Betting Questions

[Andy Capp]

Sometimes (often) people say "that's parlay material" which is a nonsensical statement, if you don't factor in bet sizing limitations.

If it's good enough to bet in a parlay, it's good enough to bet straight up. Cause it's the same bet either way.

If you bet two -400 guys together in a parlay, you're just doing -400 on one guy, and if he wins, you're doing the 100 again plus the winnings on the other guy straight again.. it doesn't change the math

"I won't bet it straight but I'll parlay it" USUALLY means that someone is tricking himself into liking a line more than he does. The bookies prey on this.

So, I bet a 3-way parlay (-360,--260, -260) at +145. It's the same as betting on all 3 individually? By betting how much? I put 1u on it and I will be up 1.45u if I they all win. Do I make the same betting them all individually, and don't I have to put more of my bankroll at risk to do so?

 

[NinjaCat456]

So, I bet a 3-way parlay (-360,--260, -260) at +145. It's the same as betting on all 3 individually? By betting how much? I put 1u on it and I will be up 1.45u if I they all win. Do I make the same betting them all individually, and don't I have to put more of my bankroll at risk to do so?

A parlay is just rolling the stake + winnings from one selection (providing it wins) on to the next and so on until the parlay is closed. Trouble is parlays bust notoriously easily and betting those selections individually reduces your exposure to variance.

 

[rev0lver]

Sometimes (often) people say "that's parlay material" which is a nonsensical statement, if you don't factor in bet sizing limitations.

If it's good enough to bet in a parlay, it's good enough to bet straight up. Cause it's the same bet either way.

If you bet two -400 guys together in a parlay, you're just doing -400 on one guy, and if he wins, you're doing the 100 again plus the winnings on the other guy straight again.. it doesn't change the math

"I won't bet it straight but I'll parlay it" USUALLY means that someone is tricking himself into liking a line more than he does. The bookies prey on this.

Do you not think it's ok depending on what your personal betting limits are though?

For example, I don't make a huge income and supplement with putting small amounts each paycheck into betting. Usually $150 or less, maybe more if I'm carrying over a profitable betting week. If I see a line I'm very confident in, but it's -350, I don't really have the resources to make much off that. But if there's a dog I really like on the same card, why not attach the -350 to that?

 

[EzFlyer]

Do you not think it's ok depending on what your personal betting limits are though?

For example, I don't make a huge income and supplement with putting small amounts each paycheck into betting. Usually $150 or less, maybe more if I'm carrying over a profitable betting week. If I see a line I'm very confident in, but it's -350, I don't really have the resources to make much off that. But if there's a dog I really like on the same card, why not attach the -350 to that?

betting limits i meant regarding the amount the bookies will let you bet

if someone has a small bank roll, he should use small limits

 

[NinjaCat456]

Do you not think it's ok depending on what your personal betting limits are though?

For example, I don't make a huge income and supplement with putting small amounts each paycheck into betting. Usually $150 or less, maybe more if I'm carrying over a profitable betting week. If I see a line I'm very confident in, but it's -350, I don't really have the resources to make much off that. But if there's a dog I really like on the same card, why not attach the -350 to that?

That can work for a while but how bad are you going to feel when it's the -350 lock that busts your bet? I've done beautiful 6-leg parlays where everything hits bar the -500 certainty I added just to add a few pennies to the winnings. It's a horrible feeling.

 

[rev0lver]

That can work for a while but how bad are you going to feel when it's the -350 lock that busts your bet? I've done beautiful 6-leg parlays where everything hits bar the -500 certainty I added just to add a few pennies to the winnings. It's a horrible feeling.

I've had it happen both ways lol

 

[Andy Capp]

A parlay is just rolling the stake + winnings from one selection (providing it wins) on to the next and so on until the parlay is closed. Trouble is parlays bust notoriously easily and betting those selections individually reduces your exposure to variance.

