Do you use Kelly criterion or flat bet?

[rito]

 

Not many people realistically have a 100,000 dollar bankroll. How could I ever get down large play if I needed to reserve 99% of my BR??

 

But the ones that do usually started with $500 and bet 1%

[Flying Dutchman]

OK, Lets get real...

 

99%+ of the punters, certainly on this site are NOT pros. You/they may think you are, but from reasoning I'm seeing here, you're not.

 

Now, this is not a criticism, you need to know who you are.

 

This means you are NOT going to get rich of this stuff. Most of the so-called pros don't get rich off this stuff, but make a reasonable or increasingly now, a not so reasonable living. BUT! you can have fun with it. Enjoy your betting like you enjoy a good vacation. And, like you are on vacation, you want to make your money stretch for the entire vacation (or season like in sports) so you can have some money to wager on the Super Bowl or college bowls at season's end without tapping the kid's college money.

 

If you burn up your bankroll by mid-season, you'll have a short, sad vacation. BR management is exactly like managing your money on vacation.

 

Thats where systems like the Century system comes from. It lets you enjoy your entire vacation, or season.

 

And, even if you are a pro, Kelly Betting can be death-on-a-stick. You absolutely MUST know your win %, and even most pros do not. And unless you are extremely good at math, and can use either excel well or can program, STAY THE FVCK AWAY FROM KELLY. Even when you think you know your win%, it is very easy to go wrong. Sports change, the sports market changes, coaches change, training methods change, and the sports market is increasing getting sharper.

 

Betting $20 or $5 a game can make it fun & interesting, so why not? Is someone grading your bets? "Dude, you're not betting $1000 a game so you're a wuss"?

 

Get over it. AND, if you are good, you'll slowly increase your BR and be able to sleep nights.

[pokerjoe]

If you are betting for fun, bet all of it if you want, assuming it's truly losable money, if that rush is what's fun for you. If "what's fun for you" is to have a lot of small action for the whole season, bet that way.

 

It's only if you're trying to find out whether you're a winner that you should even think about BR management.

 

But there's this effect to consider (and I've seen it a gazillion times in poker): if you depo 500 and bet it and double up, you're going to try again, the double and re-double, and you'll never crack that addiction.

 

Every once in a while we all hear about some guy who won millions but then lost it all back. People always ask, "Why didn't he quit when he was up 1 million?" But if he was the type to quit when he got to 1 million, he never would have got to 1 million, because he first would have had to NOT quit at 1/2 million, and before that, not quit at 1/4 million, and so on, and by the fact that he got up 1 million at some point, you know he wasn't the type to stop pressing his luck. So he was always doomed. The real sickos in gambling aren't trying to win money.

 

Everyone's going to be what they want, period. If they have an action junkie's personality, they're going to keep it almost all in play; if they're risk averse, they'll bet a small percentage. But your bet size will always, when you get down to it, be emotion-based, and no amount of math in the world can change that fact.

 

What's the percentage of guys who start out thinking they'll keep to a certain BR plan, and then actually keep to it? I'd say <1%. It doesn't do most people any good to think in terms of BR if, after a bad weekend, they try to get even on MNF. And that's by far how most people approach it. And of course, if you're a losing player, the only real question is, do you want to lose slowly or quickly? And who's to say losing slowly is better?

[pokerjoe]

Unless you're a professional gambler (at which point i'd assume the whole question should be answered by yourself) the whole bankroll thing is a misnomer. The money you have to bet simply should be money you can afford to lose for everyone else. So whatever system regulating bet amounts is arbitrary unless you're just looking to extend the life of it whereby something like 1%/BR would be a good rule to follow. If people want to follow strict BR guidelines it's fine' date=' but realistically there's no point implemending a system for most people since they're not pros. In fact I think it would be better for some just to go 5%/20%+ (or whatever their pain threshold can handle) as flat betting something like $50 a game over the long haul would be like water torture for 99% of people.[/quote']

 

Okay, somehow I missed your post. I could have saved myself the trouble of the above post, for the most part.

