What Do You Really Know?

In sports betting, as in poker, it's very often useful to take a step back from the action itself and view the overall exercise. It's important to keep the mind game of sports betting in its proper framework. As I've said before, in order to "play" a good game in sports betting, you first have to think a good game. This is a good time of the season to do so, before the excitement of postseason play in basketball.

In basketball, with the daily action and the many, many games, it is imperative that you have a method of attack. You can't bet every game – unless you have a monstrous bankroll, of course. Few people do. If you don't have an unlimited bankroll, you'd better be selective about which games you bet. And if you're going to be selective, you'd better have a plan. If you guess at ballgames, you're almost certain to lose.

In order to avoid repeated, potentially disastrous losses in sports betting – as in poker – you have to have a method, a method that you calculate will give you an advantage. Whether it's strictly fundamentals and player matchups, or continually updated power ratings, or technical trends, or particular psychological situations, or scheduling dynamics, or specific pointspread values – or any combination – you should have a method, and you should know what it is so that you can modify it if it isn't working well in any season.

The goal of your particular method should be to eliminate random and impulse wagers in sports betting by continually providing edges against the oddsmaker. It is true that every wager involves an educated guess. But, if you guess randomly at games without a system, or if you end up making lots of impulse bets, you have no chance for long-run success, and you're almost certain to lose over any intermediate period, even though you might have a short run of success.

Regardless of your method, you must constantly be mindful of the realities of sports betting. You are wagering on an outcome that is uncertain. Even if you are quite assured that your approach is well-designed to give you repeated edges against the oddsmaker, you can still lose any wager once you place your money on the counter. That is the nature of competitive sports. You might think you know the outcome, but in fact you don't. The contest still must be played. Injuries, a poor performance from the team you're supporting, an unexpected outstanding performance by its opponent, a missed call by officials, fights involving players, and technical fouls called on coaches or players – or even the fans – are just a few of the possible occurrences that are beyond your control and can make your thoughtful wager worthless in a hurry. I assure you, there are dozens more unforeseen events that can occur. Just ask a regular sports bettor about his bad beats, and he'll tell you.

How often have you heard someone say, "I knew [team name] was going to win"? You might even mutter the same thing to yourself after one of the teams you were considering – but decided to omit from your wagers that day because of your method – gets off to a fast start in a game and continually pulls away for an easy cover. The truth is that if either of you truly knew that such and such team was going to win in a blowout, you would have bet your entire bankroll on the game! The mere fact that neither of you did bet it all means you didn't know.

The reality of the matter is that no one knows for sure, as long as the games are honest. In fact, a few years ago, when some guys were fixing basketball games at Arizona State, even one of those didn't work out. (And the guys were all caught, largely because Vegas sportsbooks alerted authorities to their unusual wagering.)

Because you don't know the outcome of sporting events with certainty, and because you don't have an unlimited sports-betting bank account, you can't "beat yourself up" mentally because you didn't make a wager that you were considering. What you can do is note those games and search for similar characteristics in them, with the thought of modifying your own handicapping method to give them a higher priority. Much like poker, you can't stay in every hand until the end, because you're going to end up very sorry in many of them. But you can refine your method of play through experience to become involved in a higher percentage of hands that have a higher percentage chance of winning.

If you're observant and know your own selection system, you can do the same thing in sports betting. Experience helps. Knowledge helps. Flexibility helps. A keen eye for observation and analysis helps. Poise helps, especially when coping with the inevitable losses. Discipline helps. And proper money management is absolutely essential.

What doesn't help is impulse betting: doubling up on the next game to get your money back; "chasing" the wager you thought was a high-percentage play with a bet that doesn't have as many edges.

The true fact (and those are the best kind) of the matter is that the outcome of sports events is unknown, especially when dealing with odds and pointspreads. You don't know. You might suspect, but never make the mistake of thinking you do know. And don't be too hard on yourself if you pass on a game that you had a good feeling about that happens to work out. I'm sure you had a similar feeling about many games that didn't work out.

Chuck Sippl is the senior editor of The Gold Sheet, the first word in sports handicapping for 48 years. The amazingly compact Gold Sheet features analysis of every football and basketball game, exclusive insider reports, widely followed Power Ratings, and a Special Ticker of key injuries and team chemistry. If you haven't seen The Gold Sheet and would like to peruse a complimentary copy, call The Gold Sheet at (800) 798-GOLD (4653) and be sure to mention you read about it in Card Player. You can look up The Gold Sheet on the web at www.goldsheet.com.