Square Bettors: Stop Making This Inane Blunder, You Know You Are

There are ceaseless illustrations of how counterintuitive understanding is one of the potent tools of the sharp player. This prose is neither my first nor last story that shares formulas befitting under the classification of winning sports systems that are contrary to expectation.

If I had .01 bitcoin for every time I’ve heard the canard about isolating teams that are much better on the road than they are at home and ride this dichotomy, I’d be a bitcoin millionaire. Okay, maybe hyperbole in an article refuting urban legends was over-the-top but grant me some literary license.

To illustrate, let’s say a team is 5-0 SU and ATS, winning by an average of 12 points per game, yet 0-6 SU and ATS on the road, losing by an average of 12 points per game, the “angle” would command to bet them at home and against them on the road.

I positively identify Sportsbook Review to be valuable for a lot of information, but this is as emblematic of square falsities of an article ever scripted about fabled home/road dichotomy. Correcting the grammar, which was every bit as inept as the claim, “The numbers don’t lie, brother, and it’s never a bad idea to really focus on bets when good home teams play bad road teams,” urging us to bet the home teams, while using inductive, not deductive evidence. As said prevarication was written about baseball, let’s commence on MLB wagering.

When a home team has a home winning percentage a whopping .490 better than the visitors away winning percentage, it must be a lock to unload on the home team? Not so fast. Under those exact parameters, the home team is 416-403, but for -144.22 units. With the juice and betting against the splits wins 96.16 units, said vig accounting for the variance in betting for and against the assumption.

When a home underdog has a home winning percentage of .150 or better than their opponent’s away winning percentage, going with the home puppy with great splits would be a good wager, correct? Conventional logic and the clones who regurgitate the same “home/road dichotomy” theory would scream yes. #FakeNews. The away favorite with inferior splits is +61.49 units and even better on the runline at +78.8 for 7.3 ROI.

Ah, but indubitably employing home/road dichotomy triumphs in the NBA, correct? Maddux Sports says so. “Consider the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Effect. This is the team that cannot be beaten at home and cannot win on the road. They exist, and you should bet on them when at home and also bet against them when on the road until the NBA oddsmakers make a home/road dichotomy adjustment.”

When a team is a home underdog of five or more in defiance of their home winning percentage being .110 or higher than the chalk’s away winning percentage has to be a gift from heaven, right? Risk with them on the money line will have high returns the folk tale would strongly insinuate. Nope, such teams are 75-200 straight up and 124-165-6 against the spread the factual data rejoins.

The reasons the oxymoronic “conventional logic” keeps the bookies prosperous and fully financed for us sharks is rudimentary. Oddsmakers comprehend public proclivities and modify accordingly. Bookies and sharps zig, while most bettors zag. But history bears witness to the fact considerable home/road splits are an outlier. Regression towards the standard home court/field advantage occurs more times than not.

Jekyll and Hyde (as so far as utterly different at home than on the road) teams are genuinely an aberration. You can bet on it.

The author Joe Duffy is CEO of OffshoreInsiders.com, the one-stop shop for best sports picks and vetted sportsbooks. Follow him on Twitter @OffshoreInsider His mastery of advanced analytics is why he has been a full-time gambler and handicapper since 1988. Theories are tested, enabling facts to supersede bias. Check out his sports betting YouTube channel

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