, I personally do a ton of off-season work and I recommend
that you do the same, for example, it’s a good idea to go over
each teams schedule as soon as it is released for the
upcoming season and finding potential bad spots for each
team.
By
bad spots in the schedule I mean taking note of the potential
pitfalls or scheduling quirks that might affect a teams
performance, for example, when a team is playing on the road for a
third straight week, or when a team has played two or three
straight divisional games and are in line to play a non conference
team next, or if a team is playing on a short week because they
just played on Monday night or if a team has been bouncing back
and forth from the east coast to the west coast or visa versa.
Know
in advance to the start of the new season by studying the schedule
if a team is revenge minded against another team for an
embarrassing loss or for knocking them out of the playoffs the
previous year, try to study and concentrate on historical data
from past divisional match ups, the reason is because divisional
teams face each other at least twice yearly which means that often
you can find a team that for one reason or another continues to
dominate another.
Know
in advance to the start of the new season what players a team lost
to free agency or trades and what players they added via the draft
and/or free agency and don’t forget to consider any coaching
changes, a complete turnover in coaching staffs is a hard thing to
overcome and often means that a team will struggle in the early
going of a new season because that team is still trying to learn a
new system.
The
astute gambler will then take all of the information he or she has
gathered during the off season and will prior to the start of the
new season make up a set of power ratings which are then updated
on a weekly basis once the regular season starts, a smart sports
gambler will have a set personal schedule that they adhere to once
the season is under way, keeping in mind that your off season work
has already pinpointed potential scheduling problems and you have
a set of power ratings in place, you can now use this information
to better evaluate the opening Monday morning lines for the next
week.
Monday
morning is also a good time to check the injury reports of each
team as well as advance weather reports for the upcoming
weekend’s slate of games, as the week progresses you want to
continue to monitor the posted point spread as well as the latest
injury and weather reports, if you have already isolated a contest
that has perceived value to you and that team is listed as the
favorite it is usually best to make your wager as soon as
possible, on the other hand if you like a doggie in a particular
contest its best to wait until almost game time to place your
wager.
The
reasoning has to do with the way “Joe Public” bettors wager,
which is usually on the listed favorite, by placing your wager
early in the week (if you like the favorite) you are locking in
your line before the general public has a chance to move the point
spread upward, on the flip side if you like the doggie you want
the public to drive the line upward so that you can get as many
points as possible.
I
could go on and on with this article but the end result would
resemble a book, hopefully you will take some of this advice to
heart, the one item that I did not touch on in this article but is
probably the most important aspect of gambling is money
management, without some sort of game plan with regard to
protecting your bankroll you will surely lose your shirt and not
be around placing wagers at seasons end.
Please
refer to another article that I have already written simply
entitled “Money Management”, the article explains in detail
the system that I personally utilize as a means of protecting my
bankroll over the course of a long season, one last bit of advise,
remember that the betting public is generally wrong which is the
reason Las Vegas is still standing, meaning that you should do
your homework and follow your instincts and not those of the
talking heads in the media or those of your drinking buddies.
One
of the nations most prolific handicappers is Jim Campbell who can
be found at www.footballforecastor.com,
he once again showed his expertise by finishing the 2005-2006
college football season with an overall amazing and eye opening
mark of 49-32-1 ATS for a winning rate of 60.49%
which includes a record of 9-4 ATS with his College Bowl
selections and also includes his winning selection of Texas over
USC in the BCS National Championship Game, that winning result on
Texas means that Jim Campbell has now correctly picked the point
spread winner in the past EIGHT straight College
National Championship games.
Our goal here at www.footballforecastor.com
is to hit the 60% win mark year in and year out with our NFL and
college football selections, in the big picture few handicappers
are able to achieve this lofty goal on a consistent basis. I shake
my head in wonderment on how they get away with such outrageous
claims when I see the Saturday morning scam-you-cappers on TV or
in the advertisements listed in the USA Today newspaper touting
win percentages of 75% or 80% over the course of a season.
The simple truth is that only the
very best handicappers consistently produce seasonal results that
fall within the 55% to 60% range much like we do here at
footballforecastor.com year in and year out, my advise to all new
clients is to use extreme discipline in the amount of games you
wager on each week, you must also adhere to good money management
techniques in order to get through the peaks and valleys of a long
season.
|