To Win, You Should Bet the Better Team

Statistically, the bettor will bet favorites. That is a major mistake, and here’s why.

To begin with, the average bettor tends to overstate the relative strength of the league’s better players and teams. What pro handicappers understand is that there’s actually enormous parity in the league, with not that much difference between the best player in a position and the worst.

When a group of marginally worse gamers is much more motivated than a group of slightly superior players that an absolutely upset is possible. Most certainly, it’s potential for the”inferior” team to cover the point spread.

Secondly, the point spread tends to nullify any obvious scrimmage border (skill or power advantage) a group has over its opponent. From the 1999 and 2000 seasons, for example, there were 167 games in which the point spread was seven points or more (games in which one team’s advantage over another was perceived to become large ). While the underdog won only 36 of these games outright (21.6 percent), the underdog covered the point spread in 83 of those matches (while tying it six): a success rate of 51.6 percent.

Third, by gambling an underdog, you have an important element of sport strategy on your side. NFL teams do their very best to win a game. Accordingly, in the last few minutes of a match, a team that is leading seldom takes much risk to score more points. It targets hanging on to its lead. The group that is dropping, on the other hand, usually attempts to score till the bitter end. When a bettor has taken a popular that is beforehand but not covering five minutes or not to go, that bettor is in trouble.

In 20 decades of handicapping the NFL, I have yet to come across a long-term winning bettor who does not bet mostly underdogs.

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