Bowl Thread 2010 (continued)

Quote Originally Posted by MuggsyBogues:

@@@@but I didnt laugh when I see $10 is your base unit.  It is immaterial to me.  It is just a different color chip@@@@

Exactly. There are thousands of people - mainly Vegas betting outlets, online sportsbooks and 'locals' - who pray that their 'clients' they deal with go with their 'gut' and bet more than their bankroll would dictate.

And as poker has taught me, to even have a shot at being profitable you should do what your opponent least wants you to. I've only played cash games in Vegas for 2-3 days (as opposed to months of online poker) but I quickly learnt to avoid a certain type of players.

It's someone who sits down at a $1/2 No Limit Hold'em table with just $80 and - unlike almost everyone else who is out to have fun and get wasted with 'free' drinks - pays attention to betting patterns and physical tells instead of trying to get a number of the cocktail waitress. Type A players are numerous on any given night at the Venetian poker room, and as long as they are, poker in Vegas will never die.

Playing 'the right way' is not a great way to have fun, feel 'alive' and enjoy yourself.  Unless... you treat gambling as a business and genuinely enjoy taking other people's money.

  Firebird27

And a question to vanzack: do you / have you played cards for any significant amount of money? If so, how competitive do you get even when stakes aren't high?

I have played poker, and actually played it semi seriously from about 2004 to 2007.  I was mostly playing tournaments and was doing pretty well, not getting rich, but won a few 10K range tournaments and made runs in the big tournaments too.  I made a thread here about my feelings about tournament poker LINK HERE.  If you have the patience, it is 12 pages of very interesting poker talk.

So I dont believe that tournament poker is beatable longterm, by anybody.  But I do believe cash games are, and many do make money.

I just dont like it.  It drives me crazy to sit at a poker table for 10 hours, mostly with people who tend to be social outcasts (no offense meant).  It just isnt my style.  But to answer your question, I play the same whether I am playing for cheerios or thousands.  Makes no difference.

Quote Originally Posted by Firebird27:

Thanks Van for the friend request accept.  Nice job on LSU last night.  It's good to be able bounce ideas/questions off someone who takes the approach to wagering like you do.  You don't use some kind of "Vanzack Voodoo" to make your selections.  They are "Vanzack Vulcan" methods based on logic, probability and objectivity. 

There are 2 expert cappers on covers I read when I can.  Marc Lawrence and Ted Sevransky.  I read Marc's Playbook.com magazine and Ted's articles on this site.  I've also read Secrets of Professional Sports Betting by Michael Kochan.  I have found these resources to be helpful getting me on the right foot.

I respect your insights and knowledge but I don't want to just follow you blindly like the Cover's sheep.  I want to know why you selected a team, the methodology, and how you applied the methodology.

You could probably write a book on the subject and charge people $20 for it.  I'm sure it would an interesting read.

BOL with the rest of the bowl season!

Thanks Skipster.... 

Firebird - its funny - I dont want anyone blindly following me too.  I have gone through phases of my posting life here at covers where I post games Im betting, and phases where I dont.  I cant win.  When I post, I get bashed for any losers even if you win the previous 70%, and when I dont post people ask if I could post my games.  So I have learned the drill, I post when asked or when I feel like it, and will answer any and all questions and know that I will get bashed when I lose (just look after the WVU game, its like a free for all).

The problem I always have is that my handicapping and actual bets that go until the end of the game are only a percentage of how I make money.  I like to call it multiple income streams, or diversification.  I make money buying and selling lines, betting live lines, and arbitrage situations.  So a lot of times a bet I have on a Monday never goes to post time (today I bet the Jets +3 at -102 and sold it at -3 +125).   This is a business for me, and any business with only one client is vulnerable, you need diversification.  When my capping is bad, my line speculation might be good, or vice versa.

For instance, the playoff games this weekend.  5 years ago I bet every playoff game, but I do sense something has changed in me (probably for the worse) in that I just dont seem to have the stomach for it anymore. If I dont feel like I have a clear edge in a game, the consequences of self hatred and buyers remorse seem to grow more and more as the years go on.

Part of the reason is that the percentage of effort I put in to buying and selling positions has grown in relation to my handicapping wagers - which has shrunk. I dont know where this is going, but I can tell you that there are lots of days I feel like I have had enough and should call it a day until I can have Neteller and every book at my fingertips like the early 2000's. The cost and risk of doing business these days is so high, sometimes I just woner if it is worth it - and I keep getting squeezed on costs to the point that so much of my income goes to just keeping the business going. So if I make some dumb playoff bets - well - now you can see why I get crazy and beat myself up - there isnt much room for error anymore these days.

If I was as smart as I am today back in the early 2000's, it would have been a perfect situation - and I hope one day it will be like that again. I used to be able to transfer 50K on neteller from my bank account to any of 20 books to hit a line in less than a minute, and I used to transfer a winning wager back to my bank account in less than 5 minutes with virtually no cost or risk. Now I meet guys in parking lots with brown bags, and pay through the nose for wires or checks that might bounce, and most importantly lose out on opportunities because I have money at one book and not the right one at the right time. I wonder if I just dont have the stomach for this anymore.

The guys you mention in your post have the right idea.  They have multiple income streams too.  If they actually do bet on the games they pick, it is funded by the income they generate from writing books or selling picks.  Kind of like the poker players too - they are sponsored - and rarely pay for tournament entry fees - multiple income streams.  I have often thought about writing a book, mostly because I think it would help people, not so much that I would become a NYT best seller on the back of a sports gambling book.  Lets face it, the sports gambling world is small, then cut that in to people who want to hear how to take all of the fun out of it by treating it like a business, and you have a small slice of the public left.  Very few people doing this really want to make money, they might say they do, but the action is the big draw.

