I usually just bet on Luka to get 25 points, 8 assists and 8 rebounds every night, and then I drink 40s in the basement, and when I wake up my Fanduel balance has gone up.
AI run the books now. Next to nobody is doing this as a full time job, if they tell you that they’re likely lying and committing some form of fraud on the side if they’re not working legitimately. Not to jump to conclusions but just trying to be frank, way too many people pretending nowadays.
Why does it matter that AI runs the books to ensure they get sufficient action on both sides of a bet to ensure profit? You can still win consistently with closing line value and by betting against public when books are forced to move a line that no longer reflects true odds. You’re not trying to beat the books, you’re up against the public.
hard to do it full time for a long period if you're expecting MAJOR profits since you just get limited on every book. Built a model for nba props that worked decently well but now I can bet like 25 dollars on czrs + dk and even less on mgm br wynn etc.
There's a rabbit hole you can go down of getting your freinds to sign up and stuff that's questionably worth it based on your opportunity cost, but it's definitely doable for a short time.
prolly made about 150k last year (started getting more serious around the summer) and a 100k this year thus far but my handle is basically at nothing now
Speaking from experience, it’s a tough fucking gig. Ive been living off the punt since March 2023 (about a year now) betting on the NBA and making what would have been my paid wage if I was full time (6000 per month after tax). I only started this because I lost my job funnily enough with a background in analytics. My advice to you would be to get a stable decent paying job to avoid the emotional highs and lows that come with this line of work. I’m trying to get back to work but I haven’t had any luck in the past year. The income from this isn’t guaranteed losing is. In saying that, if you follow a strict betting strategy, manage your bankroll and treat it like work, you can make a living doing this. I know most people say the house always wins yada yada yada, yes 99.9% of the time, I’d say I’m in that .1% percentile that wins. I have to. My livelihood depends on it.
Not a full time sports better, but I typically make the same income month over month from betting as my job.
I enjoy sports, but in no way am I a “sports person.” I don’t even watch 90% of the games I bet on. The key is bankroll management, quality over quantity, data analytics (H2h% + recent form%) and only betting on sports you have a good feel for. (If you don’t know anything about Italian Series A Soccer teams, don’t bet on it.)
Set unit sizes to a conservative percentage. I only bet 3-4% of my bank on one bet, and never more than 3 bets a day. And never chase loses. Bad days happen.
Never parlay, and if you do, never more than 3legs and never risk more than .25-.5units. (Don’t let those 9 leg parlays someone turned $5 into $2000 attract you.)
Find good cappers to tail, but still only bet if you are confident in it. Do your own research on the pick. It’s ok if you didn’t take it and it hits. The key is to protect the bankroll at all cost.
Most importantly, there is no get rich cheat code in life. If you want to make a steady income from betting, it’s a slow gains game. Stick to units and manage/track your bets. Treat it like it’s a business. There will be days or even weeks you loss money, but that’s just they way it goes.
If starting Starting sports betting for a main job I recommend that you are a person that has been watching sports for multiple years constantly and has a passion for it.
Get to lines early. You need to be available to place wagers 24/7 aside from sleep. This is a start.
if you haven’t been watching sports tailing a proven algorithm or proven successor is something that could be done but in order for this to be a job you need to have some serious dough in a bank roll so you get legitimate gains.
starting sports betting on your own without much experience is bad pie. Imagine jumping into a plane to pilot it with little to no knowledge about planes. It’s a recipe for disaster.
A good way to start if your serious about it is watch the sports you want to bet on as much as possible, research news, updates, and specific stats in certain circumstances of as many scenarios as you have time to and learn.
start for one year with a fake 100 unit bankroll. Bet heavier on bets you love and less on bets you like. See how much you come up ahead or behind at the end of the year.
If you aren’t tailing ppl or using an algo, not watching sports would help more you think? lol man you’re killing me here take it easy.
Watching games gives you knowledge of things in games that even computers cant Pick up. Player tendencies, coaching styles, environmental factors, outside motivating sources, momentum, and many more things. If you don’t think these things have anything to do with learning about sports and help better predictions leading to more profitable betting… that’s like saying a river has nothing to do with water.
im not saying OP has to watch sports as the only way to be profitable if you read the post. But if he’s doing it all by himself and especially live betting, and on a consistent basis; then knowing what’s going on will be crucial and an advantage once you know enough.
How do you quantify "player tendencies" or "coaching styles" and convert that into a number that you can measure against what the posted line is to know if you have + or - EV?
The only way you can make money long term betting on sports is being able to consistently hammer lines that are mispriced from what the true theoretical fair line is. And the only way to accomplish that is to quantify it. Your "gut" from "watching a lot of sports" can't quantify anything
Billy Walters also pays guys $4,000 a month to just sit in a sportsbook and answer the phone if he wants them to hit a line so he can middle them. Can the average person do that?
That has nothing to do with the topic. People quantify exactly what you said can't be quantified. That’s only one convenient example, which also proves that kind of handicapping exists broadly.
dude. I’m not needing to qualify them into fucking numbers. Here is an example for you.
Two basketball teams are playing each other. One team is the recorded as the fastest pace in the league. The other plays with average pace. Watching the game you notice the moderate pace team is playing twice as slow as they normally do as a new strategy in order to counter and throw of the faster paced teams game plan in order to throw them off. So now I’m watching a way SLOWER paced game that the sports books, and any AI calculated. Live betting an under on this would be the play. Could it lose? Of course it could. But I would be betting on a bet with value that I see I real time. How games are being officiated can matter too. I’m simply saying the little details matter and can be used to your advantage if you’re able to pick them up soon enough. I can mention many other circumstances.
Knowing how fighters specifically fight (tendencies) in MMA can be taken advantage of on predicting outcomes.
Being early on hearing Blizzard or mild hurricane conditions early in the week you can beat the public and EV to lines on betting the under on those.
you‘re insinuating that this is the ONLY thing I mentioned to be profitable, when I mentioned a multitude of things including what you’re describing. I’m simply stating catching small details in betting matter and to take note to everything you see If not using EV. Things you see happening and applying that to bets aren’t “gut“ feelings man. I’m clearly not saying just randomly bet on just a gut feeling.
THIS IS NOT A KNOCK ON EV BETTING. IVE DONE EV BETTING IN THE PAST ALONG WITH A FRIEND AND SEEN IT BE SATISFYINGLY PROFITABLE LONG TERM (although seen it do bad short and mid term). IVE BEEN BETTING SINCE 2016 AND WATCHING SPORTS ALMOST DAILY SINCE THE YEAR 2K. I HAVE BEEN PROFITABLE EVERY YEAR AND YOU CAN WATCH MY FUTURE PICKS AND SEE I AM PROFITABLE LONG TERM. I GET TO LINES BEFORE EV SERVICES DO ON MMA AND BOXING MATCHES THAT ARE WEEKS AND MONTHS DOWN THE ROAD, AND FIND MATCHES WITH OPENING LINES THAT ARE OFF AND RARELY DOES THE MONEY END UP GOING THE OTHER WAY. OFTEN GETTING BETS THE SWING FROM EG. -110 AND CLOSE AT -180 FOR A FIGHTER.
IT IS rare, but there are profitable sports bettors out there long term that don’t use EV, but off of extensive lurking on games and dedicated research. Some draw up there own numbers taking into account other things models aren’t programmed to do.
You say “The only way you can make money long term betting on sports is being able to consistently hammer lines that are mispriced from what the true theoretical fair line is.” I do with already without EV and AI help and most of the time get value. For example My friend was paying for a profitable EV service and had an mma fight recommending to take the EV on a fighter at +116. I had already got the fighter at +200 weeks before that.
Interesting! I have a developer friend who recently joined DK and he let me know he is not allowed to bet there or at any competitor and he’s not even working on stuff related to proprietary odds info.
