Betting Big Dogs Collectively?

[allthethings]

Hi folks, I don't know if this is a good idea going forward, but I did this successfully Sunday and today in Italy Serie A, so it's worth considering. What I'm thinking is that the money lines taken league-wide are kind of absurd. There were six games today where they ML was roughly +400 or better, so I threw ten bucks on each one. The results: Soccer - Bologna - moneyline (+420) for the regulation time held on Jan 28 at 2:30pm [winner] Soccer - Genoa - moneyline (+740) for the regulation time held on Jan 28 at 2:30pm [loss] Soccer - Napoli - moneyline (+450) for the regulation time held on Jan 28 at 2:30pm [loss] Soccer - Palermo - moneyline (+640) for the regulation time held on Jan 28 at 2:30pm [loss] Soccer - Udinese - moneyline (+390) for the regulation time held on Jan 28 at 2:30pm [winner] Soccer - A Catania - moneyline (+435) for the regulation time held on Jan 28 at 2:30pm [loss] This was more games than I wanted to play, but upsets happen, right? Winning one of them would have lost me ten bucks...winning two put me plus 40. It was the same scenario on Sunday; I won one game at +435 and lost two, although in that case I conveniently didn't play a big home dog...still, winning one out of four still would have won me a few bucks. So anyway, I was watching some of the other premier leagues where MLs are offered...Netherlands seemed pretty good, too, and so did Spain, whereas England Premier it just hasn't happened the same way. It makes me wonder, though, whether these lines get out of whack because so many people play favorites as part of parlays...games where the favorites "can't lose," thus driving the ML from a reasonable number to something offering value collectively. I mean, you hear this all the time: "There are three big favorites, but one of them is bound to get upset." Getting better than 4 to 1 on the one you cash makes it a pretty reasonable bet...maybe. I guess the question is, do big upsets happen at least 25% of the time? And the answer is, it depends on what you think of as a big upset. Take one of today's upsets: 2nd-place Juventus loses at 14th-place Udinese. Juve away was 5-3-2 coming in (20% losses on the road) against a team winning 40% of its home games. The reason for the big line is the current form: Udinese had won 0, drawn 2 and lost 8 of its last ten games, while Juve came in 8-1-1 in its last 10. I've always thought current form is a poor gauge for prediction, since if teams always played to current form, there would be no upsets at all. My point is that if all these lines were 2 to 1 or 3 to 1, it would be a terrible wager, but at 4 to 1 up to 7 to 1, it seems a little skewed. Food for thought. I'm gonna keep watching, see if it holds over time.

[Cogge]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? Bookmakers often put their overround (margin) more heavily on the underdogs, as their liability is higher in those cases. I'd say you just got lucky this weekend. But if you believe in it, continue and keep this thread with bets and see where it ends up in a month or two. You might be on to something.

[allthethings]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? I know that home field is huge in soccer pretty much everywhere, and most of the big plus-money lines are therefore poor away teams visiting top home teams, but what I don't know is which matchups lead to upset wins. There are eight teams out of 20 in Serie A with 0 or 1 home loss out of 10 or 11 played this season, and if you look at who they've lost to, it's not the bottom feeders. (Among the six teams with 1 home loss, only Fiorentina lost to a bad team.) That's what I've noticed in EPL...Liverpool loses to Man U loses to Arsenal loses to Chelsea...none of them lose to West Ham. The two away teams I won with this week were Bologna (16th, 2-4-4 away coming in) winning at Atalanta (11th, 7-1-2 at home coming in), and Cagliari (10th, 1-2-6 away) winning at Lazio (9th, 5-3-2 home). Neither of those seem like matchups that could possibly justify lines of +435 and +420...current form favored the home teams, and the away teams had poor away records, but the overall records were relatively similar. So maybe the thing to do is fade the top teams away only, and fade the midtable favorites at home...and as mentioned, only when the line gets to be 4 to 1 or higher.

[Cogge]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? Ah oki, well then it's a whole other thing. I thought you were just betting on longshots really :P If you have system for determining away team performance and estimating that their price should be lower then you're placing value bets :P Good luck!

[allthethings]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? I'd just like to point out--and maybe I'm resulting here--that the big dogs are still barking, and I'm going to get on 'em. Note, and these are just the biggest dogs: Italy Serie A Torino +1115 loss (1-1 FT) Cagliari +735 win (3-2 FT) Reggina +460 loss (2-2 FT) I think you can surmise that it might be a good thing to oppose these big favorites on the HC. One win = five units profit. Spain Primera Santander +605 loss (1-2 FT) Valladolid +535 win (3-2 FT) Numancia +490 loss (0-2 FT) Almeria +475 loss (2-3 FT) Even one out of four shows a profit of two-plus units. Eng Premier Everton +720 loss (0-1 FT) West Ham +530 loss (0-0 FT) Okay, this is a 2-unit loss, but note that both were close. Netherlands Eredivisie Volendam +695 loss (1-1 FT) Utrecht +535 loss (0-0 FT) Sparta +505 loss (0-2 FT) Heerenveen +460 win (1-0 FT) De Graafschap +460 loss (0-2 FT) Even 1 out of 5 = 1/2 a unit win Germany Bundesliga Bielefeld +695 win (2-1 FT) Cottbus +650 loss (0-2 FT) M'gladbach +650 loss (0-2 FT) Another 5-unit win for the 1-2 weekend. France Ligue 1 St. Etienne +725 loss (1-1 FT) Caen +585 loss (0-2 FT) 2-unit loss, but St. Etienne almost cashed on the 11-on-10 game against Lyon. That's plus-8.5 units for one weekend. You tell me...is this just a lucky weekend, or is this what happens every weekend?