GL

****  When I said above "today I bet the jets....." - I didnt mean I bet the jets at +3 -102 today - it should read

"for todays game, I bet the Jets -3 -102 on Sunday night, and then sold......"

To add to that rant......

I really think that the fact that I am down 4 units on these bowls, and am still able to pay my rent, and it doesnt affect my ability to have a car, or buy groceries - is a big deal in being successful longterm.  I have learned over the years here, and am now convinced - that the great majority of people deposit 1K and think they are going to turn it in to 20K.

My approach couldnt be more opposite.  If I end up 4 units on bowls or down 4 units on bowls, it isnt any difference to my daily life.  The reason I say that is not to say "look at me, Im rich" - it is to make a point that I think success comes from not having the 1k to 20k mentality.  I have said it before, but I am emotionless (for the most part), and try to be like a machine.  If I lose 4 units on bowls, I win some on line selling, some on arbitrage, or NFL or soccer.  I do understand when people want to bash for losing my bigger plays, and believe me I hate losing any plays, but I get the feeling that their wager means a lot more to them than mine does to me.

That might be the key to success - I dont know - but I do think it is a component of it. 

THAT's rite! i feel you dogg...

Consilience, Huss, QBoption, Rocksacki - Thanks 

Quote Originally Posted by TRAIN69:

I should have been the bigger man when you came in my thread and started shit for some reason (sure just for your entertainment) and not come in your thread to bash as its not my style.

Hope you end the bowl season well.

No problems.

Truce.

But I want something understood - I didnt go in to your thread for entertainment or sport - it was to vocalize a point that I feel strongly about - and it boils down to if you are going to post on covers to help or tell people what you are doing, I just think it should be as transparant as possible.

I feel strongly about it, but probably went about expressing it the wrong way.

Quote Originally Posted by Firebird27:

Van - Your short story really provides a tiny inside look at the effort you go into keep your multiple income streams flowing in a positive direction.  I'm sure there's many stories you have about the "goings on" of your day-to-day operations.  Sounds like hard work and I hope there are moments where you can step back, smile and say to yourself, "This is why I choose to do this."

soonboomer - When I first wrote that, I thought it would make some people laugh, but at this time that's my base.  I don't want to bet so much money that it ruins my enjoyment of watching a game win or lose.  When gambling stops being fun, I pick up my bankroll and take a break.  I took a whole month off from late Nov to Xmas.  Now I'm back to posting to the degenerates, studying the lines and cashing a few tickets

BOL

I do it because I have been able to see my children grow up, from home.  I have months off when I want them.

But there are plenty of days......

gcnmoo - we are going to have to agree to disagree on the poker thing.  I dont believe that 3-5 years is a long enough sample to see if you can do this longterm (20 years), there is too much variance.  And throw in the expenses of actually travelling, hotels and all of that?  No chance.

Im going by my own personal observations, and I would love it if you posted in the linked thread above - but if you have the time to read that thread I state my position pretty clearly. 

Tournament poker is a threshold skill, and once you have that skill, the only way to be profitable is if there are enough non-skilled players to feed the skilled players.

Its kind of like a ponzi scheme, and is why I theorize how it is brilliant for these skilled players to glamourize poker on TV, create the celebrity image that they have - because they are drumming up more fish by doing so, and effectively keeping their coffers full.  Add to that sponsorship, and now maybe you can be profitable.

But until someone can tell me where I go wrong with my position (better in the linked thread than here) with questions like "why dont you see the same players winning year after year" and a clear explanation of how a normal distribution of a threshold skill can beat the rake - then I say you are fooled by randomness.

As for the current state of sports gambling.....

I am not kidding when I say there are days when I think I will just hang it up for a while until things change.  I am fortunate enough that I have made a nice nest egg over the past 10 years or so to do this without financial worry, but I do worry about boredom.  The current sportsbetting climate is sub-freezing.  If 2003 was 100 degrees and sunny, today it is 10 degrees windy and snowy.  And unfortunately, I am not gifted enough to just crystal ball handicap my way to profitability, my whole model is designed on this temperature at least being warm enough to just wear a sweater.

I have built a model that depends on free movement of money, and lots of options to wager.  That is how I do it.  I cant have one book where I take whatever line they offer, and deposit and withdraw whenever.  My models success is totally 100% tied to the temperature.  And it is just getting colder and colder.  When you start to add up the risks of meeting people in parking lots with brown bags, you start to wonder if you have beaten the odds long enough.  I do believe it will get better one day - but the current costs are squeezing me.

My early bets usually go in to Pinnacle or Greek, and then they are usually sold late in the week at MB (usually on gameday).  MB is useless up until gameday, and sometimes even then (depending on the event).  I use Betfair too, and they are sometimes useful.  For MLB, MB is very useful.  But MB change about a year and a half ago in their commission structure was devastating to me.  They used to charge 2% of all winning wagers, but if you bought and sold it would only be charged on the net won.  So I could buy lines almost risk free, and sell them later with no commission.  In other words, I could buy the Rangers at -135, and as long as I could sell them later at +135, I had no impact on commission.  If I sold them at +136, I would only pay commission on the NET gain for me.  Today, when you buy the rangers at -135, you have to sell them at +137 just to break even on commission!  It effectively eliminated buying and selling there on the same event.

Now, add in to the costs, and more importantly the risks - of making a 1 cent scalp to profit 100 bucks on an MLB game, and then the subsequent costs of moving that 10K back to reset your balances at 2 different books, and well......  you can see why sports betting grinding might not be the place to be these days.