Sports and Fantasy betting

Why you should build a statistical model for betting baseball

Thursday, May 20th, 2010 | Poker Articles, Sports and Fantasy betting | No Comments

Submitted by Alex, this article belongs to the Sports and Fantasy betting series.

Alex is a fantasy betting expert (compared to me at least) who has recently joined forces with one of the top fantasy betting sites, namely FanDuel. Alex has been kind enough to write some general sports and fantasy betting articles.

In fantasy betting your opponents are other sports bettors and the format resembles the SNG (Sit and Go) and MTT (Multi Table Tournament) formats found on poker sites. Briefly, the object of fantasy betting competitions is to pick a team of players within a certain sport given certain restrictions (usually an overall salary cap). Depending on your player’s performances during the games played, you score points counting towards your overall placement in the competition.

Lots of people will try to sell you on the idea of using systems or angles for betting baseball. Some will be simple: for example, always bet on the home underdog. Others will be far more complex, introducing a variety of criteria or filters for determining whether a team is worth betting on. For example, bet against a team with a losing road record in the final game of a series. While there can be some validity to some of these patterns, they can rarely be used for long term profitable betting.

The problem is that in most cases, the patterns used to ‘prove’ that the system works have not existed over a long enough sample size to provide statistically meaningful results. Or they’ve been discovered by data mining or ‘cherry picking’ what has happened to work best in the past. Using that approach does a much better job of predicting the past than predicting the future.

In the rare instances when there truly was enough of a bias in the betting ‘market’ to yield a valid angle, once the statistical data accumulates enough to be meaningful, other bettors will discover it, exploit it, and remove the inefficiency from the market…often making it a ‘play against’ in the future.

So if angles and systems don’t work, how should you approach sports betting? By building a statistical model. Typically created in Excel or a dedicated statistical analysis software package, models are basically your attempt to simulate or calculate the likelihood of various outcomes in a sporting event. The advantage of using them is that once you model what you think the odds of various outcomes are, you can compare them to what the market (in the form of the odds) says will happen and limit your bets to situations where there’s value in the form of a positive expectation bet.

In addition, if your statistical model is based on the players in each team’s lineup (as it should be), then you can use it to attack less efficient markets, such as daily fantasy sports. Your opponents won’t be using such sophisticated techniques, and over the long haul you’ll be able to grind out some serious profits.

Check out fantasy betting at FanDuel

Tags: Poker Articles, Sports and Fantasy betting

Understanding the Baseball Money Line

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010 | Poker Articles, Sports and Fantasy betting | No Comments

Submitted by Alex, this article belongs to the Sports and Fantasy betting series.

Most betting on baseball uses the money line rather than a point spread. That means that you’re betting on who will win the game, not on how much they’ll win by. Typically the odds will be listed for both teams in a game. They’ll appear something like this: Yankees – 200, Blue Jays +180. That means that you’ll have to bet $200 to win $100 on the Yankees (if they win), while you’d only have to bet $100 to win $180 on the Blue Jays (if they win).

The casino makes it’s money on ‘the vigorish (vig)’. That’s the difference in the odds on each side. By balancing the amount of money bet on each side, the sportsbook can ensure that they’ll make a profit no matter what the outcome of the sporting event. The initial line created by the sportsbook is based on what they anticipate the public perception of the event’s likely outcome to be. As people begin to bet, they may move the line in an attempt to balance out the betting on each side. Ultimately, this results in the closing line being the most accurate predictor of the event’s outcome, and the entire sports betting market being quite efficient. All it take is one really sharp gambler with a large bankroll, and most of the potential profit for everyone else disappears from the market, as the line at the sportsbook will move to the ‘correct’ point.

A far less efficient (and more exploitable) market is the daily fantasy sports market. These games are similar to sports betting in the sense that you’re making a wager on the outcome of sports events, and winning (or losing) that day, based on the result. However, instead of betting ‘against the house’, you’re selecting an opponent and betting against that one person. As long as that single person isn’t more knowledgeable than you, you’re at an advantage. And you’re picking a lineup of players (rather than just a team), which introduces a greater degree of skill to the games. To top it off, these games are completely legal in the United States, allowing deposit by Paypal or credit card and withdrawal by Paypal or check.

