Sure books win money off there players because they get to collect the juice over time and also they clean house with the sucker bets (teasers, parlays) that are lost. Of course one of the biggest ways is through bad money management and guys chasing when they are down and losing their shirts or the reverse they are up big and take a shot to double up and then give it back. All these things contribute to books winning overtime but I am here to tell you that over the course of a season in almost every sport every year we also win approximately 55% of the sides we need on the Big (largely bet) games. The games I am referring to are SNF, MNF, Marquee matchups in NFL, The ESPN games on Saturdays (like Florida last Saturday) and other large games (like Texas on Saturday). In college hoops it is much the same as CFB. Of course the bowl season and all the playoffs including march madness we do the best because they are the heaviest bet games with the most action. So how do we do it? How do we over 55% of our big games over time? Well there are a couple of different reasons. Many say games are fixed and I have seen enough games to tell you for sure there are certain things that happen in some games where there definitely has been foul play. That being said it probably occurs in 1 out of 100 games or even more. That is my opinion. The main reason books win more then they lose in big games has to do with Tax. Public perception is everything and the guys who set the lines know this. Public teams getting taxed at a much higher rate then other teams. For Example look at LSU @ Florida from last weekend as an example. You had the LSU (ranked #4) at <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com
ffice:smarttags" /><st1:State w:st="on"><st1
lace w:st="on">Florida</st1lace></st1:State> (ranked #11). Put these teams on a neutral field and LSU would be around a 4 point favorite give or take a couple points. Maybe even higher as we compare that to <st1:State w:st="on">Texas</st1:State> and <st1:State w:st="on"><st1lace w:st="on">Oklahoma</st1lace></st1:State> who also played neutral and line was 7 (another game which involved serious taxing). So LSU would be let’s say for example a 4 point favorite on a neutral field and now lets give Florida 4 points for home field advantage the line should have been around a pk. Lets even say they are in the swamp which is worth 2 more points due to the crazy environment there. Now we are giving a 6 point home field advantage so <st1:State w:st="on"><st1lace w:st="on">Florida</st1lace></st1:State> should have been -2. But they weren’t they were -6. That means LSU was taxed. Does this make sense to you? Line should have been 2 for this game without taxing either team. Due to public perception which involves many key factors such as but not limited too how they fared the previous week (Gators lost at home to Ole Miss) or LSU are the defending national champions. These are just a couple of examples but the line setters knew they could set the line at 6 and still get even action at the very least. Turns out even with a line of 6 the books were still rooting for the Gators. As the line rose to 7 at most shops LSU was taxed at an even higher tax rate. Overtime this tax adds up and there are games that land in the tax zone that the books win that had the game not been taxed they would have lost. I hope this makes sense to everyone; I did my best to explain. Remember I am not a writer. Also, I am sure there are many different and still some conflicting views on this matter. I do not proclaim to know all but this has been my experience and developed opinion from many years of watching where the line is set on these games.
ffice:smarttags" /><st1:State w:st="on"><st1lace w:st="on">Florida</st1lace></st1:State> (ranked #11). Put these teams on a neutral field and LSU would be around a 4 point favorite give or take a couple points. Maybe even higher as we compare that to <st1:State w:st="on">Texas</st1:State> and <st1:State w:st="on"><st1lace w:st="on">Oklahoma</st1lace></st1:State> who also played neutral and line was 7 (another game which involved serious taxing). So LSU would be let’s say for example a 4 point favorite on a neutral field and now lets give Florida 4 points for home field advantage the line should have been around a pk. Lets even say they are in the swamp which is worth 2 more points due to the crazy environment there. Now we are giving a 6 point home field advantage so <st1:State w:st="on"><st1lace w:st="on">Florida</st1lace></st1:State> should have been -2. But they weren’t they were -6. That means LSU was taxed. Does this make sense to you? Line should have been 2 for this game without taxing either team. Due to public perception which involves many key factors such as but not limited too how they fared the previous week (Gators lost at home to Ole Miss) or LSU are the defending national champions. These are just a couple of examples but the line setters knew they could set the line at 6 and still get even action at the very least. Turns out even with a line of 6 the books were still rooting for the Gators. As the line rose to 7 at most shops LSU was taxed at an even higher tax rate. Overtime this tax adds up and there are games that land in the tax zone that the books win that had the game not been taxed they would have lost. I hope this makes sense to everyone; I did my best to explain. Remember I am not a writer. Also, I am sure there are many different and still some conflicting views on this matter. I do not proclaim to know all but this has been my experience and developed opinion from many years of watching where the line is set on these games.