But straight betting on each (in the case I mentioned) triples your stake and exposes you to more risk. So, there is, in fact, a time when it's good to straight bet and a good time to parlay. I'm trying to get a better grasp on the finer points of that... @EzFlyer your input is desirable here.

 

[EzFlyer]

But straight betting on each (in the case I mentioned) triples your stake and exposes you to more risk. So, there is, in fact, a time when it's good to straight bet and a good time to parlay. I'm trying to get a better grasp on the finer points of that... @EzFlyer your input is desirable here.

just gonna spell some things out for you and others

there's no more risk, it's just tricking you into betting something you don't wanna bet, if you don't know what you're doing

it's letting you commit to more things than you would otherwise, etc

let's say you use 5dimes. let's say you wanna make a parlay on fight day of two guys who are both -200.

you bet $100 on the two-team parlay. it pays $125, or +125
the reason it pays +125 is because:
$100 on fighter A pays $50 (risk divided by 2, cause -200)
then you roll the risk again as well as the would-be winnings into:
$150 (100+50) on fighter B pays $75 (again, risk divided by 2, cause -200)
$50 from first leg + $75 from second leg = $125. (125 / 100 = 1.25, aka +125)

say you started with $100 on straight bets, same situation.

you could bet $100 on the first fighter. if he loses, you lose.. just like the parlay. but if he wins, you get $150 back into your account (100 risk + 50 winnings). then you decide to bet 150 for 75 on the 2nd fighter. as you can see, it pays the same net result from the same original risk.

remember: the order of the fights does not change the parlay payout, whether it's two guys or 100. a parlay is SIMPLY rolled up straight bets. the math doesn't change whatsoever.

sidenote: if you're doing this on 5dimes, you probably have reduced lines available for STRAIGHT bets only, not parlays. so you could, in fact, bet that $100 risk on fighter A at -190, instead of -200.. which would pay out $52.63. and then you could risk that $152.63 on the 2nd fighter at -190 also on reduced, which would pay 80.33.
52.63 + 80.33 = 132.96. that's an 8% profit on your winnings rather than the parlay at the same risk.

hope that clears some things up.

 

[Andy Capp]

just gonna spell some things out for you and others

there's no more risk, it's just tricking you into betting something you don't wanna bet, if you don't know what you're doing

it's letting you commit to more things than you would otherwise, etc

let's say you use 5dimes. let's say you wanna make a parlay on fight day of two guys who are both -200.

you bet $100 on the two-team parlay. it pays $125, or +125
the reason it pays +125 is because:
$100 on fighter A pays $50 (risk divided by 2, cause -200)
then you roll the risk again as well as the would-be winnings into:
$150 (100+50) on fighter B pays $75 (again, risk divided by 2, cause -200)
$50 from first leg + $75 from second leg = $125. (125 / 100 = 1.25, aka +125)

say you started with $100 on straight bets, same situation.

you could bet $100 on the first fighter. if he loses, you lose.. just like the parlay. but if he wins, you get $150 back into your account (100 risk + 50 winnings). then you decide to bet 150 for 75 on the 2nd fighter. as you can see, it pays the same net result from the same original risk.

remember: the order of the fights does not change the parlay payout, whether it's two guys or 100. a parlay is SIMPLY rolled up straight bets. the math doesn't change whatsoever.

sidenote: if you're doing this on 5dimes, you probably have reduced lines available for STRAIGHT bets only, not parlays. so you could, in fact, bet that $100 risk on fighter A at -190, instead of -200.. which would pay out $52.63. and then you could risk that $152.63 on the 2nd fighter at -190 also on reduced, which would pay 80.33.
52.63 + 80.33 = 132.96. that's an 8% profit on your winnings rather than the parlay at the same risk.

hope that clears some things up.

