Saturday Basketball In Depth Look

[Guest Carmine Bellini]

Last Week: 12-8 (60%) Well last night was a refreshing change to the bad start I had to the week as things are starting to fall back into place. The key to doing this for a long time is money management and patience, but I will save that long drawn out discussion for another day so we can concentrate on the big basketball card for today. First the record update for this week: 7-13 (35%), still well below the .500 mark but a increase with some winners yesterday. Now on to Saturday: With 75 games on the board, I am going to go through a typical Saturday in basketball and show you how to minimize work and maximize profits. I thought I would get this up early in case there is any questions or comments about games we could get them going well in advance! Be back shortly, Carmine

[Guest Carmine Bellini]

Re: Saturday Basketball In Depth Look So as mentioned we have over 75 games of college basketball and it is almost impossible to handicap every game for Saturday and this does not even include the NBA. The key is to have a game plan. There is no sure fire method for handicapping on a college basketball full day and out of the many people I knew all of them have a different method of going about it. Some like to concentrate on one particular team or division or conference, and this is even helpful down the road when they have conference tournaments however I think it will hurt you when it comes down to the tournament in March. To me the entire season is just a warm up to the tournament in March and so if you just focus on one school or conference you will miss out on important information, players, and teams that could surprise in March. Every year there is a team or two that surprises in the tournament and if you do your research right you will not be surprised. Anyway back to today and my method for attacking a very big card such as the one for today. First I look over the card and the opening lines. As I have mentioned before I lean to being an underdog player because I think you get more value with the dog, I am not strictly a dog player but that is where the value is. I also think that home court advantage is strongest in college basketball then it is in any sport in today's games. Regardless of your record the home crowd will always support the home team because they have students and students follow the team closely. Also the time of year when rivalries, conference play, and seniors come into play. So those two combination is where I start and I look for home dogs with something to play for. First out of the entire card ( not including added games) there are 21 games that fit the criteria of home underdogs. Now those 21 games are not automatically a play but it does take over 50 games off the board. This does not mean I will not acknowledge the other games because home favorites also are a decent role to back in the right spot. In fact later in this thread I will go over one for Saturday that is in a very good lesson role. This is just a way to split the card into smaller portions to allow you to concentrate on the smaller aspect of the games before making the final selections on the day. Now let's go to consensus, I do not like to be on the same side as public money. They win their share of games however for the most part the public does not win and so I want to do my best to avoid them at all costs. Luckily for me the public will usually back a favorite which makes the dogs even more interesting. How do you find the consensus? Well there are several sites out there that actually will take a straw poll and see who everyone likes and I will suggest checking them out, but be careful as you have to try and figure out just who are making the selections and if they have anything to gain by posting numbers. Another good way is too go to any forum and check the threads and look for posts that do not post much information, yet just a team and if you find the team most people in any forum are taking you can bet it is a solid go against consensus play. After a quick look, my hunches were correct as every road favorite out of the 21 games I mentioned are being backed by the public, which already makes me comfortable with this approach for Saturday. Coming up I am going to expand a little more on these 21 games and see why you want to get rid of some and which ones shape up to be solid selections for Saturday! Carmine