Check out fantasy betting at FanDuel

Tags: Poker Articles, Sports and Fantasy betting

Can you guarantee sports betting success by using a progressive betting system?

Sunday, May 16th, 2010 | Poker Articles, Sports and Fantasy betting | No Comments

Submitted by Alex, this article belongs to the Sports and Fantasy betting series.

Many people will try to tell you that you can guarantee success at sports betting by using a progressive betting system such as a Martingale system. These systems involved making a series of bets, with the amount escalating after each losing bet, until you win and achieve your desired profit. For example, let’s say your target profit is $10. You make a $5 bet. If you lose, you’re down $5, so now you need to bet $7.50 to reach your target. If you lose again, you’re down $12.50. Now you need to bet $11.25 to reach your target. The lure of these systems is that given an unlimited bankroll, unlimited betting limits, and unlimited time, you’re eventually guaranteed to reach your target. Rinse and repeat, and it’s only a matter of time until you’re a millionaire.

So does this actually work? If it sounds too good to be true, that’s because it IS too good to be true. The problem is that nobody has an unlimited bankroll and no games have an unlimited bet size. Eventually you’re going to hit a long losing streak, and when you do, you’re eventually going to be unable to make a large enough bet to hit your target profit in one shot.

So what about more complex progressive systems? The most popular of these currently is promoted by John Morrison. These sports betting systems involve following a series of rules for determining what bet to make, but the bet sizing still gets progressively larger in order to hit the profit target in one shot. These still do not work! If the betting rules don’t yield a profitable expectation on their own, using them progressively isn’t going to change that. Generally speaking, the rules don’t change the nature of the game…they just obfuscate the issue. Many of those promoting these systems are well aware that they’re selling garbage, and realize that without the complexity of the betting rules, many potential suckers will see right through them. Others don’t understand the principles of statistical testing and probability, and genuinely believe they’ve hit on the Holy Grail of profitable sports betting.

In any case, no progressive betting system can turn a loser into a winner. You’re better off learning shop for ‘bad’ lines at the sportsbooks, or learning to handicap an inefficient market like daily fantasy contests.

Check out fantasy betting at FanDuel

Tags: Poker Articles, Sports and Fantasy betting

WOSB fantasy betting league; 40 GBP prize in January’s competition

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010 | Sports and Fantasy betting | 2 Comments

My good buddies from WOSB have recently launched the WOSB fantasy betting league.

The WOSB fantasy betting league is in short an advanced sports betting competition. Each player starts with a 1000 unit bankroll, and the aim of the league is to increase your bankroll as much as possible throughout the month the competition lasts. It is completely free to sign up to the league.

You increase your bankroll by placing bets on selected soccer matches, just like you would at any regular bookmaker. The league software then automatically keeps track of your betting history and your bankroll development compared to the other league participants.

The 1st prize in January’s competiton is 40 GBP (around 70$). There are currently very few registered participants in the league so the chances of winning the first prize are still very good. Especially because one of the participants is me (look for the pokerBRB profile), and I have had a terrible start. January’s WOSB fantasy betting league competition runs until January 31st.

The WOSB fantasy betting league is still only a beta version, so minor bugs are to be expected. However, the people behind WOSB are very keen to get user feedback to improve their league for future competitions.

Additional WOSB fantasy betting league features

Private Groups (Sub Competitions)

In addition to the primary WOSB Betting Competition, you can create and participate in so called private groups.

Private groups are sub group to the main WOSB Betting Competition where you and your friends can create your own closed group based on the same betting profile which participates in the main WOSB Betting Competition.

I have created a private group called PokerBankrollBlog, which is currently open for players who think they stand a chance against my superhuman betting skills.

Private Leagues (Secondary Competition)
These leagues are totally independent of the main WOSB Betting Competition. They are either leagues created by secondary sponsors or different web sites for their unique users.

For these private leagues you create a totally new betting account inside your fantasy betting profile. So they wont affect your betting at WOSB Betting Competition.

When creating the private leagues you can change quite a number of parameters such as competition length, maximum bet allowed, max number of participants allowed or whether it shall be an open or closed league.

Another way of using the private league possibility, would be to create a private independent league for you and your friends. You could even add your own little prize pool to make the competition a bit more fun.