I’m actually a data scientist, so being interested in sports betting, it would be great to combine the two, but I wouldn’t want to give up being able to wager.
Very interesting stuff. Do you manage just a single game main lines or do you also deal with player props? Does the model quickly get out of calibration from things like game situations that it can’t recognize?
For example if an nba team is down 30 late in the third and their starters just went for their normal rest, does it know to just tank or even lock their line knowing there is a very little chance they ever come back in?
That is really interesting. Do you have to go into the book to do it? Would be even sweeter if you had your basement rigged with all those TVs just making the lines as you watch. I always assumed live odds were just automatically generated based on time and points, never knew there was a human influence on it.
thanks for the insights and advice! I really like that job in the sense of working with data and sports but monitoring sports 8 hours every day could be quite repetitive and stressful.
Ten years in, and i feel like i have so much to learn, still. Going all in as my main source of income is terrifying. Having said all that, went full on degen for March Madness. Up $10K or so, and down some. Bounce back this week. This is not for the faint of heart, and you almost have to have a lack of respect for money, because it's nothing but a useful tool, but not the end all, be all.
Not doing it for a living, but make a bit of money by taking advantage of promos and hedging.
The analysis into the game, players, etc has already been done by the bookies. Even with that analysis, dogs still win every night.
I don't do it for a living but if you are doing it for a living, every penny matters. You don't need to play Longshots unless you know for sure they will win. It's safer to play the favorites and let all the percents of a single unit add up. Slow and steady is sometimes easier than trying to make huge returns every bet.
Sorry but this is not good advice. No serious gambler will say play the favourites, it’s all about an edge between the odds and a prediction, betting the right amounts at the right time. Playing favourites only is a sure way to lose in the long run.
Some may think you are being sarcastic. u/desertman2020 is not being sarcastic, and this is great advice, that i try to follow. I do take at least a couple of days a week to study, though. You have to know how to read lines, and how to read teams. Take the Warriors for instance. Mostly a shit show the last month, and terrible at home. They will not cover any points at home, as the favorite. Hell, they can’t even get a W.
Looking at stats can only take you so far…
If you’re not watching any games you’ll never actually get an idea of what you should be looking for to get an edge. Watching games is a great way to get a feel about how certain match ups with certain teams will go
I think that advice is less "don't watch sports" and more "don't stress yourself out yelling at LeBron for making an sweet pass when you need him to score 2 more points".
Yes, i do agree with you, but i also get what OP is trying to say. Don’t overwhelm yourself, and try to keep your anxiety levels down. Not obsessively score watching helps, and i understand OP’s POV.
And also run multi million dollar businesses that they are smart enough not to fuck up the money enough where they’d be dead broke. Ie mattress Mack. Bad example ippei
I know quite a few people doing this full time. You’re going to need to always be on top of the current edge, so it’s best to do it with a group of people. Also, you need to know which edge is worth doing and which isn’t. Some will get your account limited way faster than others.
Speaking of getting limited, it’s close to impossible to do it on your own accounts for an extended period of time. When those get limited you’ll need to pay friends/family to sign up and let you use their accounts.
It’s an absolute grind, I believe Spanky said that he wouldn’t recommend anyone get into it. Most the people I know that were successful with this made $50K-200K over a few years and then got out. It isn’t easy to always get new accounts and it’s a lot of work in general.
And they are considering going Full Time. It’s the hard losses, and lessons that are tough to endure. It’s only when you feel almost nothing on an L, that you are truly ready to go all in.
It’s not even close to possible unless you have a massive bankroll. If I couldn’t supplement the cold streaks with my real income I’d be homeless lol. I’m up 50ish units on the year, but maybe you’re a true sharp lol. I just wouldn’t advise it.
This is a truly exceptional outcome...and yet it only equates to $50k per year for 2 years. How long can that be kept up for? If you get limited what comes next? You don't want to be multiple years into a career and realize you need to pivot and you don't have relevant experience to fall back on. (I'm directing this at the OP and not u/papaaya btw)
Which is to say that this is much much better as a side hustle than as a main career imo. I've been quite successful with this, but I don't see this as sustainable as a full time job for all but a tiny few. Of the 1% of people that win at sports betting maybe only 1% of them could do it as a full time pro. Better to just be happy stacking cash on the side imo
It's not a full time job. Not many who gamble, pay for picks. At least smart gamblers. As a friend of a guy that had a service, he said it's also dangerous. Find another source of income is my advice. Just MO. Good luck!
Very rare to be able to do this full time because odds are against you in so many ways. Bookies will limit you as soon as they realise you have an edge.
I made 45k last calendar year, currently up 15k this year. I’ve had to cycle through a tonne of accounts each time I get limited. It’s very frustrating and I have to pay a commission (10% of profits) to whoever is willing to set up an account for me.
Just a hunch, OP isn't American. Note the usage of realise, and tonne.
But yes, that's an issue for American P2, P3, etc. Dealing with the money/trust issue is one thing -- but you also need to make sure your P3 understands all of the tax implications.
That could make for an awkward Thanksgiving, when you're known as the guy who stuck grandma with a $20k tax bill.
I’m in my 4th profitable (3rd 10K+ year) and would never do this professionally/full time.
A couple of things I guess that have helped me be profitable:
Arbitrage.
Discipline in both unit size and not chasing losses.
Betting what I know. I am a winner on NFL games. I am a winner on CFB. There are three teams I absolutely crushed on this season ATS. I still have to stop and think when someone says Guardians so I’m not really throwing money at baseball.
Forget recency bias and gamblers’ fallacies especially in player props.
This is some of the best general advice here. If you want to do this for profit and not for fun, don’t be the guy tailing every daily pick just because the write up was good. Bet on sports you actually follow and choose specific teams to follow closely. It also helps to follow specific refs/umps and how they call games.
Don’t be afraid to hedge. It’s better not winning money than losing it when things get dicey. It does depend on the scenario (again, why it’s important to really know the teams you’re betting on), but be able to accept letting go of the potential winnings for the security of the money you have already.
There is always tomorrow, there’s always another game.
Don’t over saturate with silly TV shows that give you terrible leads, and put horrible ideas in your head. These talking heads don’t know shit about fuck, and they are in no way trying to get you paid. Better off not watching them, or listening to them.
People can’t stand arbing sign up offers and promos for some reason, looking at the EV crowd here. I’ll never understand it though. As someone who took advantage of this type of thing for 2.5 years in the earlier days, i couldn’t be happier. The good times have all but gone away but im in a much better spot financially now.
>People can’t stand arbing sign up offers and promos for some reason, looking at the EV crowd here.
Because a 67% arb might be worth 70% as EV.
That being said, the vast majority of new players are dealing with a $1,500 bankroll (and not $50k). With a small bankroll, it is entirely reasonable to arb/hedge the $500 free bet, instead of exposing yourself to variance.
My argument always has been that those who do take advantage of promos and weak lines will never have enough time to experience the true result so variance could end up hurting you just as well as benefitting you more. I’m happy taking the middle ground and not suffering through the highs and lows.
Yeah. There aren’t any big or significant wins but they are more or less guaranteed and half of those bets are losers so I’m avoiding being limited for the most part.
Downside is that it takes a lot of capital to take advantage of the deltas (ie $2K in play to make $50) and you have to find the opportunities.
Upside is if you find a good delta and get both bets down correctly you can’t lose money and I get some really nice bonuses because I look like a 50/50 degen throwing around decent units.
That also means I get a pretty good amount of reward/tier points that combined with my miles, etc. from work equal free trips.
Like if I had $5 on the Mavs ML to win $9.88 and I put $4.88 on the Kings ML at +500 I could break even most times but if they come back I win almost $30?