[pokerjoe]

especially when factoring in bonuses' date=' i think chris/spankie approach is better for almost all posters/bettors. the use of varying amounts of "bankroll" implies that it could never be replenished and doesn't move. if i just inherited 500k (i wish) then my bankroll just went up big time, why should a game i like this week be bet at 5k and last week only $100?[/quote']

 

Uh, because your BR just went up by 500k? Is this a trick question?

 

But I'm reminded of poker author Mike Caro's point about large BR's being more precious than small ones. If you're almost broke, "fuck it, bet all of it" might actually be a fair approach. Go big or go home can make sense partly because going home might be the best thing for you, and partly because small BR's are more easily re-raised (I vote for the former, btw; go the fuck home, and if you can't do that while you have money in your pocket, then do yourself a favor and lose the money in your pocket as fast as possible, and then hopefully, on the long drive home, realize that you suck at gambling and get on with your life).

[Flying Dutchman]

 

What's the percentage of guys who start out thinking they'll keep to a certain BR plan, and then actually keep to it? I'd say <1%. It doesn't do most people any good to think in terms of BR if, after a bad weekend, they try to get even on MNF. And that's by far how most people approach it. And of course, if you're a losing player, the only real question is, do you want to lose slowly or quickly? And who's to say losing slowly is better?

 

Yup, bet the entire BR on the first game of the season. If you win, stop as a winner for the season. Lose, well...you were going to lose it anyway.

 

 

[GameBred]

OK, Lets get real...

 

99%+ of the punters, certainly on this site are NOT pros. You/they may think you are, but from reasoning I'm seeing here, you're not.

 

How would a pro reason this out?

 

I have my reservations about even the top notch pros being able to gauge their edge with the granular accuracy necessary to make fully Kelly viable (you seem to agree). Even if you are the nuts when it comes to sports investing and have an intimate knowledge of Kelly, there is a 50% chance you could experience a 50% drawdown using full Kelly; way too much volatility for me. If you lose 50% of your trading equity, you need to make 100% back just to get back to break even. Forgive me but I would much rather have 2% smooth returns than 3% choppy ones. I am well aware that if you turn over 1 million in the market, 3% ROI returns 50% more profits than 2% ROI .

 

I would assume most pros trade their equity curve using a proportional fixed fractional BR system along with their perceived edge (typically 1% of current BR +/- any perceived edge). I have given this much thought and it seems to be the best balance between being offensive and defensive with one’s money management strategy.

 

Do you find this logic flawed?

[pokerjoe]

Dug this up from a post I made at EOG once on the subject of the limitations of Kelly.

 

Cleaned up a little for grammar, concision and snarkiness (actually, almost entirely re-written).

 

I--and many of you--really do get snarky on forums, don't we? For me it's because that's my inner voice when thinking about gambling. I tend to think to myself, "You were a fucking idiot, trying to bluff that guy."

Good poker players--and people who end up being good--are pretty blunt with themselves and each other. If I made a bad bluff in a game and asked you about it later,you'd say only, "Are you kidding me? That guy's folding there, like, never, you idiot." Ain't no one good at poker going to hold your hand and say, "You tried, you know? Good for you. Participation badge!"

 

Anyway:

 

 

 

Kelly is something of an illusion. You guess at your edge, you guess at your bankroll, you plug those guesses into an equation and end up with non-guess?

 

You don't know your edge. You estimate it as best you can, but you don't know it. Even when middling the NFL 3, we'd all agree you have an edge, but no one knows exactly what it is because no one has anything but an estimate on the NFL 3 push frequency. Even with the same DB (and choosing/building a DB is itself an estimation), give that DB to 5 sharps, and you will get 5 different push frequencies. They may not differ much from each other, but there's pretty much no chance their push frequencies will be the same by the second decimal place.

 

Your BR, the same. Most people take a % of their net and say "This is my BR for sports betting." I do that, too.