[allthethings]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? Okay...let's see if we can get 2 out of 11 tomorrow: Eng Premier Soccer - Middlesbrough - moneyline (+470) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 7:45am [pending] Germany Bundesliga Soccer - Bochum - moneyline (+645) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 9:30am [pending] Eng Premier Soccer - Hull City - moneyline (+1400) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 10:00am [pending] Eng Premier Soccer - Bolton - moneyline (+420) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 10:00am [pending] Eng Championship Soccer - Preston - moneyline (+425) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 10:00am [pending] Italy Serie A Soccer - Lecce - moneyline (+530) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 12:00pm [pending] Netherlands Eredivisie Soccer - Willem II - moneyline (+1100) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 1:45pm [pending] Netherlands Eredivisie Soccer - NAC - moneyline (+585) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 1:45pm [pending] Spain Primera Soccer - Santander - moneyline (+685) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 2:00pm [pending] Italy Serie A Soccer - Reggina - moneyline (+1280) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 2:30pm [pending] France Ligue 1 Soccer - Sochaux - moneyline (+525) for the regulation time held on Feb 7 at 3:00pm [pending]

[allthethings]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? Today the posted plays all lost...I went 1-11 when I added Sparta Rotterdam when it reached +425. Going 2-10 would break even...and four of the games were close. Reggina led most of the way against AC Milan, and with the score knotted at 1-1, Reggina missed by inches at the end of injury time...they were +1280. Sochaux (+525) was leading Lille 2-0 at HT, but got a 50th-minute red card and lost 2-3. Hull held Chelsea 0-0 as a +1400 dog, Preston held Reading 0-0 as a +425 dog... I'll probably try again tomorrow...typical that I watch this do well over a series of weeks, then jump on just in time for the dogs to stop barking. 4-5 with 3 pushes if you played HC...not good at (mostly) -130. Hull was +125 for +1.5, by far the best HC line today. Tomorrow's ten games...Genoa, Lazio, Siena and Gijon can all be had at plus-money HCs of between +0.5 and +2 (Gijon). 1. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Dortmund Money Line (+690) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 2. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Gijon Money Line (+1340) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 3. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 West Ham Money Line (+510) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 4. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 ADO Den Haag Money Line (+600) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 5. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 De Graafschap Money Line (+545) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 6. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Numancia Money Line (+560) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 7. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Volendam Money Line (+660) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 8. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Lazio Money Line (+425) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 9. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Genoa Money Line (+410) Game Remove Item Risk To Win 10. Soccer - Sunday, February 08, 2009 Siena Money Line (+410) Game Remove Item

[allthethings]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? These 10 plus Bologna +415 went a combined 0-10 with Gijon still to play...back to the drawing board, I guess...or should we expect that since this weekend saw the high-priced faves go 1-22, that the upsets will come down the road?

[allthethings]

Re: Betting Big Dogs Collectively? I'm fascinated by this for some reason, even though it keeps costing me money...not a lot, but a steady drip-drip-drip. I feel like it'll come around eventually, but who knows? What was fascinating today was how close it was to really breaking through...the first day I've seen in which playing the handicap would have been great, the first day with almost no favorites covering... Monchengladbach +720 +1.5 -149...1-1 FT Inverness +430 +1 -154...1-1 FT (led 1-0 with 10 men; gave up the tie at 79') Blackpool +425 +0.5 +115...1-1 FT Coventry +440 +1 -145...2-2 FT (gave up the tying goal at 90') Watford +760 +1.5 -141...1-3 FT (led 1-0 at 70', gave up the lead at 77') Betis +520 +1 -123...2-2 FT (led 2-0; Barcelona tied it at 84') Torino +440 +0.5 +120...1-1 FT (gave up the tying goal at 75') Bologna +500 +1 -128...1-1 FT Grenoble +865 +1.5 -137...1-1 FT Nancy +410 +0.5 +114...1-1 FT (gave up the tying goal at 89') St. Etienne +480 +0.5 +123...1-2 FT Volendam +1050 +2 -101...1-2 FT (led 1-0 early, got a man sent off at 19', lost the lead soon after) So, 0-12 today, but 10-2 ATS, including eight games in which the big dog held the lead...