Tags: Sports and Fantasy betting

WOSB.com launch Betting Tips in German and English

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009 | Poker News, Sports and Fantasy betting | No Comments

Today WOSB.com has launched Betting Tips in Danish and English, take a look here:

German website – Fussball Wetten Tipps
Danish website – Tips Spil

The two new pages will be pretty similar to the English WOSB.com Betting Tips, but might take different paths in the near future.

In addition to the 2 new pages each preview has been improved with WOSB betting tips for each match, added external betting tips and injury information for the major leagues.

Tags: Poker News, Sports and Fantasy betting

Draftbug Blogger Fantasy Baseball Invitational Contest player picks

Friday, July 17th, 2009 | Sports and Fantasy betting | 1 Comment

Tonight I will be playing in the Draftbug blogger MLB fantasy betting freeroll. My aim is not to finish in last place as I did last time I played in a Draftbug invitational event.

Before I reveal my picks I thought I would share with you some basic information about Major League Baseball and the way contests are scored at Draftbug.

A Major League Baseball team consists of 9 players that have different roles depending on whether the team is fielding (trying to catch the ball) or batting (trying to hit the ball). When the team is batting, all 9 players take turn hitting against the pitcher (the guy throwing the ball) of the other team. When the team is fielding the following positions need filling out:

1B: First Baseman

One of the 4 infielders. The first baseman covers the first base.

2B: Second Baseman

One of the 4 infielders. The second baseman covers the second base.

3B: Third Baseman

One of the 4 infielders. The third baseman covers the third base.

SS: Short Stop

One of the 4 infielders. Covers the area between second and third base.

C: Catcher

The guy who catches the ball thrown by the pitcher

SP: Starting Pitcher

The guy who throws the ball to the catcher in an attempt to strike out the batter of the opposing team.

OF: There are 3 Outfielders namely left fielder, center fielder of right fielder

Guard the playing area outside the infield

The way you score points in Draftbug is when the players you choose for your team complete one of the following actions:

1B: 1 point is given when the batter hits the ball into play and reaches the first base safely

2B: 2 points are given when the batter hits the ball into play and reaches the second base safely

3B: 3 points are given when the batter hits the ball into play and reaches the third base safely

HR: 4 points are given when the batter hits a home-run

R: 1 point is given for each run scored

RBI: 1 point is given for each run batted in

BB: 1 point is given for each base on ball

SB: 2 points are given for stolen base

K: -1 point is given for each strikeout charged to a batter

W: 10 points are given for each win a pitcher is credited for

L: -3 points are given for each loss a pitcher is credited with

SV: 7 points are given for each save a pitcher is credited with

IP: 3 points are given for each inning pitched

H: -1 point is given for each hit charged to the pitcher

K: 1 point is given for each strikeout charged to a pitcher

ER: -1 point for each run allowed by a pitcher

BB: -1 point for each base on ball allowed by a pitcher

You can find more information on Major League Baseball here.

From a quick glance on all the different MLB stats that are out there, I can see that I am in way over my head here. To keep things simple I am therefore going to choose players from the two teams that from an odds point of view are the biggest favorites tonight, namely New York Yankees and St. Louis Cardinals.

So here are my picks:

SP: AJ Burnett from New York Yankees

SS: Derek Jeter from New York Yankees

C: Yadier Molina from St. Louis Cardinals

1B: Mark Teixeira from New York Yankees

2B: Skip Shumaker from St. Louis Cardinals

3B: David Freese from St. Louis Cardinals

OF: Johnny Damon from New York Yankees

OF: Rick Ankiel from St. Louis Cardinals

OF: Nick Swisher from New York Yankees

Tags: Sports and Fantasy betting

Draftbug Blogger Fantasy Baseball Invitational Contest

Thursday, July 16th, 2009 | Sports and Fantasy betting | No Comments

Tomorrow I will be playing in the Draftbug blogger MLB fantasy betting freeroll. My aim is not to finish in last place as I did last time I played in a Draftbug invitational event.

I will be checking out either Yahoo (Yahoo|Sports|MLB|Players) or Hardball Times for player stats and try to understand player positions before I make my picks.

For those who aren’t familiar with Draftbug contests, the concept is simple – fantasy baseball contests lasting just one day. Each participant picks a team of players within a salary cap, and wins (or loses) based on the performance of their players in that night’s games. Cash contests range from $1 up to $55, and a daily freeroll (with no entry fee and small cash prizes) is offered every day.