It does. When you add the amount you (presumably) won from your first wager, to the original stake, and do it again on subsequent bets, you make out the same if they all win, however, what about the vig? You only pay vig on 1 bet instead of 3. I presume the bookies take this into account when setting the line for your parlay, but how would you work out the math to know if that's true or not? I.e. can you verify you're paying the same vig if it's 3 bets vs 1?

Edit: and isn't this related to how gamblers can take advantage of arbitrage?

 

[Andy Capp]

Aside from the vig, which is maybe a finer edge than I need to worry about at this early stage, the explanation from @EzFlyer makes perfect sense from the point of view that the bookies will always have the math worked out. But then, it sort of raises the question, aside from the convenience of only having to place one bet instead of 3, is there really only downside to parlays? I get the roll over part, so I'm presuming you could place another bet after an earlier contest is decided.

If that is the case, does that also mean that in that scenario, if I won on the first bet and only wanted to bet 1u again on the second bet and the third, instead of rolling over, that parlays are a totally bad idea?

Edit: of course, I just realized there is the phenomenon of changing betting lines, particularly close to the start of the fight. What factors allow you to infer which way the line will move?

 

[Andy Capp]

Wow, just thinking about the answers I may receive to the 2 previous posts has given me new insight into low-volume betting on 1 on 1 contests.

It's definitely different if you are a volume bettor looking for a finer edge. I'm thinking about people betting on 10 or so football (either kind) or baseball games per week or what have you. I wonder if we could also hear about how volume/edge affects betting patterns.

 

[EzFlyer]

just remember: it's all the same. every bet the sportsbooks offer. you can never get "better" than the straight plays. equal or worse (worse meaning if you buy points and such on team sports etc)

 

[Andy Capp]

There's no difference between parlays and straights. yet people bet things in parlays that they wouldn't bet straight.

There's nothing wrong with a parlay.

The only thing that's wrong is betting a line in one and not the other.

I think this is what was really throwing me off. I had it in my head the incentive to betting a parlay was to get better odds because if one of your picks loses you lose the entire stake compared with making separate bets. I don't know why but I just didn't think it would be the same. That being the case though, I can't see any reason for betting a parlay. The fights the other night were a perfect example. I bet a 3-way parlay, the 1st one won, the 2nd lost and the 3rd won. If I had made 3 separate bets I'd have won 2 and lost won instead of losing everything.

Why would anyone bet a parlay in that case? There has to be some benefit to it that hasn't been mentioned.... doesn't there?

 

[null]

Parlays mostly work on simple psychology, not some kind of enhanced mathematics. It's not much fun nor is it psychologically very satisfying to bet $100 to win a pittance like $17 on a big favorite, then put that combined $117 on another big favorite to win another small amount like $35 and then try to put the combined stake plus winnings again to make a third leg and end up winning about $100 net in total. It's much more satisfying to bet all three bets in advance to risk say $100 to win $100. Also, if the events overlap because they are on at the same time, you won't be able to bet one after another in sequence anyway. And lastly, if you were to wait until fight day or game day to bet, the odds could be much worse due to line movement than if you locked them down days or weeks ahead.

 

[iGnP]

I think this is what was really throwing me off. I had it in my head the incentive to betting a parlay was to get better odds because if one of your picks loses you lose the entire stake compared with making separate bets. I don't know why but I just didn't think it would be the same. That being the case though, I can't see any reason for betting a parlay. The fights the other night were a perfect example. I bet a 3-way parlay, the 1st one won, the 2nd lost and the 3rd won. If I had made 3 separate bets I'd have won 2 and lost won instead of losing everything.

