why is sports betting so hard to be successful in when stats and trends are readily available to the public?
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Specifically because stats and trends are readily available to the public.
Sports betting isn’t you against the bookie. Sports betting is you against every other bettor.
When a bookie takes in bets, they adjust their odds for future bets. This way, they can have bets balanced between all outcomes. A bookie is making money *no matter who wins*.
Here’s how this works:
1. I offer odds of 1:1 for outcome A and outcome B
2. All the early bets are on outcome A. For future bets, I’ll make outcome A less valuable and increase the value of outcome B.
3. Now future bettors think outcome B is more attractive, so they bet on it.
There’s math behind it, but the overall jist is the bookie wants any outcome to result in paying out about 90% of what was bet. That way, they get 10% no matter what.
Now that you understand how this works, you see the bookie doesn’t care who wins. You aren’t trying to beat him, you’re trying to beat every other person who bets with him, because his odds already reflect what they think.
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