The format allows players to obsess over all the same details as in full season salary cap games (park, opponent, lefty/right match ups, home/away splits, weather, injuries, etc.), while not imposing any future time commitments on participants beyond the current day’s contests.

I will be competing against 11 other bloggers, some of which are very much into fantasy betting and MLB. Beating any of them will be a great victory for a noob like me.

Here’s a list of my competitors:

Alex from Daily Baseball Data
Sean from 27 pitches
Dave H. from Rotoguru2
Dave R. from Dinks and dunks
Charlie from Fantasy Baseball 365
Josh from Future of Fantasy
Jay from Cardinal’s front office
Ryan from Lester’s Legends
Tim from Rotorob
Troy from Rotosavants
Carl from Five Tool Fantasy Baseball

I will update you with my picks tomorrow as soon as I receive the password for the event.

Check out fantasy betting at FanDuel

You could be posting your articles on the Poker Bankroll Blog. Read all about it here.

Tags: Sports and Fantasy betting

Playing Match-ups in Daily Fantasy Baseball Contests

Monday, June 1st, 2009 | Sports and Fantasy betting | 1 Comment

Submitted by Alex, this article belongs to the Sports and Fantasy betting series

Alex is deeply involved in the fantasy betting scene and has written this strategy article on how to pick a good base stealer in Major League Baseball fantasy betting.

One of the great things about daily fantasy baseball contests like Draftbug is that there are a so many different angles that can impact your strategy. Not only are you trying to figure out who the best players are, which games provide favorable situations to one team, and which players are priced attractively, but there are situations where some players match up particularly well against their opponent.

One of those situations is good base stealers against starting pitchers who are easy to steal against. The first thing to understand about this is that while both pitcher and catcher impact the difficulty of stealing bases, the influence of the pitcher is greater. Because of that (and to keep things simple), when I evaluate these match ups, I look at who the pitcher is, and ignore the catcher. ‘Stolen bases against’ data tends to show very good consistency from year to year, so it’s definitely something with good predictive value.

Here are the “leaders” from 2008. If you’re looking for a good player to pick in Draftbug, see whether any good base stealers are opposing anyone on this list:

Floyd
Jurrjens
D. Cabrera
Wakefield
Millwood
Webb
Danks
Feldman
Burnett
R. Johnson
Volquez
Maddux
G. Olson
Weaver
Pettitte
Snell
Lincecum

Others who would have made the list quite easily if they had started more games include:

Contreras
C. Young
Gorzelanny
Banks

A player like Juan Pierre could be a good play against almost anyone on this list. Not only can he exploit their inability to prevent stolen bases, but he’ll rarely strike out against anyone, neutralize a large part of the edge that most good pitchers have. And he doesn’t rely on home runs, so ground ball pitchers like Webb also lose the advantage they gain from that edge. And at a price of only 84 in Draftbug, he’s a steal…
Check out FanDuel fantasy betting here.

You could be posting your articles on the Poker Bankroll Blog. Read all about it here.

Tags: Sports and Fantasy betting

Fantasy betting at Draftbug

Sunday, May 31st, 2009 | Sports and Fantasy betting | 3 Comments

Fantasy betting is a big deal in the US, but not so much in Europe yet (most likely because sports betting is not illegal in Europe). I like the community aspect of fantasy betting so much that I decided to devote a page on the pokerbankrollblog entirely to Sports and Fantasy betting. My favorite fantasy betting site is Drafbug.com and for this reason I recently decided to become an affiliate and start promoting the site. The people behind Drafbug have written a thorough description of what Drafbug is all about, how to sign up and how to play in their contests. Read it through if you are interested in fantasy betting and post a comment if you have any questions.

What is Draftbug?
Draftbug offers daily fantasy sports contests, where you pick a roster of players for the current day’s games, and win or lose based on their performance that day. Registration is free and only takes a minute. You can play for free, and win small cash prizes, in our daily baseball freeroll. Once you’re ready to play for higher stakes, you can use your credit card to make an instant deposit. After you’ve made a fortune in Draftbug contests, you can receive your withdrawal via check.