Why would anyone bet a parlay in that case? There has to be some benefit to it that hasn't been mentioned.... doesn't there?

only real reason to use a parlay:

let's say you have a parlay on two baseball teams, let's call them team A and team B. i think its been touched on that the math works out the same, and a parlay of the team A and B is equal to winning on team A and rolling the original stake plus the winnings onto team B. Well, what if both teams play at the same time? You wouldn't be able to roll one team's winnings onto the other in the conventional manner. throwing them in a parlay essentially bypasses this issue

 

[Barkus]

Think of parlays as letting your winning bets ride. If you have a 10 team parlay, you're letting the stake + winnings ride from one bet to the next 10 times over. You can do the same thing manually, but most people who aren't total degenerates would not, because by the end the stakes can get pretty damn high. It's why people hedge when their parlays near the end. But doing that means you're just taking action on both sides and losing on the spead, it's doing the bookie a favour.

I've noticed a lot of guys like to parlays favourites to make a bet close to even money. Luca does this all the time. It seems like a lot of bettors just like to have even money bets . I think it's probably why the point spread is more popular than the money line in NFL football. I don't see any logic is behind this, I think it's purely psychological.

My take on parlays is that they can be useful for getting around betting limits and locking in odds if you don't have a large bankroll. They can also be fun if you want to make lottery tickets. But otherwise they have no useful value. And you'll lose value when you inevitably hedge in the end. You can further lose value using because some books will give you slightly worse lines (no reduced juice) when you build your parlay.

 

[Barkus]

when you say bet mma live, you mean betting between rounds or between fights? Could you break some live betting strategies?

Have you tried it yet mate? Recognising signs of faltering cardio, pacing and anticipating judges' scoring are big factors live betting. I don't have time to research all the fights from card to card (not even close), but I have made decent bank from live betting often without knowing anything about the fighters themselves. Being familiar with how fights tend to play out is necessary for beating live betting.

 

[LEMONZEST]

There is a convenience factor as well with locking in plays. Time is a limiting factor for most of us with other shit to do.

In addition time is a limiting factor if you want to make a handful of parlays. For example lets say I make 10 parlays with 5-10 legs each. Without using parlays that means I need to quickly make 10 bets between every fight which is not much fun and is hard to keep track of.

I think generally parlays are best played low risk high reward, that is to say bet a small amount on a potentially large return.

 

[Andy Capp]

Great answers, but they all mean they are practically useless in MMA. Good to know.

 

[Roads55]

Aside from the vig, which is maybe a finer edge than I need to worry about at this early stage, the explanation from @EzFlyer makes perfect sense from the point of view that the bookies will always have the math worked out. But then, it sort of raises the question, aside from the convenience of only having to place one bet instead of 3, is there really only downside to parlays? I get the roll over part, so I'm presuming you could place another bet after an earlier contest is decided.

If that is the case, does that also mean that in that scenario, if I won on the first bet and only wanted to bet 1u again on the second bet and the third, instead of rolling over, that parlays are a totally bad idea?

Edit: of course, I just realized there is the phenomenon of changing betting lines, particularly close to the start of the fight. What factors allow you to infer which way the line will move?

Great answers, but they all mean they are practically useless in MMA. Good to know.

slightly disagree with people saying there is no benefit to parleys, the math works out the same if you don't account for odds movement, so if you anticipate odds getting worse then locking them up in a parley can be valuable, not to mention the time saved and the inability to roll over single winnings onto something happening simultaneously (like ignp mentioned) which happens a lot in soccer, basketball, gridiron, tennis etc. but this goes both ways, alternatively if you think the odds on something might get better than holding out and rolling winnings over onto the next selection can be a good idea too.

there's nothing about odds changing that's a phenomenon, it's 100% natural otherwise everyone is basically agreeing that the odds are right. there's many ways to predict movement such as public sentiment, comparing various sites to look for trends one way or the other, your own analysis of the event to name a few.

but yeah the emphasis on parleys with the general public is all psychological, casuals bet for fun and think they are being smart when they make some long-shot parleys which if you factored in the overround taken out of each selection means they are mainly getting terrible value. parleys only are worth doing if the odds aren't too juiced and you think they infer value. one way to get around the overround is to roll over winnings on exchange markets (if you have access) where the juice removed from the lines is minimal.