God’s Tid-Bets, Vol. 13
Joe Duffy (www.godspicks.com)
Inconsistency is Your Friend
Here is another Golden Rule of handicapping. As Schneider from One Day at a Time used to say, “Always remember and never forget” what is bad for the oddsmakers is good for you. What is good for the oddsmakers is bad for you. The linesmakers and square players loathe uncertainty. That’s why books love the square player; they play to linesmakers’ strengths while the sharp player will exploit their weakness.
Games are circled or off-the-board because of ambiguous injury information to a key player, severe weather or sometimes pending motivation factors late in the year concerning playoff ramifications, coaches resting healthy key players, etc. Why? The sharp players use equivocal information as a resource not a liability.
I hear bush league punters (as they call them in Europe) all the time say something along the lines of, “I just can’t get a handle on that team. I avoid their games altogether.” I’ve spoken to most of the big name oddsmakers and sportsbook directors at one time or another and every one of them will bemoan that the haphazard teams are the ones they despise the most. “Predictably unpredictable” teams are very high percentage plays. Such teams are box of chocolates–you never know what you will get. That’s why taking a large pointspread number in a game in which the oddsmakers struggle to cipher is a good venture. There are many teams that will on a predictable basis follow up a great effort with a dud and visa versa. This is typical of young teams or those with erratic star players, and talented but poorly coached teams.
Hence contrary to what Joeybagodonuts thinks, it’s actually better to go against “predictably unpredictable” teams when playing well and with them when they are playing poorly. Combining the two, inconsistent big dogs are good percentage plays to bet on and inconsistent favorites playing well are go-against plays. In short the same teams that seem to loathe prosperity also are the most dangerous once essentially counted out. When it comes to bettors, winners are proactive, losers are reactive.
That’s a Bowl of Crap
There are not many givens in gambling. One that’s almost etched in stone is the books make a windfall during the bowls. The square players come out of the woodwork for the bowls and March Madness. One of the biggest groupthink falsities is those who believe in betting the teams that enter bowl season the hottest. While we do find that true for March Madness, in both the conference tournaments and the Dance, not only is it not true for football’s postseason, actually more times than not it’s the opposite. But that’s why there are not many bookmakers in the breadline. Conventional illogical separates the fool from his money.
Which team needs 20-30 days off the most—the team playing their best football at the end of the year, or the one playing their worst? Rest can often take a team out of their rhythm, be it good or bad pulse. Three weeks is a lot of time for mentally and physically tired teams to regroup. Also it’s the perfect trap for a peaking team to lose their edge.
Be a Fan of Fan Attendance For Bowl Games
Not all widely held conventions are based on illogic, though in many cases there is still more that meets the eye and the pocket. A great example is most gamblers sharp and square realize if there is a huge difference in fan contingencies one team brings to a bowl game, there is without debate an advantage to the team that will have more partisans on a neutral field. But this advantage is exploitable when it’s actually a symptom of a greater truth. Especially when it comes to minor bowls, one of the biggest x-factors is analyzing which teams are truly interested and which are playing in a consolation game.
In that sense the fans and the players are congruent. If there is less fan interest, there is less player interest and visa versa. There’s a chicken/egg scenario in there somewhere. However if the dichotomy is better explained by one school being much physically closer to the site of the bowl or a larger school with more alumni then the advantage is lessened. However if one school is transporting a much larger contingent despite a geographical inconvenience, there we have an angle. That’s a strong indicator one team considers the bowl a major contest while the other is in the proverbial kissing-your-sister game.
Media reports and the teams’ and bowls press releases are sources for accurate information on which teams will have the bigger cheering sections.
Duffy’s plays are part of the Dream Team at Godspicks.com. He is perhaps the most published and respected author on sports gambling theory and has been featured as a regular guest as the handicapping expert on the Rick Ballou Show on Sporting News Radio, Gamblers Zoo national radio show, the Meat and Potatoes gambling show, Gridiron Gamblers, Pro Fantasy Sports Internet radio and Grogan’s Fantasy Football show.