 

But that BR is chosen by emotional comfort, so Kelly becomes a way of structuring your bets to fit your emotional comfort zone. That's fine, just let's not pretend it isn't an emotional calculation, even if done with numbers. That's what KC is generally: a way of structuring bets in an organized fashion for people who are happier betting that way (which is me, btw). There are people who find emotional comfort in math (me again) because we know it can lead to greater accuracy in estimation, and also because we believe that if we have the emotional ability to stick with the math calcs, we'll be less prone to the negatives of emotionalistic decisions, and thus more profitable long run, which is ... emotionally satisfying.

 

But then again the people with the emotional ability to stick to a BR plan while losing were already, by definition, less likely to make emotionalistic betting decisions.

 

And, in truth, people who use Kelly emotionalize their edge calcs, too. They either use their full edge estimate with a fractional Kelly, or a fractional edge estimate with full Kelly (which puts you in the same place, obv), or horribly overbet. That fraction is arrived at my emotions.

 

If you've made X bets at Y%, you still don't know your edge. If you decide to assume that you actually have Y%, that's an emotion-based decision. Yes, it is, sorry, because you could also say, "I should have 2X bets before assuming Y% is accurate to degree C, therefore ..." Statistical accuracy measures come on a continuum, they aren't absolutes, thus it is not possible to get your instincts/emotions out of the equation.

 

Here's the thing to remember about Kelly, even if you don't use it: to maximize profits, bet more when you have more edge, but always also remember that even with an edge, if you bet too much, you'll go broke. BR management is, most fundamentally, for those with an edge, a battle between those two truths.

 

For those without an edge, BRM is really only a budgetary matter.

 

 

[Flying Dutchman]

 

How would a pro reason this out?

 

I have my reservations about even the top notch pros being able to gauge their edge with the granular accuracy necessary to make fully Kelly viable (you seem to agree). Even if you are the nuts when it comes to sports investing and have an intimate knowledge of Kelly, there is a 50% chance you could experience a 50% drawdown using full Kelly; way too much volatility for me. If you lose 50% of your trading equity, you need to make 100% back just to get back to break even. Forgive me but I would much rather have 2% smooth returns than 3% choppy ones. I am well aware that if you turn over 1 million in the market, 3% ROI returns 50% more profits than 2% ROI .

 

I would assume most pros trade their equity curve using a proportional fixed fractional BR system along with their perceived edge (typically 1% of current BR +/- any perceived edge). I have given this much thought and it seems to be the best balance between being offensive and defensive with one’s money management strategy.

 

Do you find this logic flawed?

 

I'll take the 3% choppy, I can take the roller coaster ride IF I KNOW I'M PERFORMING AT MY GIVEN WIN%. Typically I divide initial BR into two pots, ~5% for parlays, ~95% for "regular" action. Parlays go at Kelly, regulars go at a modified Kelly according to Bayesian Smoothers over a certain look-back period which is fairly complicated. The "~" means that % will move according to how sweet the parlay payouts are.

 

I'm not going to comment on your system. You've got to do risk according to your own risk tolerance.

[Brutus Buckeye]

Great discussion. I've learned quite a bit.

[Guest ChrisHarvard]

If you are betting for fun, bet all of it if you want, assuming it's truly losable money, if that rush is what's fun for you. If "what's fun for you" is to have a lot of small action for the whole season, bet that way.

 

It's only if you're trying to find out whether you're a winner that you should even think about BR management.

 

But there's this effect to consider (and I've seen it a gazillion times in poker): if you depo 500 and bet it and double up, you're going to try again, the double and re-double, and you'll never crack that addiction.

 

Every once in a while we all hear about some guy who won millions but then lost it all back. People always ask, "Why didn't he quit when he was up 1 million?" But if he was the type to quit when he got to 1 million, he never would have got to 1 million, because he first would have had to NOT quit at 1/2 million, and before that, not quit at 1/4 million, and so on, and by the fact that he got up 1 million at some point, you know he wasn't the type to stop pressing his luck. So he was always doomed. The real sickos in gambling aren't trying to win money.

 

Everyone's going to be what they want, period. If they have an action junkie's personality, they're going to keep it almost all in play; if they're risk averse, they'll bet a small percentage. But your bet size will always, when you get down to it, be emotion-based, and no amount of math in the world can change that fact.