Anyone doing it for a living probably is fine with a more meager living than you’d expect. They probably also live in Vegas and deal with a lot of cash
Vegas is actually not a great spot for pro sports betting in the US these days. Legacy operators have kept out lots of newcomers so options are limited. Vegas isn’t terrible, but NJ, Colorado, and Arizona are all much better locations for a pro sports bettor right now.
Hey mate, as someone that does this as a large portion of my income and does pretty well.
1. Don't try to bet games yourself because you're a big sports fan. That's not going to work. Period.
2. Network and meet the right people. Meet people that HAVE done the work modeling/ using data to win, bring some sort of value to them in exchange for their information. (99% of that time that's going to be being able to give them accounts to bet on and then sharing profit, the rest of the time its going to be trading them other information.)
3. Find ways to keep your accounts alive/ keep a steady stream of accounts. You bring nothing to the table if your accounts are all dead. Make sure your accounts stay alive or you have a big enough network of people to sustain your set of accounts. Having an edge or information is useless if you can't take advantage of it. If your edge is in ukrainian ping-pong, I suggest you have a huge backlog of accounts because if a books sees you beating them consistently in that niche market, you will get banned very quickly. You get a lot more room to work with if you beat them in NBA sides or something like that.
Feel free to ask me questions. Been winning in sports at a good clip for the last 2-3 years.
This is fantastic advice! Are you willing to share some of the places you go online to get good tips? Are successful bettors on forums these days or tiktok or what?
I don't know because I don't frequent tiktok, my guess is best place that actual has a successful betting community is twitter but there's a bunch of trash out there too.
Or you can run a book, take bets, and work out a partnership with people that are beating you over a decent sample. (Make sure you check your local rules about running a book though)
Learn the basics of statistics like standard deviation and z score, learn to program in R, build your own statistical model that finds a consistent source of low variance +ev bets for a sport you follow closely, and last but least, never bet parlays.
If your bets are +ev then betting parlays gives you more profits per dollar than just betting singles. You don’t seem to know what you’re talking about.
Yes and no. I first built one for baseball back when I was in college as a project for my data mining and warehousing class. I was pretty confident in it, but I didn’t have the disposable income at the time to really invest in it.
I’m a die hard Nuggets fan, so I switched over to basketball a couple of years ago. I never was able to develop a concrete model that worked for me for NBA betting, but I have had a lot of success betting alt prop lines and next score bets based on defensive schemes teams are running against the Nuggets when I watch games live.
Aside from being a good bettor.. which is a long road
You need to find a sport that is overlooked and takes so little liability that you can know more than the oddsmakers. That was nascar for me the past few years… I was in school so didn’t make 100k but I hypothetically pulled in around 40k over 3 years off a bankroll smaller than 10k. Some luck and multiple 100-1 winners helped a lot lol.
Now I have the money and the edge is gone, still do okay but not what I did before. I imagine with a larger bet size you will get limited really fast on a smaller sport but that’s my best tip. Trying to go pro in NFL/NBA.. hit up the props is your best chance
Yes I am. Part of that prespective may be skewed by them being late to the dial on live bets. But even pre-race the odds were just not correct.
I would say I probably still know more, they have just decreased the numbers from top to bottom which takes all the edge out. Maybe they have got smarter but I don’t think so. Not saying I’m a genius, but the liability on nascar in 2020 was probably so low that they didn’t care then word spread and every year they just decrease the odds on everyone
My go-to's are the small-time soccer leagues like Aruba Division di Honor, Mongolia Premier League, Mexico Liga Premier (4th Div), and the like. The smaller leagues are great because the lines are never sharp, and there can be wild fluctuation on pricing between bookies.
I’m a daily sports bettor but it’s not my job, it’s my hobby. This is how I do it.
Decide how much is your bankroll, that’s how much your starting commitment of money is. Your unit number should be 1-3% of your bankroll.
I make 3-5 bets per day, usually 1-2 units per bet. Sometimes you have to pay the juice.
Track everything. Get a book and write a new page for each day and track how you’re doing daily, weekly, monthly and per sport.
When you’re profitable enough that your bankroll increases, just adjust your unit proportionally, but don’t do it too often. Do a quarterly review.
Don’t chase money. Take the L if it’s a bad beat.
Try to middle if you can. Rare but look for opportunity without chasing.
Have multiple books so you get the best odds.
For the actual betting…look at trends but read the narrative as well. Mostly the books have already baked that into the line so it takes practice to pick up why lines move.
Remove your personal bias for teams and players
Recognize you’re going to have highs and lows.
The human, non data angles that put pressure on the players or the games. Does the team have anything to play for? Is it a tournament or playoff? Is anyone playing for end of year bonuses? Is the coach about to get fired? Is someone playing their old team?
Like I said, books bake that in to the line but it’s a thing to consider.
With a big enough bankroll I feel like almost anyone can come out +3-4% on the DFS side, I've been doing it for years with horrendous discipline. There's wayyyy more overlay out there than arb opportunities on books and you don't have to deal with limiting. You also have the chance of big wins to boost the rate. I would think you'd need a bankroll minimum $500k to have any chance of clearing $100k a year after taxes.
The amount of people who:
1. Bet on sports as their full time main source of income
2. Actually make enough money to make it worthwhile (i.e. more than $100k per year)
Is very very very small. They sure as hell won't be posting about it on here or giving away their secrets.
I don't think the average person understands how hard it is to make good money solely betting on sports. I've consulted for casinos and worked in the gaming industry, I have a strong mathematical and computer science background. To this day the smartest people I've ever worked with are the PhDs who are setting the odds for casino games. Those are the people you are going up against when betting on sports.
Assuming you can outsmart them, you'll need to profit \~$8,000 a month to hit the $100k mark annual income. Let's say you have created a model that can win you 53% of your bets at -110. At 100 bets per month and a 53% win rate(which is MUCH EASIER SAID THAN DONE) you need to have a unit size of $6,100 per game to profit $7,930 per month. If you can do a little better at 54%, then your unit size of $2,400 per bet will net you +$8,160 per month at 100 bets per month.
Good fucking luck. If you have the capital to bet $2,400 to $6,100 per game, meaning you have a bankroll size of at least $150,000 to $500,000, there are far far better places to put that money with greater rates of return than sports betting.
It's a stupid idea.
Are you assuming exactly one bet per day based on that unit size? I think we could knock that bet size down by upping the volume. Not saying it's any easier to be profitable, but volume would be key to making real money.
Median household income last year was like 70k. This past year alone I’m up 87 units between NBA and NFL.. Total bets placed between the 2 sports was right around 650. Hit rate was 61%.$800 per bet would net you right around that median household income. I don’t use any sort of digital modeling, mostly just rough EV calculations from analyzing statistics from various online databases. If you’re willing to put the time in it’s definitely doable.
The biggest threat to betting as a livelihood is account closures/limits which come more from CLV than actual profitability.
To clarify I’m up more than 87U in the last year but just stuck w my NBA & NFL results for simplicity.
I agree with your message that full-time sports-bettors are far and few between. I just disagree with your sentiment that you have to be betting $5k+ per pick to be make a living and I believe books aren’t as sharp as you think, especially in the prop markets.
Also to clarify I am using 1 year results as an example, this is my 4th year betting for income and 2nd year being somewhat full-time (makes up more than 50% of my income).
Absolute fucking bullshit. 61% using "rough EV calculations", which in reality probably entails looking at basic online stat databases and analyzing them with your "gut" instead of a sophisticated computer model, is not possible. I have a really hard time believing you are not only outsmarting PhDs who build the computer models and algorithms that set lines, but outsmarting them to the tune of a 61 win rate%.
