At long last...

Yes, I am fully aware that it has been far too long since I've updated this, for which I apologize. Well... Not really, no. Things have just been busy lately; I'd give you details, but you wouldn't believe me. Really, you wouldn't. The good news is that I've had some truly excellent ideas come up that will ultimately find their way onto these pages for your enjoyment. I've been surprising myself with some of the thoughts I've come up with these past few weeks (or months), and think you'll enjoy them.

Alas, they will not be appearing today, as today is reserved for the re-emergence of the most holy of holies, FOOTBALL. And knowing how much you love this topic, I'll try to keep this blog post short, and keep it away from actual discussions of football.

Instead, I'll talk about gambling. Historically, and not withstanding that I live in Las Vegas, I am not a gambler. I have been known to play some pretty serious poker, but almost never will I play ANY game against the house, since the simple fact of the matter is that playing against the house, it's just a matter of time before you lose. It's simple math: betting against the house, the numbers project that even if you win, you will still lose (if you want a mathematical analysis of this, just let me know). Poker on the other hand, is played against people, and therefore much more flexible mathematically. Little details become important, human nature is a factor, and as people are generally pretty dumb, it's possible to win if you're some combination of smarter and/or more patient than the rest of the table. Thus, poker passes HT's test for safe gambling: if you're betting against a person, you have a chance to win. If you're betting against the house, it's just a matter of time.

Which brings us to sports gambling. Once upon a time, it was possible to make a living betting sports, especially college hoops and football, since it was possible to know more about the teams and games than the bookies did. The lines are set based on how much Vegas knows about the games, so if you were deeper in the know than Vegas, you could beat the house. Generally, the way to go was to study one conference with more scrutiny and detail than Vegas would, and exclusively bet games involving that conference. If you really did know more and crunch the number better, you would win in the long run.

Alas, those days are largely gone. Even college betting is now big business, and Vegas has caught up. Professional bookies who do nothing but research and crunch numbers do their jobs exceedingly well, and Vegas now knows more than all but the most well-informed betters. And that's now the case even with hundred-team sports at the college level. With regard to NFL football, it has been a LONG time since anyone was able to crunch the numbers and project the odds better than Vegas does, so betting football is just like playing 21 or craps: with any given bet, you have approximately a 50% chance of winning, but as the house has effectively infinite funds, you will eventually lose, as chance and anti-chance combine to form losing trends that will clean you out. Again, if you want analysis of the math, let me know.

So I got to thinking about how it might be possible to make sports betting a matter of betting against people and against human nature, rather than betting against the pure numbers offered by the house. Theoretically, this is possible, based on statistical trends reflecting the difference between the mathematics of the games and the trends of the (human nature driven) betting world. For example, the numbers dictate that if you bet every single NFL underdog every single week, by the end of the season, you will finish at about +35: you will have won 35 more times than you lost. So if you bet $1,000 on every underdog every week, you will make $35,000 over the course of a season. This is far too broad a margin and is too consistent from year to year to be a pure mathematical anomaly, which indicates that there is hole in the game that might be exploited. Specifically, bet underdogs.

The year-to-year success of underdogs is part math, part human nature. Math because betting an underdog has more possible winning results: even if the underdog loses, it might still win on the spread. The underdog is also astronomically favored by anti-chance, which means they benefit hugely from unexpected but not uncommon events like a special-teams touchdown, or an injury to (or a bad game by) a key player. Like Tom Brady being hurt in the first quarter this weekend, for example: NE failed to cover the spread, even in a home game against a weak team like the Chiefs.

Human nature is a factor because people tend to bet favorites, which moves the betting line. Everybody loves a winner, after all. The betting line for a big favorite (that many fans bet on) is higher than the actual line that mathematics says the favorite will win by, because the bookies want an about even number of bets on both teams. Hypothetical example: Dallas (a big fan favorite) is playing Seattle (not a fan favorite). Mathematically - for the purposes of this hypothetical - Dallas is expected to win by a touchdown. But the bookies know that a lot more Dallas fans will bet the game than Seattle fans, and the bookies' goal it to get an about even number of bets on both teams. To get enough bets on the Seattle side of the ledger, the bookies will fudge the numbers to make Seattle a more attractive gamble. The number of bets on Dallas will move the line to make Seattle a more attractive bet, with the end result that Dallas must win by even more to cover the spread. So while the actual numbers dictate that Dallas is favored by a touchdown, the line that is put up for wager will be slightly higher: Dallas by 8 1/2 or 9. The mathematics are fudged in favor of the underdog, based on human nature of betting the favorties.

Now all of the above, while mathematically sound and statistically supported, is purely theoretical. But it does open the door for a little experiment about sports betting: is the variance between the mathematically probable margin of victory for a fan-favorite and the final line for that favorite substantial enough to be exploited by a better?

So here's what I'm going to do: I am going to bet $20 on five games every week. The will be almost no calculation, as the sole basis for choosing the bets will be underdogs against fan-favorite teams, ideally where the underdog is also the home team. I will bet (at the last minute, after the lines have moved as much a they are going to) on five underdogs every week: whoever is playing against rabid fan-favorite teams Dallas, Pittsburgh, New England, San Diego, Denver, Indianapolis, New York, or Philadelphia. Among those teams, preference in choosing just which five games to be bet will be given first to home underdogs, then rounded out with whichever lines are highest, since home teams statistically cover the spread more often, and bigger underdog lines reflect lots of fan influence, and are more likely to cover as well.

So, this week the bets were: CLE (home against DAL, +6), OAK (home against DEN, +3), KC (at NE, +16), CAR (at SD, +9.5), and HOU (at PIT +9.5). These bets are not based on which teams I rationally think will cover, but instead on which games the lines have been most probably influenced by uneven betting in favor of favorites. Seriously, who would think that the high-powered Chargers would fail to cover a spread in a home game against Carolina (with their gimpy QB and Steve Smith suspended)? That's the common thinking, and that's the sort of reasoning I want to hear. Because of that common thinking in favor of the favorites, the lines for those games will be theoretically higher than the actual (mathematical) margin of probable victory. So I will be the other side.

As of right now, KC covered against NE, and CAR beat SD outright (so much for fan wisdom), while HOU and CLE failed to cover. This leaves me even, with OAK (+3) hosting DEN tonight. I will finish plus or minus $20 for the weekend, and will continue betting along this formula for the season, just to see what happens.

I will keep you updated on my bets, as well as possible changes to the betting format. (Which will be based on analysis of who the big fan-favorites are, not analysis of which underdogs are most likely to cover. For example I many drop NE off the list of favorites to bet against, based on the degree of injury to Tom Brady.)

Should be a fun experiment, win or lose.