 

What's the percentage of guys who start out thinking they'll keep to a certain BR plan, and then actually keep to it? I'd say <1%. It doesn't do most people any good to think in terms of BR if, after a bad weekend, they try to get even on MNF. And that's by far how most people approach it. And of course, if you're a losing player, the only real question is, do you want to lose slowly or quickly? And who's to say losing slowly is better?

 

 

Insightful post!

[Guest ChrisHarvard]

PokerJoe, what was the comback kid, Stu Ungar's style of play and what can we learn from his example?

[FISHHEAD]

Always love discussions on KELLY C

[milwaukee mike]

PokerJoe' date=' what was the comback kid, Stu Ungar's style of play and what can we learn from his example?[/quote']

 

 

he sure was ahead of his time! i wish i could go back in time 40 years and play poker, some of those guys were good at reads/tells but even a mediocre player today would have a huge advantage back then.

 

i think many things can be learned, one of which is the effect of drugs/alcohol on gambling. it exacerbates the "what the fuck" aspect of shoving a bunch of money on -ev wagers. gambling is a weird thing, even the "professional" gamblers can grind, grind, grind, make 1000, and then piss 3000 away in an online casino in 5 minutes.

 

and at the end of the day, does it really matter? yes it feels bad for a while after a big, dumb loss, but it's better than feeling nothing. and none of us are freezing to death or starving to death so who cares?

[Chickadee]

PokerJoe' date=' what was the comback kid, Stu Ungar's style of play and what can we learn from his example?[/quote']

 

Stu's biggest financial mistake was crossbooking with someone like Doyle Brunson. The ratio of money pissed away was probably 19-1 sports betting to drugs. He was obviously a skilled gambler when it came to poker, blackjack and gin rummy where his eidetic memory gave him an edge along with his aggression but he was eaten alive betting against even a rudimentary 'model' (which I believe Doyle and co had at their disposal for MLB/NFL at that time) in those soft markets.

 

 

 

[Flying Dutchman]

Dug this up from a post I made at EOG once on the subject of the limitations of Kelly.

 

Cleaned up a little for grammar, concision and snarkiness (actually, almost entirely re-written).

 

I--and many of you--really do get snarky on forums, don't we? For me it's because that's my inner voice when thinking about gambling. I tend to think to myself, "You were a fucking idiot, trying to bluff that guy."

Good poker players--and people who end up being good--are pretty blunt with themselves and each other. If I made a bad bluff in a game and asked you about it later,you'd say only, "Are you kidding me? That guy's folding there, like, never, you idiot." Ain't no one good at poker going to hold your hand and say, "You tried, you know? Good for you. Participation badge!"

 

Anyway:

 

 

 

Kelly is something of an illusion. You guess at your edge, you guess at your bankroll, you plug those guesses into an equation and end up with non-guess?

 

You don't know your edge. You estimate it as best you can, but you don't know it. Even when middling the NFL 3, we'd all agree you have an edge, but no one knows exactly what it is because no one has anything but an estimate on the NFL 3 push frequency. Even with the same DB (and choosing/building a DB is itself an estimation), give that DB to 5 sharps, and you will get 5 different push frequencies. They may not differ much from each other, but there's pretty much no chance their push frequencies will be the same by the second decimal place.

 

Your BR, the same. Most people take a % of their net and say "This is my BR for sports betting." I do that, too.

 

But that BR is chosen by emotional comfort, so Kelly becomes a way of structuring your bets to fit your emotional comfort zone. That's fine, just let's not pretend it isn't an emotional calculation, even if done with numbers. That's what KC is generally: a way of structuring bets in an organized fashion for people who are happier betting that way (which is me, btw). There are people who find emotional comfort in math (me again) because we know it can lead to greater accuracy in estimation, and also because we believe that if we have the emotional ability to stick with the math calcs, we'll be less prone to the negatives of emotionalistic decisions, and thus more profitable long run, which is ... emotionally satisfying.

