Sports Betting – A Deep Dive Into Pro Bettors’ Thought Process
Professional sports betting requires an in-depth knowledge of sports and an ability to identify value bets. Although odds may fluctuate constantly, having access to the proper tools and strategies will help increase your win rate and help ensure greater returns.
The tactical depth of video gaming is not unlike sports betting where well-directed bankroll management and detailed analysis are the keys to its success.
They’re Unbiased
Smart gamblers know to put the feelings behind them and make sound bets, be it on poker or sporting events. Annie Duke’s best-selling Thinking in Bets tells us to play decision-making like poker – thinking about options and odds, but be prepared to pivot when new information appears.
Professional bettors are not biased when analyzing sports and teams, and they look for mismatches between projections and the oddsmakers’ lines that can make you large profits with multiple plays. They are also staking conservatively with no more than 1-2% of their bankroll per bet.
Losing-hunting is a popular betting emotional vice, and it’s the attempt to pick up the tab with larger bets or riskier bets. Professional gamblers understand losses as part of the game and make allowances for them.
They’re Team Players
In comparison to using your intuition and gut instinct, the pros make their decisions based on sophisticated statistical and mathematical tools such as expected value, regression and probability modelling.
They use aggressive line shopping, looking for odds that have positive expected value (EUR2.8 at 50% chance of winning) and watching close lines and player sets through bet-room software like OddsJam.
This way they can make money even when their team is losing, as long as they play smart. This keeps the players busy, and operators benefit from this by providing new deals and promotions with seasons passing – like offering wagers on large international games such as NFL rivalries can keep their customers engaged with those sports leagues.
They’re Long-Term Thinkers
We can all get away with chasing short-term wins, but as any good gambler knows, regular wins demand a long-term plan. This perspective supports punters to transcend feelings that can influence immediate action, and stimulates thinking and calculated risk.
Cognitive Reappraisal — Cognitive Reappraisal re-frames bettors in ways that help them defy irrational action. This also avoids the traps of chase losses or betting more than they can lose.
It’s effects-regulation strategies like noticing what gets us excited about things that are a good way to keep the disciplined, strategic thinking in play. Seeing losing bets as opportunity costs (like buying a TV) can help gamblers stay in the flow, and reducing negative self-talk can stop them engaging in irrational decision-making.
They’re Adaptable
Betting is done by numbers and statistics – not guesses – by successful gamblers. They record everything that’s been bet, tweak what works and then, in the end, make consistent profits from all the effort.
If you know how progressive and fixed betting systems work, it will help bettors adjust based on each case, and a well-managed bankroll can help you reduce losses during long cold streaks.
For a bettors with eyes for the ball, cognitive biases such as confirmation bias and hindsight bias distort how teams, players and games look to them. The knowledge of these cognitive biases allows the bettors to be objective, while rejecting superstitions or unreasonable beliefs; in other words, reduce variance impacts on profit margins.
They’re Networkers
To be a successful sports bettor is to find bets that give +EV, or expected value. To do that you need to understand the odds changing throughout the day, how to monitor lines and when to bet – all skills that take years of practice to master.
Pro gamblers toil away hours delving into stats and lines to determine mathematically advantageous bets and to hedge up and arbitrage bets to earn the biggest profits. More than that, successful bettors know how to manage their money effectively – never wagering more than they can lose on any one bet, reinvesting winnings to build the long-term value, and then turning a big profit each year.
