MLB/NHL Betting System

I want to get peoples opinions on this. This has been very profitable for me over the last couple of years. I wanted to know what you all thought about it and see if there was any way to improve it. This only works on sports where the PL/RL is always -1.5 (so MLB and NHL).

run/post it when you start...sounds interesting (but risky, especially on the ice). My input is play scenarios similar to your example...road faves only on the diamond.

GL

Thx. I'll definitely post my progress (or lack thereof). I may even start during the wbc (tomorrow might be a good day) since I'll be going to SD to watch the second round games anyways, and maybe the rest in LA if my team advances! 

interesting methodology

As it appears, no real back testing has been done, post some plays, let's see what happens, next month baseball starts, post more plays, lets see what happens..this strategy does have merit, however, the system needs a bit of fine tuning,  added perimeters to make it solid, in the pursuance of gaining the winning edge...may you prosper always.

keep it going

Thanks sports_Network!

So for tonight, my NHL games would be:

Winner yesterday!

Interesting; what criteria do you use for picking the mlb games to parlay? Thanks and best of luck this season.

Thanks, Ken. 

Going forward, I won't put the games in a parlay format, but each game as its own separate bet(s). I like these three games today:

Where'd you go? 

Sorry I was on vacation for a couple of weeks and as such, have not been paying attention to games. Got back tonight. I will likely resume making picks for MLB when the season starts. It's also possible, but not probably, that I'll send some NHL games too, time permitting. 

I ran a few queries using SDQL to narrow down games since 2007 with ML favorites having positive RL odds. I wanted to see how often the ML favorite won by exactly one run because that's the only result that loses in this system.

ML favorites won by exactly one run in 16.4% of those games (1 out of every 6 games).

•     Home ML Favorites: 18.3% (1 out of every 5.5 games)

•     Away ML Favorites: 12.2% (1 out of every 8 games)

Looks like a good initial filter is picking games where the ML favorite is on the road. This makes sense because the road team always has to bat in the ninth inning. If a home favorite is leading by one run after the top of the ninth, they don't have to bat in the bottom of the ninth to try expanding their lead.

As a continuation to my previous post, I then ran a query to determine the impact of O/U totals on those filtered games. There were less games won by exactly one run as the O/U total increased. This makes sense because higher scores generally lead to larger win margins.

The largest drop-off occurred around an O/U total of 8.

•     O/U less than 8: 13.9% won by exactly one run (1 out of every 7.2 games)

•     O/U 8 or more:   11.5% won by exactly one run (1 out of every 8.7 games)

So, a good secondary filter is picking games where the O/U total is greater than or equal to 8.

I find this interesting. I have no idea about baseball so I wont know or even try to figure out if this could work there or not. If someone posts the plays then I could play them.

For NHL, I tried to think of the pros and cons of this. The first pro is that this system could actually be rather easily backtested. Basically it means that one would just check the % of games that end ML with +odds and then just estimate (rather easy) the PL odds. One could of course have some artificial line such as +140. Of course this does not take into account any of the high-scoring/goal-allowing team -stuff but that just sounds rather timetaking especially if the system is e.g. ca 5% to 7,5 % ROI, as it sounds like to be (just my estimate when, the MLB could be less but if its very certain, then one could have a big unit size or bet many units to win loads of units during a season).

Not sure why you went away from the original idea of parlays. It wouldnt have to be triples even when you have three games that match your criteria. Just make doubles between all of them.

But then again, the singles will work too.

I always like to follow the results too (especially when something has not been backtested or if it can not be backtested). So here are the results for the NHL games from the 10th of March that you posted:

Sounds very interesting man! Could you run something similar for NHL? Or explain how it could be done so I could do it instead if it takes a lot of time (if you wouldnt have the time).

The O/U point would definitely work for NHL too. Not sure what anotehr filter for NHL would be. Any ideas?

I ran a few additional queries to see if actual ML odds and RL odds impacted these filtered results, but the improvement was negligible.

So, just filtering for Away ML Favorites and O/U Total greater than or equal to 8 gives the following game results for the past 10 seasons.