 

But then again the people with the emotional ability to stick to a BR plan while losing were already, by definition, less likely to make emotionalistic betting decisions.

 

And, in truth, people who use Kelly emotionalize their edge calcs, too. They either use their full edge estimate with a fractional Kelly, or a fractional edge estimate with full Kelly (which puts you in the same place, obv), or horribly overbet. That fraction is arrived at my emotions.

 

If you've made X bets at Y%, you still don't know your edge. If you decide to assume that you actually have Y%, that's an emotion-based decision. Yes, it is, sorry, because you could also say, "I should have 2X bets before assuming Y% is accurate to degree C, therefore ..." Statistical accuracy measures come on a continuum, they aren't absolutes, thus it is not possible to get your instincts/emotions out of the equation.

 

Here's the thing to remember about Kelly, even if you don't use it: to maximize profits, bet more when you have more edge, but always also remember that even with an edge, if you bet too much, you'll go broke. BR management is, most fundamentally, for those with an edge, a battle between those two truths.

 

For those without an edge, BRM is really only a budgetary matter.

 

 

This is a very good post. I wish I had written it.

 

...and it seems to have magically appeared as I did NOT see it here before this moment so I think there is still some jacking around on posts getting inserted with the unstable software.

 

Poker gets at a point here that the precision dudes ignore, using math and especially a "math proof" to shore up one's emotional structure. Being a math guy, I wanted to gain some insight into Kelly so I built a simulation to see how fast things roll off either side of the best point "proven" by Kelly, i.e. what is the frequency distribution of the entire set of bet fractions. The Monte Carlo simulation was set up to maximize BR growth in a set amount of time, measured by the median value of the total simulated finishing BRs; I used medians as averages are really skewed in the long-tailed environment Kelly lives in. To my astonishment, Kelly was not optimal, it was suboptimal. The actual "optimum" was much higher. I knew I made a mistake, so I reran it; same result. Rewrote the simulation; same result. My conclusion? Kelly apparently did not "prove" anything. Remember he did a proof symbolically back in 1957, he did not use a computer to verify anything as there were not many to use anyway.

 

So now, my new "optimal" fraction was so high, that even a numbers crazy guy like me could NOT make bets at that fraction. I went back to using Kelly as a "comfortable" upper bound, and forgot about using the simulation or that new "optimal" fraction again.

 

Flash forward a few years and after several seasons of in-season betting and I'm noticing that simultaneous events are tending to have more "Black Swan" events than they should under Gaussian conditions. i.e. for example, I'm getting a whole lot of 1-9, 9-1, 12-0, 0-12 results than what truly independent events should have. The only thing in common was: all these events were happening more or less at the same time, but usually within the same sport.

 

My conclusion? Either the universe hates true independence, or I'm simply not smart enough to recognize it when it does not exist. Either way, even "sub-optimal" full Kelly can be troublesome for my BR. Bear in mind, I have used Kelly on several occasions to run a BR 10x and even 20x, apparently missing the Black Swans by chance.

 

So, I mostly use fractional Kelly, comfortable with it...and look at all my lab results as possible win%s, and certainly not, in any way, an absolute reflection of how good my forecast simulations are, even with best hold out db methods. And even if they were, I'm not comfortable with betting them optimally, either Kelly or that "new optimal" fraction.

[Guest ChrisHarvard]

 

Stu's biggest financial mistake was crossbooking with someone like Doyle Brunson. The ratio of money pissed away was probably 19-1 sports betting to drugs. He was obviously a skilled gambler when it came to poker, blackjack and gin rummy where his eidetic memory gave him an edge along with his aggression but he was eaten alive betting against even a rudimentary 'model' (which I believe Doyle and co had at their disposal for MLB/NFL at that time) in those soft markets.

 

 

 

[Flying Dutchman]

 

Stu's biggest financial mistake was crossbooking with someone like Doyle Brunson. The ratio of money pissed away was probably 19-1 sports betting to drugs. He was obviously a skilled gambler when it came to poker, blackjack and gin rummy where his eidetic memory gave him an edge along with his aggression but he was eaten alive betting against even a rudimentary 'model' (which I believe Doyle and co had at their disposal for MLB/NFL at that time) in those soft markets.