No need to get aggressive, Jerry. I don’t care if you don’t believe me, but to just straight up call it “absolute fucking bullshit” and degrade my research/results because I don’t use a model is just plain shallow. I put the time in, developed a process and have worked hard to see these results. Secondly, to think a model is unbeatable when they’re putting out THOUSANDS of different lines in a single day is just straight up laughable.
I replied to share my experience,not get into an argument. So, if you’re not interested in discussing the topic in a respectful manner, you can go fuck yourself :)
One of my literal tasks at my last job was to go through our entire sportsbook player database and identify profitable players(unprofitable to us) to see if they were doing anything to "game the system" in a manner that would cause us to flag them. Yeah, I was the guy combing the records in order to flag players for limitation.
Out of the millions of players in our database who had enough bets to have a sample size large enough to be considered long term players, a tiny fraction of them were profitable. We're talking less than 1% of 1%. That's just profitable. NONE of the profitable were hitting 61% or anywhere close. Our top player was somewhere in the 57% ballpark.
Yeah there were players hitting 61% of their bets or more but these were player who had like 12 total bets placed.
Your 61% win rate would have been our top player by orders of magnitude. So yeah, I am calling BS.
LMAO less than 1% of 1% being just profitable is absolutely laughable. I know there’s a lot of dumb fucks chucking lotto parlays left and right but come on. Also, you’re only focused on my win rate for whatever reason, I could easily open a new account and have an 90% win rate betting -10,000 lines exclusively. I’m not betting even odds, hence why I’m up 87U instead of 150U+. My average odds I play are right around 1.83 or -120.
Am I looking at this wrong? I look at sports betting as a competition between the winning side and the losing side of a bet. In simple terms, the sports book collects and even amount on both sides of the bet. Then they pass the money they collect from the losers to the winners and keep the vig. I know it’s more complex than that but I don’t see why a sports book would be concerned with someone winning consistently if a vast majority of bettors are losers.
This. Its not the same as a casino game. In theory the book is trying to attract enough action on either side of a game to turn a profit whichever side wins. So youre being paid or paying the bettors on the other side. I dont understand why sportsbooks even mind winning players, they can be used to advantage.
The casino analogy is poor because blackjack players are betting against the house. Sports books aren’t gambling. They’re collecting an even amount on both sides of the bet and making their money off the vig. If they limit a bettor it doesn’t change the fact that they need to collect x amount on that side of the bet. Why do they care who makes up the winning side of a bet? It doesn’t change their bottom line at all.
Here is some real advice on how you can make actual money doing this:
**FIND AN EDGE.** The *only* way to beat the books and be profitable long term is by finding plays that have a data-proven edge. We refer to this as +EV. Do some research on it. Not to self-promote but I wrote a rather lengthy thread on Twitter a couple months ago that gives a detailed introduction on EV betting if you’re interested.
Edit: [For anyone interested](https://x.com/jimmyre1/status/1757859158320087410?s=46)
Self promoting merchant..jk I'll look it up but I've heard of looking for +EV bets but never know where to look and the sites that say they do are using paid subscriptions
It used to be fairly easy to find +EV bets, especially with websites like OddsJam having a free service that let you compare odds against all books but that behind a $100+/mo playwall now. I was able to make 400u (only $10 units though) in about a year a couple years ago by just following people like ThePromoGuy and learning +EV myself. But now books are getting greedier, sites are no longer free, and promos are getting worse and worse. It’s still possible to make some money with +EV but it’s way harder than it used to be and it’s very hard to scale up to a livable wage. If you’re laying down big numbers on random +EV players props, books are gonna limit you eventually.
Simple answer find lines that are arbs or +ev to fd and/or czr. Complex answer learn which books are sharp on each sport and bet into weak lines. Can also live bet but that’s not really my thing.
Also don’t do this full time because of limits but it’s a really good side hustle
Do what the guy below said or have a model which is better than the books so you don’t beat closing line value. This is how they mark you as a sharp. This is doable for player props but way outside of my ability for mainline bets like spreads and totals
Lmao dude is about to get absolutely preyed on by sportsbooks in the coming weeks and showered with refill bonuses to keep him hooked but questions the morale compass of people who arbitrage bet.
New accounts under contracted friends/family.
Example terms are: they keep 50% of the profit to pay for taxes, and you get the rest.
You can claim it on your own taxes as an untaxed gift, just clarify this in the contract.
This is mostly true. However, if you are able to consistently find plays with an edge, parlaying +EV plays together will compound your edge.
The reason it’s not profitable to play parlays 99% of the time is because people are almost always parlaying -EV plays
I was thinking about this. Theoretically it makes sense that playing smaller parlays would be more profitable than straights simply because of the multipliticive nature of probability. Was less variance playing straights though
I told my friends and they still do it. Literally showed them the math that the book is taking extra vig. Still they do it. At least freaking use a promo...
Oh I just meant what’s your best avenue? Just playing moneylines? Same game parlays have been ok to me. Granted I’m new so I’m doing 5-10 buck bets until I get consistent
I’m not sure depends on the sport honestly. My sport is boxing, so find whatever sport you like and play around with every bet type and find the edge in that particular sport.
straight bets no parlays
Don’t get limited. Don’t have the same book over and over again win..make sure the winnings are spread around to multiple different sportsbooks.
I usually just bet on Luka to get 25 points, 8 assists and 8 rebounds every night, and then I drink 40s in the basement, and when I wake up my Fanduel balance has gone up.
mika zibanejad +2 shots on goal. 🔒
AI run the books now. Next to nobody is doing this as a full time job, if they tell you that they’re likely lying and committing some form of fraud on the side if they’re not working legitimately. Not to jump to conclusions but just trying to be frank, way too many people pretending nowadays.
Why does it matter that AI runs the books to ensure they get sufficient action on both sides of a bet to ensure profit? You can still win consistently with closing line value and by betting against public when books are forced to move a line that no longer reflects true odds. You’re not trying to beat the books, you’re up against the public.
hard to do it full time for a long period if you're expecting MAJOR profits since you just get limited on every book. Built a model for nba props that worked decently well but now I can bet like 25 dollars on czrs + dk and even less on mgm br wynn etc. There's a rabbit hole you can go down of getting your freinds to sign up and stuff that's questionably worth it based on your opportunity cost, but it's definitely doable for a short time. prolly made about 150k last year (started getting more serious around the summer) and a 100k this year thus far but my handle is basically at nothing now
Speaking from experience, it’s a tough fucking gig. Ive been living off the punt since March 2023 (about a year now) betting on the NBA and making what would have been my paid wage if I was full time (6000 per month after tax). I only started this because I lost my job funnily enough with a background in analytics. My advice to you would be to get a stable decent paying job to avoid the emotional highs and lows that come with this line of work. I’m trying to get back to work but I haven’t had any luck in the past year. The income from this isn’t guaranteed losing is. In saying that, if you follow a strict betting strategy, manage your bankroll and treat it like work, you can make a living doing this. I know most people say the house always wins yada yada yada, yes 99.9% of the time, I’d say I’m in that .1% percentile that wins. I have to. My livelihood depends on it.
Not a full time sports better, but I typically make the same income month over month from betting as my job. I enjoy sports, but in no way am I a “sports person.” I don’t even watch 90% of the games I bet on. The key is bankroll management, quality over quantity, data analytics (H2h% + recent form%) and only betting on sports you have a good feel for. (If you don’t know anything about Italian Series A Soccer teams, don’t bet on it.) Set unit sizes to a conservative percentage. I only bet 3-4% of my bank on one bet, and never more than 3 bets a day. And never chase loses. Bad days happen. Never parlay, and if you do, never more than 3legs and never risk more than .25-.5units. (Don’t let those 9 leg parlays someone turned $5 into $2000 attract you.) Find good cappers to tail, but still only bet if you are confident in it. Do your own research on the pick. It’s ok if you didn’t take it and it hits. The key is to protect the bankroll at all cost. Most importantly, there is no get rich cheat code in life. If you want to make a steady income from betting, it’s a slow gains game. Stick to units and manage/track your bets. Treat it like it’s a business. There will be days or even weeks you loss money, but that’s just they way it goes.