Season    Win By 1     Any Other Result        
2007             56                  492                  10.22%
2008             55                  482                  10.24%
2009             68                  495                  12.08%
2010             52                  424                  10.92%
2011             58                  346                  14.36%
2012             53                  364                  12.71%
2013             48                  334                  12.57%
2014             37                  318                  10.42%
2015             39                  332                  10.51%
2016             58                  461                  11.18%
                
TOTAL        524                 4048                  11.46%    (1 out of every 8.7 games)


You can expect the Away ML Favorite to win by exactly one run in 3 out of every 26 games on average.

Because each bet in this system uses two games, you should be able to win (on average) 10 bets for every 3 $200 losses. So, those 10 bets need winnings that offset that $600 in losses. The average profit on the winning bets needs to be $60 to break even.

Going back to the example used above, you can see that the profit potential for the bet is either $53 or $70, depending on which of the four parlay bets wins. Let's say you win Parlay #1 or #3 for a $53 profit.  That's below the $60 average profit needed to break even with this system. However, if you win Parlay #2 or #4, then the profit is $70.

One thing to consider is making sure the game pairings create four parlay bets where the profit is more than $60, if possible.

Red Sox: ML -160, RL +130
Yankees: ML +130, RL -200

Cubs: ML -170, RL +120
Cardinals: ML +135, RL -190


$50 Parlay 1: Sox RL (+130), Cubs RL (+120)          Parlay Payout = $203, Profit = $53
$50 Parlay 2: Sox RL (+130), Cards ML (+135)        Parlay Payout = $220, Profit = $70
$50 Parlay 3: Yanks ML (+130), Cubs RL (+120)      Parlay Payout = $203, Profit = $53
$50 Parlay 4: Yanks ML (+130), Cards ML (+135)    Parlay Payout = $220, Profit = $70

Hey Scrivero,

Sorry for the confusion. I'm actually not going away from the originally posted parlay system. I'm trying to figure out which games are the best bets to include in the 2-game parlay combinations. The games with the least chance of ending in a 1-run victory for the ML favorite are the games that should be included.

I'll see if I can query up NHL data in a similar fashion after I do a little back testing with 2016 MLB data. I plan to have some better rules in place before the season starts, so plays can be posted here.

Thanks for the feedback!

Ran a couple quick queries for NHL, but didn't have any puck line numbers, so had to basically search for ML favorites only. Not sure if the puck lines were positive for the ML favorite.

No home/away advantage in NHL for games where the favorite won by exactly one goal:

• Home ML Favorites: 25.0% (1 out of every 4 games)
• Away ML Favorites: 26.1% (1 out of every 3.8 games)

Very slight advantage to choosing games where the O/U total is 5.5 or greater.

• O/U less than 5.5: 26.5% won by exactly one goal (1 out of every 3.8 games)
• O/U 5.5 or more:   24.8% won by exactly one goal (1 out of every 4 games)

Playing the 2-game parlay system seems risky for NHL.  If you have four games that meet the entry criteria, and you split them into two 2-game parlay bets, you can expect on average to win one bet and lose the other.

The chance of the ML favorite winning by exactly one goal is just too high.

This is w1s3k1d's thread, so I'll be watching any picks posted to track system progress once the MLB season starts. Game filters and parameters may be different from mine.

I plan to do my own back testing and tracking using my own filters, but will only post progress here if w1s3k1d is okay with it. Having multiple users posting about system progress could get confusing.

So far, my filters for choosing games to use in this system are:

• Road ML Favorites
• O/U Greater Than or Equal to 8

If two games meet these criteria on a given day, then I will parlay all 4 possible winning combinations, taking the + odds for every pick, as described by w1s3k1d in the initial post of this thread.

Very interesting system.

Would you have any system/strategy to bet on NBA Totals (FG/1Q/1H)?

The odds make those plays very profitable.

Thanks.

Great input from you guys, this is interesting, looking forward to what you guys come up with! Best of luck, cheers!

Ah, I think I was the one that confused you. I was actually referring to the original starter of the thread with the comment of "moving away from the parlays" and to his post number 12 in this thread where he was just playing the singles, if I understood him right.

But to you nfl_huskers, thank you for analysing this stuff! Thanks for sharing the NHL queries' results as well.

