Go Against the Sports Betting Public

Going against the sports betting public can be very profitable, especially in the most popular betting sport, football. Sports betting is always going to be popular since television gives us so many choices for our wagering, and this is even more true with NFL wagering. Since sports betting is so popular, we get a great deal of so-called “public” money. Some people refer to it as “square” money. How do we determine what constitutes public money?

The first way to determine which way the sports betting public is going is by listening to the media. Just turn on the television or radio and listen to the talk shows. Every single week in the NFL the media and the sports betting public seem to fall in love with a particular game or a particular team. The sports betting public just can’t see any way that their team will lose in the upcoming week’s game. For example, in the NFL if a team like the Ravens is coming off an impressive performance, they might become the public’s “team” of the week. It happens all the time in the NFL. It happens in other sports as well, but it is more common in pro football because betting on the NFL dwarfs everything else when it comes to popularity. Public money flows in on the NFL like no other sport. The sports betting public loves to bet the NFL and everyone has an opinion. And keep in mind that opinion is very often swayed in one direction or the other by the media. When you see this happen run to the window and bet the other side of the game. You will find that you end up on the winning side more times than not. The sports betting public does not win in the long run. It just doesn’t happen. They do, however, have their winning streaks, so don’t think you will win every time.

The sports betting public money comes into play very often when talking about the NFL, but it can be a factor in other sports as well. College football can get a lot of public money, but usually only on the high profile television games like Michigan - Iowa, Texas - Nebraska, etc. You can pretty much include any televised game into that list. NBA and Major League Baseball games are not nearly so full of public money but it does happen when the playoffs roll around. People are much more likely to start betting those two sports when they know they will be on television. A perfect example of that happened in the 2003-2004 NBA Finals between the Lakers and Pistons. Los Angeles was a huge public team and they were heavily bet in nearly every game. If you bet against the public and took the Pistons you made a lot of money.

It is best to keep in mind that betting against the public can really be a big part of your sports betting strategy. I really can’t stress this enough. If you want to win betting sports then really focus on what the public likes. If you do that, and of course bet the other way, your long-term success in sports betting is going to be better. You won’t win every time, but your wins should outnumber you losses over the long haul.