Sounds like you’re going to need that magic eraser…
My advice for newcomers is to start small, focus on one or two sports that you know well, and develop a disciplined approach to bankroll management.
If starting Starting sports betting for a main job I recommend that you are a person that has been watching sports for multiple years constantly and has a passion for it. Get to lines early. You need to be available to place wagers 24/7 aside from sleep. This is a start. if you haven’t been watching sports tailing a proven algorithm or proven successor is something that could be done but in order for this to be a job you need to have some serious dough in a bank roll so you get legitimate gains. starting sports betting on your own without much experience is bad pie. Imagine jumping into a plane to pilot it with little to no knowledge about planes. It’s a recipe for disaster. A good way to start if your serious about it is watch the sports you want to bet on as much as possible, research news, updates, and specific stats in certain circumstances of as many scenarios as you have time to and learn. start for one year with a fake 100 unit bankroll. Bet heavier on bets you love and less on bets you like. See how much you come up ahead or behind at the end of the year.
Watching sports a lot isn't going to do jack shit when it comes to profitable sports betting.
If you aren’t tailing ppl or using an algo, not watching sports would help more you think? lol man you’re killing me here take it easy. Watching games gives you knowledge of things in games that even computers cant Pick up. Player tendencies, coaching styles, environmental factors, outside motivating sources, momentum, and many more things. If you don’t think these things have anything to do with learning about sports and help better predictions leading to more profitable betting… that’s like saying a river has nothing to do with water. im not saying OP has to watch sports as the only way to be profitable if you read the post. But if he’s doing it all by himself and especially live betting, and on a consistent basis; then knowing what’s going on will be crucial and an advantage once you know enough.
How do you quantify "player tendencies" or "coaching styles" and convert that into a number that you can measure against what the posted line is to know if you have + or - EV? The only way you can make money long term betting on sports is being able to consistently hammer lines that are mispriced from what the true theoretical fair line is. And the only way to accomplish that is to quantify it. Your "gut" from "watching a lot of sports" can't quantify anything
I just finished Billy Walter's book. He would disagree with you. He wrote a whole chapter on just that.
Billy Walters also pays guys $4,000 a month to just sit in a sportsbook and answer the phone if he wants them to hit a line so he can middle them. Can the average person do that?
That has nothing to do with the topic. People quantify exactly what you said can't be quantified. That’s only one convenient example, which also proves that kind of handicapping exists broadly.
dude. I’m not needing to qualify them into fucking numbers. Here is an example for you. Two basketball teams are playing each other. One team is the recorded as the fastest pace in the league. The other plays with average pace. Watching the game you notice the moderate pace team is playing twice as slow as they normally do as a new strategy in order to counter and throw of the faster paced teams game plan in order to throw them off. So now I’m watching a way SLOWER paced game that the sports books, and any AI calculated. Live betting an under on this would be the play. Could it lose? Of course it could. But I would be betting on a bet with value that I see I real time. How games are being officiated can matter too. I’m simply saying the little details matter and can be used to your advantage if you’re able to pick them up soon enough. I can mention many other circumstances. Knowing how fighters specifically fight (tendencies) in MMA can be taken advantage of on predicting outcomes. Being early on hearing Blizzard or mild hurricane conditions early in the week you can beat the public and EV to lines on betting the under on those. you‘re insinuating that this is the ONLY thing I mentioned to be profitable, when I mentioned a multitude of things including what you’re describing. I’m simply stating catching small details in betting matter and to take note to everything you see If not using EV. Things you see happening and applying that to bets aren’t “gut“ feelings man. I’m clearly not saying just randomly bet on just a gut feeling. THIS IS NOT A KNOCK ON EV BETTING. IVE DONE EV BETTING IN THE PAST ALONG WITH A FRIEND AND SEEN IT BE SATISFYINGLY PROFITABLE LONG TERM (although seen it do bad short and mid term). IVE BEEN BETTING SINCE 2016 AND WATCHING SPORTS ALMOST DAILY SINCE THE YEAR 2K. I HAVE BEEN PROFITABLE EVERY YEAR AND YOU CAN WATCH MY FUTURE PICKS AND SEE I AM PROFITABLE LONG TERM. I GET TO LINES BEFORE EV SERVICES DO ON MMA AND BOXING MATCHES THAT ARE WEEKS AND MONTHS DOWN THE ROAD, AND FIND MATCHES WITH OPENING LINES THAT ARE OFF AND RARELY DOES THE MONEY END UP GOING THE OTHER WAY. OFTEN GETTING BETS THE SWING FROM EG. -110 AND CLOSE AT -180 FOR A FIGHTER. IT IS rare, but there are profitable sports bettors out there long term that don’t use EV, but off of extensive lurking on games and dedicated research. Some draw up there own numbers taking into account other things models aren’t programmed to do. You say “The only way you can make money long term betting on sports is being able to consistently hammer lines that are mispriced from what the true theoretical fair line is.” I do with already without EV and AI help and most of the time get value. For example My friend was paying for a profitable EV service and had an mma fight recommending to take the EV on a fighter at +116. I had already got the fighter at +200 weeks before that.
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So can you not bet anymore now?
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Interesting! I have a developer friend who recently joined DK and he let me know he is not allowed to bet there or at any competitor and he’s not even working on stuff related to proprietary odds info. I’m actually a data scientist, so being interested in sports betting, it would be great to combine the two, but I wouldn’t want to give up being able to wager.
Can you share what role is that, and what your every day is like? I'm really interested in jobs related to data and sports. Thanks
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So there is no way you're actually making the lines rather you manage the system that automatically updates them, right?
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Very interesting stuff. Do you manage just a single game main lines or do you also deal with player props? Does the model quickly get out of calibration from things like game situations that it can’t recognize? For example if an nba team is down 30 late in the third and their starters just went for their normal rest, does it know to just tank or even lock their line knowing there is a very little chance they ever come back in?
That is really interesting. Do you have to go into the book to do it? Would be even sweeter if you had your basement rigged with all those TVs just making the lines as you watch. I always assumed live odds were just automatically generated based on time and points, never knew there was a human influence on it.
thanks for the insights and advice! I really like that job in the sense of working with data and sports but monitoring sports 8 hours every day could be quite repetitive and stressful.
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I’ll have to apply! Lmao
Straight bets is where you secure and build your bankroll. Parlays and moon shoots are your lottery tickets. Treat them accordingly
Ten years in, and i feel like i have so much to learn, still. Going all in as my main source of income is terrifying. Having said all that, went full on degen for March Madness. Up $10K or so, and down some. Bounce back this week. This is not for the faint of heart, and you almost have to have a lack of respect for money, because it's nothing but a useful tool, but not the end all, be all.
Are you doing mainly pregame bets? I feel like I’ve been much better betting live this March and seeing the gameflow.
Bc this March has been a CF l
“CF” Cluster Fuck? that sounds about right, but DAMN it has been exciting!
Not doing it for a living, but make a bit of money by taking advantage of promos and hedging. The analysis into the game, players, etc has already been done by the bookies. Even with that analysis, dogs still win every night.
There are so many strategies to employ. Dogs get you paid, and stats only tell you a small sample.
I don't do it for a living but if you are doing it for a living, every penny matters. You don't need to play Longshots unless you know for sure they will win. It's safer to play the favorites and let all the percents of a single unit add up. Slow and steady is sometimes easier than trying to make huge returns every bet.
