Gratifying that at least a couple of people have had their interest in NBA betting piqued by my recent observations on the effect of big spreads on Totals betting.
Very interesting post, involving a lot of data analysis/research.
I rarely bet on basketball, (which is probably a mistake), but was fascinated by the book 'Gaming the Game', which, as you are probably aware, largely recounts the tale, of a bent basketball ref, shaving points on games, he had bet on.
In trades across many sports, 'mug' punters want to see action, and many 'Mr Unders' type betting strategies will be profitable, as it seems the lines are inflated, to account for this public need.
Keep up the good work.Whether or not rarely betting on basketball is a mistake rather depends on whether your betting would be profitable in the long-term.
The book Bossman references, "Gaming The Game" is about the 2006-07 scandal involving NBA referee Tim Donaghy and professional gambler Jimmy Battista.
The suggestion that Unders betting strategies might be profitable because mug punters like to see scoring is one that has been mooted before. While Unders is the preferred long-term strategy, I'm not convinced it is because of the 'mug' punters.
Across the major US sports, Unders wins more than 50% of the time (excluding Pushes) in every sport, but only in the NHL would blindly backing it be a profitable strategy. Since the start of the 2013 season, Unders are hitting at 52.34%, which at Pinnacle Sports' 1.952 represents a 72.62 point profit from 3,749 bets, an ROI of 1.94%.
In Canada, the Canadian Football League from 2013 on has an even better ROI of 3.72%, but from just 321 bets. Only three more games to play this season with the Division Finals today, and the Grey Cup Final next week. In the NFL, last week was a big week for Unders with 10 wins from 13 (two Pushes).
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Hi,
I have re-read your post a few times, and it leads me to want to ask many questions, which, I feel are probably unfair to ask.
Data mining, is a long laborious task, (at least it can be), and different data sets, often lead punters, to new areas of interest.
USA sports tend to have poor liquidity on the Betfair in-running mkts (at least for now), but it would be interesting to know,for example, the outcome of placing a bet on unders, at half-time, when it was a dog.
I continue to think, one day, there will be as much money in teaching US sports bettors how to re-think their trading strats, as to just betting them.
Hope the statistical bias continues.
Best wishes.
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