How do you sign up for Draftbug?
Registration for Draftbug is free and easy. When you click on any of the Draftbug links or ads on this page, you’ll be brought to a web page that looks like this:

To access the registration screen, click the ‘Create Account’ button circled in yellow in the picture above. The registration screen will look like this:

You’ll need to fill out the requested information, and then click the “Registration” link in the lower left corner of the screen. You now have a Draftbug account, and will find yourself logged into the site and viewing a list of currently available contests.

How do you play in Draftbug contests?
Playing in contests at Draftbug is easy, fun, and profitable (for the winners). When you first log in to the site, you’ll be looking at a screen that looks like this:

The main, tabbed panel of the screen shows a list of the contests that are currently open for entry. From left to right, the columns show a unique id number, the sport, the entry fee, the total prize pool, a short description of the contest, the salary cap for the contest, the number players currently entered and allowed to enter, the deadline for entering the contest or making roster changes, and the type of contest (usually ‘public’).

To learn more about a specific contest or to enter a contest, you’ll click on the hyperlinked “Description”. Since this will be your first contest, we’ll assume that you haven’t deposited any money yet, and that you want to try out the daily freeroll contest. These contests are free to enter, and pay out a total of $5 to the top two finishers. Look for a contest (often the first one listed) with a description like “MLB Tuesday Freeroll”, and click on it. You’ll now be viewing a screen that looks something like this:

The top left section shows roster requirements for the contest. By default, this will be a 1B, a 2B, a 3B, a SS, a SP, a RP, and 3 OF. The top middle section shows which games are included. Some contests will only use night games, while others will use all games. Typically only the second game of doubleheader will be used. The upper right section shows contest prizes. The lower left section shows scoring rules for the contest, while the lower right shows who has already entered the contest.

If you’re ready to enter the contest, click the “I Agree” button to accept the terms of the contest. You will then be looking at a screen that looks like this:

The upper section shows the positions available for the contest. The position highlighted in green is the one that you’re currently selecting. If you want to skip to another position, simply click on it.

The middle, left section shows the players available at the current position, and their prices. If you have enough salary remaining to select a player, there will be a green check mark to the left of the player’s name. To select the player, click on the check mark.

When you’re done picking players, click the “Enter Team” button on the right side of the screen. You can come back to this screen at any time prior to the lineup deadline (which is usually a few minutes before the scheduled game time), by going to the “My Contests” tab on the main Draftbug screen, and clicking on the contest description.

Once the deadline has passed, you can view your opponents’ picks and live scoring by going to the “My Contests” tab on the main Draftbug screen, and clicking on the “View Results” hyperlink.

Check out FanDuel fantasy betting here.

You could be posting your articles on the Poker Bankroll Blog. Read all about it here.

Tags: Sports and Fantasy betting

Draftbug blogger freeroll

Friday, May 8th, 2009 | Sports and Fantasy betting | 2 Comments

Wednesday this week I was invited to participate in the Draftbug blogger MLB fantasy betting freeroll. Since I have no clue what so ever about baseball and fantasy betting I thought it would be a great way to learn how these kind of events take place.

It was actually easier than I thought. I simply signed up for an account and then registered for the freeroll through the main lobby. This very much resembles the sign-up procedure for restricted poker freerolls. Once registered, I could enter the clubhouse for the event where I was to chose my team by the points cap method. Basically you have 1400 points available to set your team of 10 players. When you click on each of the positions to fill, you are presented with a list of players to chose from with each player costing a certain amount of points.

Having no idea what the OF, 1B, 2B, 3B, SS, C, SP and RP positions mean I just picked some random players so the total points added up to 1400. Needless to say this is probably not the optimal approach and sure enough I finished in last place out of the 13 participants. My team scored 9 points in total compared to 61 points for TheInsidePitch’s winning team

I quickly want to mention that a really cool feature of the Drafbug site is that once the MLB games start you can follow your team’s performance live in the clubhouse.

I talked to the guy who runs the Drafbug site while I was setting my team and he told me that he usually gets his player information from either Yahoo (Yahoo|Sports|MLB|Players) or Hardball Times. I will definitely try to understand player positions and get some more detailed information on their current form when I play my next event.

Here’s the list of the other bloggers who participated in the Draftbug Blogger freeroll. Most of the blogs are about sportsbetting so check them out if you want to learn more. I will see if I can arrange a poker freeroll one of these days so I can beat the guys on my homeground. How hard could it be to beat a bunch of sportsbetting poker noobs…lol ?