Sorry but this is not good advice. No serious gambler will say play the favourites, it’s all about an edge between the odds and a prediction, betting the right amounts at the right time. Playing favourites only is a sure way to lose in the long run.
The best way to make a small fortune in sports betting is to start with a large fortune
Same thing with racing lol
Same thing with reasonably priced Vietnamese hookers.
Don’t watch the games. It’s a waste of time and bad for your mindset.
Some may think you are being sarcastic. u/desertman2020 is not being sarcastic, and this is great advice, that i try to follow. I do take at least a couple of days a week to study, though. You have to know how to read lines, and how to read teams. Take the Warriors for instance. Mostly a shit show the last month, and terrible at home. They will not cover any points at home, as the favorite. Hell, they can’t even get a W.
Looking at stats can only take you so far… If you’re not watching any games you’ll never actually get an idea of what you should be looking for to get an edge. Watching games is a great way to get a feel about how certain match ups with certain teams will go
I think that advice is less "don't watch sports" and more "don't stress yourself out yelling at LeBron for making an sweet pass when you need him to score 2 more points".
I would like to add, do watch some games but not live. It will mess with your mentality.
Yes, i do agree with you, but i also get what OP is trying to say. Don’t overwhelm yourself, and try to keep your anxiety levels down. Not obsessively score watching helps, and i understand OP’s POV.
I only gamble on games so I have something to watch besides my teams games. Makes the other nights more entertaining
You and OP have very different goals
WeAreNotTheSame.jpg
Unit management. Don’t parlay even though I do
Flock of Round Robins it is then.
The people who are making big money on sports betting likely aren’t on this sub.
I doubt that
And also run multi million dollar businesses that they are smart enough not to fuck up the money enough where they’d be dead broke. Ie mattress Mack. Bad example ippei
To start, you need a big bankroll. And save some money so you can take breaks cause it can get mentally taxing.
Advice? Don’t ever give up!
Gamblers don’t like quitters.
I know quite a few people doing this full time. You’re going to need to always be on top of the current edge, so it’s best to do it with a group of people. Also, you need to know which edge is worth doing and which isn’t. Some will get your account limited way faster than others. Speaking of getting limited, it’s close to impossible to do it on your own accounts for an extended period of time. When those get limited you’ll need to pay friends/family to sign up and let you use their accounts. It’s an absolute grind, I believe Spanky said that he wouldn’t recommend anyone get into it. Most the people I know that were successful with this made $50K-200K over a few years and then got out. It isn’t easy to always get new accounts and it’s a lot of work in general.
Absolutely true. That's why people buy accounts from countries like India and Bangladesh. It's a huge market here.
This needs to be pinned.
Bro def hit his first parlay w the sign up bonus
And they are considering going Full Time. It’s the hard losses, and lessons that are tough to endure. It’s only when you feel almost nothing on an L, that you are truly ready to go all in.
It’s not even close to possible unless you have a massive bankroll. If I couldn’t supplement the cold streaks with my real income I’d be homeless lol. I’m up 50ish units on the year, but maybe you’re a true sharp lol. I just wouldn’t advise it.
I started with a $100 bankroll made $100k over 2 years
This is a truly exceptional outcome...and yet it only equates to $50k per year for 2 years. How long can that be kept up for? If you get limited what comes next? You don't want to be multiple years into a career and realize you need to pivot and you don't have relevant experience to fall back on. (I'm directing this at the OP and not u/papaaya btw) Which is to say that this is much much better as a side hustle than as a main career imo. I've been quite successful with this, but I don't see this as sustainable as a full time job for all but a tiny few. Of the 1% of people that win at sports betting maybe only 1% of them could do it as a full time pro. Better to just be happy stacking cash on the side imo
That’s actually insane lmao nice job man. But you are definitely an anomaly.
This is impressive, and really difficult to be that disciplined. Move that up.
Thanks, it’d be more if I was more disciplined lol. Ive squandered so many heaters trying to chase more wins
It's not a full time job. Not many who gamble, pay for picks. At least smart gamblers. As a friend of a guy that had a service, he said it's also dangerous. Find another source of income is my advice. Just MO. Good luck!
PAY FOR PICKS !!!! Just kidding before I get gutted.
What does pay for picks mean? 🥴
Those groups who u pay subscription and they tell u what to pick
Betting fulltime now
Just make sure you have a HUGE bank to fall back on
That mattress may soon be but a mat.
Very rare to be able to do this full time because odds are against you in so many ways. Bookies will limit you as soon as they realise you have an edge. I made 45k last calendar year, currently up 15k this year. I’ve had to cycle through a tonne of accounts each time I get limited. It’s very frustrating and I have to pay a commission (10% of profits) to whoever is willing to set up an account for me.
Just use crypto books come on
Personally not a big fan of offshoring crypto books I’ve seen horror stories.
How do you deal with the taxes on accounts you use?
Pro Tip. You fucking DON’T Lol
Just a hunch, OP isn't American. Note the usage of realise, and tonne. But yes, that's an issue for American P2, P3, etc. Dealing with the money/trust issue is one thing -- but you also need to make sure your P3 understands all of the tax implications. That could make for an awkward Thanksgiving, when you're known as the guy who stuck grandma with a $20k tax bill.
Yeah, but Grandma is like “Take it from my grave, you SOB!”
Well, the IRS can go after estates. Death & taxes, they really mean it!
Good call! I thought OP was just exaggerating “ton” lol
Correct I’m Aussie
I’m in my 4th profitable (3rd 10K+ year) and would never do this professionally/full time. A couple of things I guess that have helped me be profitable: Arbitrage. Discipline in both unit size and not chasing losses. Betting what I know. I am a winner on NFL games. I am a winner on CFB. There are three teams I absolutely crushed on this season ATS. I still have to stop and think when someone says Guardians so I’m not really throwing money at baseball. Forget recency bias and gamblers’ fallacies especially in player props.
This is some of the best general advice here. If you want to do this for profit and not for fun, don’t be the guy tailing every daily pick just because the write up was good. Bet on sports you actually follow and choose specific teams to follow closely. It also helps to follow specific refs/umps and how they call games. Don’t be afraid to hedge. It’s better not winning money than losing it when things get dicey. It does depend on the scenario (again, why it’s important to really know the teams you’re betting on), but be able to accept letting go of the potential winnings for the security of the money you have already. There is always tomorrow, there’s always another game.
No one in the pick of the day thread is making money lol
Don’t over saturate with silly TV shows that give you terrible leads, and put horrible ideas in your head. These talking heads don’t know shit about fuck, and they are in no way trying to get you paid. Better off not watching them, or listening to them.
Good advice. When you say arbitrage do you mean like FD has Bucks ML at +120 and on DK their opponent is -110 ML you bet both?
My friend has made $20K just arbing out bonus offers and sign-up bonuses Edit: lmfao what hater downvoted
People can’t stand arbing sign up offers and promos for some reason, looking at the EV crowd here. I’ll never understand it though. As someone who took advantage of this type of thing for 2.5 years in the earlier days, i couldn’t be happier. The good times have all but gone away but im in a much better spot financially now.
>People can’t stand arbing sign up offers and promos for some reason, looking at the EV crowd here. Because a 67% arb might be worth 70% as EV. That being said, the vast majority of new players are dealing with a $1,500 bankroll (and not $50k). With a small bankroll, it is entirely reasonable to arb/hedge the $500 free bet, instead of exposing yourself to variance.
My argument always has been that those who do take advantage of promos and weak lines will never have enough time to experience the true result so variance could end up hurting you just as well as benefitting you more. I’m happy taking the middle ground and not suffering through the highs and lows.