 

 

 

I've always been a ham and egger math guy...what I mean is, I was never remotely close to being the sharpest guy in my math classes at university. Actually, I was considered a dolt as I was in applied math, while the brainiacs were all math theory, Naturally, they treated us "applied" guys like shit. To boot, I ran track, so as a "jock" I was a double Neanderthal.

 

I get back to a school reunion, and I run into some of the 100 lb brains and they are all, to a man, burned out, bitter PhDs in dead end teaching jobs, most not tenured, totally jealous of my success when they find out how I've done.

 

I'm like, "dude, if I had your gifts, and my 'street smarts', I've gone much farther....come to think on it if I can chose only one, I'll take my street smarts every time."

 

Great gifts often leads to great arrogance...actually, I'll change that to 'most often'.

[pokerjoe]

 

Flash forward a few years and after several seasons of in-season betting and I'm noticing that simultaneous events are tending to have more "Black Swan" events than they should under Gaussian conditions. i.e. for example, I'm getting a whole lot of 1-9, 9-1, 12-0, 0-12 results than what truly independent events should have. The only thing in common was: all these events were happening more or less at the same time, but usually within the same sport.

 

My conclusion? Either the universe hates true independence, or I'm simply not smart enough to recognize it when it does not exist. Either way, even "sub-optimal" full Kelly can be troublesome for my BR. Bear in mind, I have used Kelly on several occasions to run a BR 10x and even 20x, apparently missing the Black Swans by chance.

.

 

I must deal with this when I have more time, because it's important stuff, but for now I'll just say that I don't think market events are independent. Markets are not roulette wheels. Markets have memory. Markets may have due factors that accumulate, have a tipping point, and break like a dam bursting. But it's a subject that has to be written about very carefully to have any chance of avoiding massive stupidity, so it's on my list of things to post about some other time, lol.

[pokerjoe]

PokerJoe' date=' what was the comback kid, Stu Ungar's style of play and what can we learn from his example?[/quote']

 

 

The only time I ever met Stu Ungar was in the sports books downtown, where he was a humble degen and we'd have normal convos while watching games (I got to do this twice with him, once at the Fremont, once at Binions I think).

 

I did see him play cash games a few times, where he was fast and furious, absolutely. Poker is a sport where true degens can have an edge because they're true degens (degens of the Ungar style, not the TBC style). The more truly fearless you are about money--we might even say, the more oblivious you are to the realities of life--the more objective you'll be in your decision making and observations, or interpretations of those observations. Ungar, by all accounts, couldn't have told you the price of gas.

 

But he was an action junkie, and though I never played with him, I've played with guys like him, and the trick to beating them is (semantics warning) you let them beat themselves. Sit there patiently enough, long enough, and they'll beat their own brains out (hopefully, obv; and in the long run, obv). They won't make emotional decisions about the money, but they will about the lack of action, and once you get them, or anyone, to be more emotional in their decision making ...

 

The trick is in the game makeup aside from you two. If there are no other LAGs in the game, the sole LAG is alone in trying to create action (probably complaining about how everyone else is a bunch of nits), and his desire for action for its own sake will crunch him. But if there are 2+ other LAGs in the game, their action feeds off each other, there's plenty to watch if not do, they get their action junkie fix, they stay on their A game, and thus can be deadly. If you're not the LAG, and you're up against multiple LAGs, think about a table change; if you're not a LAG, and there's only one in the game, he's the one who should make the change, you should get ready to make money off him, even in you're not in any hands against him, because he's likely to positively change the game for you.