It sounds like the original idea would work best with MLB. I tried to figure out something with a similar idea for NHL. With "the similar idea" I am referrjng to playing both sides of a game in some way and using the fact/statement that nfl_huskers said of "the chance of the ML favorite winning by exactly one goal is too high".

My first idea would be this:
- Take two games where there is a clear ML favorite, e.g. tonight Detroit-Carolina (+162 vs -180).
- Play ML for the favorite.
- Play handicap of +1,5 for the dog.

If the game ends with exactly 1 goal difference for the favorite, then we win both bets. If it ends with a 2 goal differential for the favorite or more, we win the ML bet. If it ends with the dog winning ML or with more than 1 goal, we win just the +1,5 bet.

So lets calculate with that exact example game (1 unit per each bet):
1. We win both options (fav wins ML with exactly 1 goal): ML gives us a profit of 0,555 units, and the +1,5 win gives us a profit of 0,552 units. Total profit of +1,107 units.
2. We win just the ML (with 2 goal difference or more): Loss of -0,445 units.
3. We win just the +1,5 dog: -0,448 units.

If at least 33 % of games (and one 2/3 end with either just ML win or +1,5 dog win, doesnt matter which as the odds are almost the same) in a certain odds category end up with the ML favorite winning with exactly 1 goal, then this system would have a ROI of +10,7 %.

That sounds pretty awesome, but lets test another game with different odds, a more even game of Florida-Buffalo (-120 vs +109):
1. We win both options (fav wins ML with exactly 1 goal): ML gives us a profit of 0,833 units, and the +1,5 win gives us a profit of 0,363 units. Total profit of +1,196 units.
2. We win just the ML (with 2 goal difference or more): Loss of -0,167 units.
3. We win just the +1,5 dog: -0,637 units.

This gets a bit more complicated to calculate and back test, as one would have to check how many of the games with such odds end with just the ML win and how many with just the +1,5 dog win. Lets assume that 1/3 games end with just teh ML win and 1/3 games with just the +1,5 dog win. with both hitting 33 % of the time, our ROI would be +19,6 %.

Ok, not sure if I trust my calculations but thats how it would go. Its probably more realistic to expected that more than 1/3 of the games end with the +1,5 dog being the result so the ROI would be smaller. No way to know before backtesting though.

Question (to nfl_huskers): Can you check how many games with a clear ML favorite (e.g. between -170 to -190, or any other odds) ended with the ML favorite winning by exactly 1 goals? I have all the data but I cant do SDQL queries, hence my "manual" method on Excel would take forever.

Could you also check another category of ML favorite of ca -110 to -130 like in my second example and this time also see the portion of games ending to results +1,5 dog and ML (with a 2 goal difference or more)?

It could actually basically be any other ML favorite with any odds. I highly doubt that playing each and every game like this would be profitable, but finding a certain category of games that end with an exactly 1 goal difference and high enough odds +1,5 dog and fav ML would bring the cash.

My second idea would be:
- Have a similar game with similar ML favorite (e.g. -170 to -190)
- Play the +1,5 for the dog and the -1,5 for the favorite.

This way, the numbers for possible options would look like this (the same Detroit-Carolina game:
1. We win just the PL (+163), game end with a 2 goal difference for the ML fav: profit of  of +0,63 units
2. We win just the +1,5 dog (game ends with ML fav winning with 1 goal, or the dog winning with any amount of goals: -0,448 units.

So basically, what we would need to run as test would be, whether the game ends with a 2 goal difference for the ML favorite more often than to any other results. Then again, does this make sense at all? Because, lets calculate us playing just the PL for the ML favorite and nothing more, options:
1. We win the PL, profit of 1,63 units.
2. We lose the PL, loss of -1 units..

This one being profitable depends on the amount of games that end PL. I dont think it would work. I have previously backtested extensicely the situation of a ML favorite of minimum -225 winning ML or PL or the min +200 dog winning ML or Reg and the results were basically +-0.

I'd say that the second idea probably has no chance of working, but the first idea might, if there is a certain group of games with certain criteria (e.g. specific odds, specific O/U, etc. etc.).

Now this became a rather long post. I must warn that I might have misthought or miscalculated something in there, happens sometimes. I like to write everything out like this though, to see what I think and at the same time see if the things I think would make any sense as actual systems.