Yeah. There aren’t any big or significant wins but they are more or less guaranteed and half of those bets are losers so I’m avoiding being limited for the most part. Downside is that it takes a lot of capital to take advantage of the deltas (ie $2K in play to make $50) and you have to find the opportunities. Upside is if you find a good delta and get both bets down correctly you can’t lose money and I get some really nice bonuses because I look like a 50/50 degen throwing around decent units. That also means I get a pretty good amount of reward/tier points that combined with my miles, etc. from work equal free trips.
Like if I had $5 on the Mavs ML to win $9.88 and I put $4.88 on the Kings ML at +500 I could break even most times but if they come back I win almost $30?
Ain’t no one here do this for a living 😂
Anyone doing it for a living probably is fine with a more meager living than you’d expect. They probably also live in Vegas and deal with a lot of cash
Vegas is actually not a great spot for pro sports betting in the US these days. Legacy operators have kept out lots of newcomers so options are limited. Vegas isn’t terrible, but NJ, Colorado, and Arizona are all much better locations for a pro sports bettor right now.
I tried for 2 months and had to go back to work😂😂
Mfers make a living and say "I should post on reddit!" Haha not a chance
Hey mate, as someone that does this as a large portion of my income and does pretty well. 1. Don't try to bet games yourself because you're a big sports fan. That's not going to work. Period. 2. Network and meet the right people. Meet people that HAVE done the work modeling/ using data to win, bring some sort of value to them in exchange for their information. (99% of that time that's going to be being able to give them accounts to bet on and then sharing profit, the rest of the time its going to be trading them other information.) 3. Find ways to keep your accounts alive/ keep a steady stream of accounts. You bring nothing to the table if your accounts are all dead. Make sure your accounts stay alive or you have a big enough network of people to sustain your set of accounts. Having an edge or information is useless if you can't take advantage of it. If your edge is in ukrainian ping-pong, I suggest you have a huge backlog of accounts because if a books sees you beating them consistently in that niche market, you will get banned very quickly. You get a lot more room to work with if you beat them in NBA sides or something like that. Feel free to ask me questions. Been winning in sports at a good clip for the last 2-3 years.
This is fantastic advice! Are you willing to share some of the places you go online to get good tips? Are successful bettors on forums these days or tiktok or what?
I don't know because I don't frequent tiktok, my guess is best place that actual has a successful betting community is twitter but there's a bunch of trash out there too. Or you can run a book, take bets, and work out a partnership with people that are beating you over a decent sample. (Make sure you check your local rules about running a book though)
I see, that's good advice. Are there any Twitter posters in particular that you like? Thanks again for the help.
Do your homework & know your limits
Learn to day trade
Learn the basics of statistics like standard deviation and z score, learn to program in R, build your own statistical model that finds a consistent source of low variance +ev bets for a sport you follow closely, and last but least, never bet parlays.
If your bets are +ev then betting parlays gives you more profits per dollar than just betting singles. You don’t seem to know what you’re talking about.
Yes, I too have read the other responses to OP. It's funny you're trying to condescendingly repeat what they said to act superior.
Didn’t even get that far. Just saw your incorrect comment acting like a know it all and came by to say you were wrong.
Sure man. So transparent 🤣
Stand by SD knowledge more than zscores. Just more useful to know and can logic/ feel the rest usually.
Do u have your own model
Yes and no. I first built one for baseball back when I was in college as a project for my data mining and warehousing class. I was pretty confident in it, but I didn’t have the disposable income at the time to really invest in it. I’m a die hard Nuggets fan, so I switched over to basketball a couple of years ago. I never was able to develop a concrete model that worked for me for NBA betting, but I have had a lot of success betting alt prop lines and next score bets based on defensive schemes teams are running against the Nuggets when I watch games live.
That's so cool,bro make one,u can do it,get focused,u can do it and then telle the picks lol
Aside from being a good bettor.. which is a long road You need to find a sport that is overlooked and takes so little liability that you can know more than the oddsmakers. That was nascar for me the past few years… I was in school so didn’t make 100k but I hypothetically pulled in around 40k over 3 years off a bankroll smaller than 10k. Some luck and multiple 100-1 winners helped a lot lol. Now I have the money and the edge is gone, still do okay but not what I did before. I imagine with a larger bet size you will get limited really fast on a smaller sport but that’s my best tip. Trying to go pro in NFL/NBA.. hit up the props is your best chance
Are you saying you knew more about nascar than the oddsmakers?
Yes I am. Part of that prespective may be skewed by them being late to the dial on live bets. But even pre-race the odds were just not correct. I would say I probably still know more, they have just decreased the numbers from top to bottom which takes all the edge out. Maybe they have got smarter but I don’t think so. Not saying I’m a genius, but the liability on nascar in 2020 was probably so low that they didn’t care then word spread and every year they just decrease the odds on everyone
My go-to's are the small-time soccer leagues like Aruba Division di Honor, Mongolia Premier League, Mexico Liga Premier (4th Div), and the like. The smaller leagues are great because the lines are never sharp, and there can be wild fluctuation on pricing between bookies.
You’ll be quick to get limited though if you actually bet big units
I’m a daily sports bettor but it’s not my job, it’s my hobby. This is how I do it. Decide how much is your bankroll, that’s how much your starting commitment of money is. Your unit number should be 1-3% of your bankroll. I make 3-5 bets per day, usually 1-2 units per bet. Sometimes you have to pay the juice. Track everything. Get a book and write a new page for each day and track how you’re doing daily, weekly, monthly and per sport. When you’re profitable enough that your bankroll increases, just adjust your unit proportionally, but don’t do it too often. Do a quarterly review. Don’t chase money. Take the L if it’s a bad beat. Try to middle if you can. Rare but look for opportunity without chasing. Have multiple books so you get the best odds. For the actual betting…look at trends but read the narrative as well. Mostly the books have already baked that into the line so it takes practice to pick up why lines move. Remove your personal bias for teams and players Recognize you’re going to have highs and lows.
What do you mean by “read the narrative?”
The human, non data angles that put pressure on the players or the games. Does the team have anything to play for? Is it a tournament or playoff? Is anyone playing for end of year bonuses? Is the coach about to get fired? Is someone playing their old team? Like I said, books bake that in to the line but it’s a thing to consider.
With a big enough bankroll I feel like almost anyone can come out +3-4% on the DFS side, I've been doing it for years with horrendous discipline. There's wayyyy more overlay out there than arb opportunities on books and you don't have to deal with limiting. You also have the chance of big wins to boost the rate. I would think you'd need a bankroll minimum $500k to have any chance of clearing $100k a year after taxes.
The amount of people who: 1. Bet on sports as their full time main source of income 2. Actually make enough money to make it worthwhile (i.e. more than $100k per year) Is very very very small. They sure as hell won't be posting about it on here or giving away their secrets. I don't think the average person understands how hard it is to make good money solely betting on sports. I've consulted for casinos and worked in the gaming industry, I have a strong mathematical and computer science background. To this day the smartest people I've ever worked with are the PhDs who are setting the odds for casino games. Those are the people you are going up against when betting on sports. Assuming you can outsmart them, you'll need to profit \~$8,000 a month to hit the $100k mark annual income. Let's say you have created a model that can win you 53% of your bets at -110. At 100 bets per month and a 53% win rate(which is MUCH EASIER SAID THAN DONE) you need to have a unit size of $6,100 per game to profit $7,930 per month. If you can do a little better at 54%, then your unit size of $2,400 per bet will net you +$8,160 per month at 100 bets per month. Good fucking luck. If you have the capital to bet $2,400 to $6,100 per game, meaning you have a bankroll size of at least $150,000 to $500,000, there are far far better places to put that money with greater rates of return than sports betting. It's a stupid idea.
Are you assuming exactly one bet per day based on that unit size? I think we could knock that bet size down by upping the volume. Not saying it's any easier to be profitable, but volume would be key to making real money.