[James D]

betting 1% to me (FIVE DOLLARS?). At least if you go 2-0 you have 1700 give or take and then you can be a be more selective on when to lay a few hundred and when to lay the hammer down. Unless you are just betting for fun' date=' I see no reason to bet 5 dollars. Not many people realistically have a 100,000 dollar bankroll. How could I ever get down large play if I needed to reserve 99% of my BR??[/quote'] I have to agree that betting 1% unless your bankroll is 50k or better seems ridiculous. The majority of gamblers gamble for action and that just seems so tedious. Let's say a guy has 2k and EVERY WEEK of the 18 week NFL regular season he goes an impossible 3-1. His bet size of 20 dollars won't even increase to 30 dollars and his overall profit will be under 1000 dollars. Instead if watching those four games he would have been better off working a part time job at the lowest salary the US federal govt allows. At $7.25 an hour he would have produced double the profit of winning an impossible 75% of his games.

[Guest ChrisHarvard]

Boom. Sharp posting.

[hustledouble]

 

How would a pro reason this out?

 

I have my reservations about even the top notch pros being able to gauge their edge with the granular accuracy necessary to make fully Kelly viable (you seem to agree). Even if you are the nuts when it comes to sports investing and have an intimate knowledge of Kelly, there is a 50% chance you could experience a 50% drawdown using full Kelly; way too much volatility for me. If you lose 50% of your trading equity, you need to make 100% back just to get back to break even. Forgive me but I would much rather have 2% smooth returns than 3% choppy ones. I am well aware that if you turn over 1 million in the market, 3% ROI returns 50% more profits than 2% ROI .

 

I would assume most pros trade their equity curve using a proportional fixed fractional BR system along with their perceived edge (typically 1% of current BR +/- any perceived edge). I have given this much thought and it seems to be the best balance between being offensive and defensive with one’s money management strategy.

 

Do you find this logic flawed?

 

 

I don't think this is flawed, but I certainly think it is much newer thinking than the idea of a professional sports bettor. Before the internet, and even, really, before mass media, there have been people making their living as punters who weren't using much mathematics to assess what they were doing. They were exceedingly rare (but so are successful pros now). Some people need, use and excel with the numbers. Others see the ball and hit the ball.

[hustledouble]

I have to agree that betting 1% unless your bankroll is 50k or better seems ridiculous. The majority of gamblers gamble for action and that just seems so tedious. Let's say a guy has 2k and EVERY WEEK of the 18 week NFL regular season he goes an impossible 3-1. His bet size of 20 dollars won't even increase to 30 dollars and his overall profit will be under 1000 dollars. Instead if watching those four games he would have been better off working a part time job at the lowest salary the US federal govt allows. At $7.25 an hour he would have produced double the profit of winning an impossible 75% of his games.

 

 

Even at $50,000, you need to bet a lot of games. If you are a smaller scale bettor, you not only need to be good, but good while betting volume.

 

At $50,000, betting 7 games per week all year, you'd make about $19,800 hitting 57% when betting to win $500 a game. That's not really enough return to justify your remarkable skill.

 

If you are betting 14 games per week all year, you'd make a little more reasonable $30,000 at 57%.

 

At $200, which is the tout "standard", you're making $14,560 per year betting 57% on 14 games per week. Now you know the answer to the question, "if these guys can make all this money, why do they charge?" Because they don't.

 

Still, there is a reason and place for flat betting. It helps create discipline, and if you are not a professional but want to be, getting into the habit of doing that is probably a good idea. As a previous poster mentioned, it's very difficult to get out of the habit of taking major swings when the first few work.

 

If you want to be a professional, emulating one can probably help. But it has to be more than just understanding when/how much to value a bet. There are a lot of lifestyle things most recreational gamblers would have to change to eliminate waste.

 

I think the biggest problem for recreational gamblers is often wanting to act like Billy Walters before they have his bankroll

[Guest ChrisHarvard]

 

Every once in a while we all hear about some guy who won millions but then lost it all back. People always ask, "Why didn't he quit when he was up 1 million?" But if he was the type to quit when he got to 1 million, he never would have got to 1 million, because he first would have had to NOT quit at 1/2 million, and before that, not quit at 1/4 million, and so on, and by the fact that he got up 1 million at some point, you know he wasn't the type to stop pressing his luck. So he was always doomed.

 

 

I've been thinking about this for a week, now.