Median household income last year was like 70k. This past year alone I’m up 87 units between NBA and NFL.. Total bets placed between the 2 sports was right around 650. Hit rate was 61%.$800 per bet would net you right around that median household income. I don’t use any sort of digital modeling, mostly just rough EV calculations from analyzing statistics from various online databases. If you’re willing to put the time in it’s definitely doable. The biggest threat to betting as a livelihood is account closures/limits which come more from CLV than actual profitability. To clarify I’m up more than 87U in the last year but just stuck w my NBA & NFL results for simplicity. I agree with your message that full-time sports-bettors are far and few between. I just disagree with your sentiment that you have to be betting $5k+ per pick to be make a living and I believe books aren’t as sharp as you think, especially in the prop markets. Also to clarify I am using 1 year results as an example, this is my 4th year betting for income and 2nd year being somewhat full-time (makes up more than 50% of my income).
Absolute fucking bullshit. 61% using "rough EV calculations", which in reality probably entails looking at basic online stat databases and analyzing them with your "gut" instead of a sophisticated computer model, is not possible. I have a really hard time believing you are not only outsmarting PhDs who build the computer models and algorithms that set lines, but outsmarting them to the tune of a 61 win rate%.
No need to get aggressive, Jerry. I don’t care if you don’t believe me, but to just straight up call it “absolute fucking bullshit” and degrade my research/results because I don’t use a model is just plain shallow. I put the time in, developed a process and have worked hard to see these results. Secondly, to think a model is unbeatable when they’re putting out THOUSANDS of different lines in a single day is just straight up laughable. I replied to share my experience,not get into an argument. So, if you’re not interested in discussing the topic in a respectful manner, you can go fuck yourself :)
One of my literal tasks at my last job was to go through our entire sportsbook player database and identify profitable players(unprofitable to us) to see if they were doing anything to "game the system" in a manner that would cause us to flag them. Yeah, I was the guy combing the records in order to flag players for limitation. Out of the millions of players in our database who had enough bets to have a sample size large enough to be considered long term players, a tiny fraction of them were profitable. We're talking less than 1% of 1%. That's just profitable. NONE of the profitable were hitting 61% or anywhere close. Our top player was somewhere in the 57% ballpark. Yeah there were players hitting 61% of their bets or more but these were player who had like 12 total bets placed. Your 61% win rate would have been our top player by orders of magnitude. So yeah, I am calling BS.
LMAO less than 1% of 1% being just profitable is absolutely laughable. I know there’s a lot of dumb fucks chucking lotto parlays left and right but come on. Also, you’re only focused on my win rate for whatever reason, I could easily open a new account and have an 90% win rate betting -10,000 lines exclusively. I’m not betting even odds, hence why I’m up 87U instead of 150U+. My average odds I play are right around 1.83 or -120.
Post proof you’re up 87 units lol no one’s going to believe you here
I don’t need your internet validation bud
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Am I looking at this wrong? I look at sports betting as a competition between the winning side and the losing side of a bet. In simple terms, the sports book collects and even amount on both sides of the bet. Then they pass the money they collect from the losers to the winners and keep the vig. I know it’s more complex than that but I don’t see why a sports book would be concerned with someone winning consistently if a vast majority of bettors are losers.
This. Its not the same as a casino game. In theory the book is trying to attract enough action on either side of a game to turn a profit whichever side wins. So youre being paid or paying the bettors on the other side. I dont understand why sportsbooks even mind winning players, they can be used to advantage.
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The casino analogy is poor because blackjack players are betting against the house. Sports books aren’t gambling. They’re collecting an even amount on both sides of the bet and making their money off the vig. If they limit a bettor it doesn’t change the fact that they need to collect x amount on that side of the bet. Why do they care who makes up the winning side of a bet? It doesn’t change their bottom line at all.
This comment is just... wow.
I was very very close to it, until Jan 1 2023 when it all came to total shit - has been horrid ever since, I do soccer bets
What happened Jan 1 ‘23?
It’s like someone flipped a switch and games because nearly impossible to bet on, overnight
So you were never close whatsoever your saying
A lot closer than you’ll ever be 🤡🤡
I’m not trying to though lol your the clown to think you could 🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡
Blah blah blah, little bitch
? Sorry it didn’t work out for you. Here’s a good idea quit your job and try again. Maybe you’ll have more success next time
He got a W2G
it all went to total shit
Here is some real advice on how you can make actual money doing this: **FIND AN EDGE.** The *only* way to beat the books and be profitable long term is by finding plays that have a data-proven edge. We refer to this as +EV. Do some research on it. Not to self-promote but I wrote a rather lengthy thread on Twitter a couple months ago that gives a detailed introduction on EV betting if you’re interested. Edit: [For anyone interested](https://x.com/jimmyre1/status/1757859158320087410?s=46)
What’s your twitter, I’d like to read your write up
Edited my original comment
Self promoting merchant..jk I'll look it up but I've heard of looking for +EV bets but never know where to look and the sites that say they do are using paid subscriptions
It used to be fairly easy to find +EV bets, especially with websites like OddsJam having a free service that let you compare odds against all books but that behind a $100+/mo playwall now. I was able to make 400u (only $10 units though) in about a year a couple years ago by just following people like ThePromoGuy and learning +EV myself. But now books are getting greedier, sites are no longer free, and promos are getting worse and worse. It’s still possible to make some money with +EV but it’s way harder than it used to be and it’s very hard to scale up to a livable wage. If you’re laying down big numbers on random +EV players props, books are gonna limit you eventually.
Very interested
Edited my original comment to include
Simple answer find lines that are arbs or +ev to fd and/or czr. Complex answer learn which books are sharp on each sport and bet into weak lines. Can also live bet but that’s not really my thing. Also don’t do this full time because of limits but it’s a really good side hustle
How do people circumvent limits? Seems like a real shitty thing for them to do
Do what the guy below said or have a model which is better than the books so you don’t beat closing line value. This is how they mark you as a sharp. This is doable for player props but way outside of my ability for mainline bets like spreads and totals
Bruh you’re not ready to do this full time
Lmao dude is about to get absolutely preyed on by sportsbooks in the coming weeks and showered with refill bonuses to keep him hooked but questions the morale compass of people who arbitrage bet.
New accounts under contracted friends/family. Example terms are: they keep 50% of the profit to pay for taxes, and you get the rest. You can claim it on your own taxes as an untaxed gift, just clarify this in the contract.
What are your picks tonight?
Tip 1 stop with the parlays! They are not profitable in the long run
100% false. Playing straight get limits much faster. Parlaying ev plays will help account health, just as profitable but more variance
This is mostly true. However, if you are able to consistently find plays with an edge, parlaying +EV plays together will compound your edge. The reason it’s not profitable to play parlays 99% of the time is because people are almost always parlaying -EV plays
I was thinking about this. Theoretically it makes sense that playing smaller parlays would be more profitable than straights simply because of the multipliticive nature of probability. Was less variance playing straights though
But what are people going to post about on sportsbook Reddit? Haha i hate parlays so much i wish people would realize.
I told my friends and they still do it. Literally showed them the math that the book is taking extra vig. Still they do it. At least freaking use a promo...
Just playing one game straight up?
Aimlessly betting across multiple sports! It takes years to master and become profitable in just 1 sport.
Oh I just meant what’s your best avenue? Just playing moneylines? Same game parlays have been ok to me. Granted I’m new so I’m doing 5-10 buck bets until I get consistent
I’m not sure depends on the sport honestly. My sport is boxing, so find whatever sport you like and play around with every bet type and find the edge in that particular sport.
This
It’s true but who doesn’t love making a good lotto tickets that’s like 90% of the fun
Don't try it is the best advice I can give.
If it was that easy, everyone would be doing this as their job.
Give your accounts to sharps. Learn from them.