Beginners Guide to Sports Betting
Welcome to our Beginners Guide to Sports Betting!
Every bettor is at a different level than the next. Some are pros, while some are just getting started.
I guarantee that even the most experienced bettors will learn a thing or two, or at least be refreshed, from this in-depth beginners guide to sports betting.
There are many nuances when it comes to placing a bet, but my goal is to make those as simple as possible.
So even though this report may dive into all the details, I’ll simplify everything along the way giving you just the nuts and bolts you need to walk away a successful bettor.
The notion of betting starts young.
I think my kids were trying to bet me on games or their own shooting skills since they were six.
It’s just a natural flow of language, “I’ll bet you they win today.”
It doesn’t involve money at first, it’s just for bragging rights. As we get older, we realize with nothing on the line, we’ll bet on anything – money makes it interesting.
The “I’ll bet you they win today,” turns into, “I’ll bet you $20 they win today.”
The wide world of sports betting is just a continuation of those old bets you placed with your friends through high school. But now we are on a much larger scale, and betting on everything from points scored, to obscure sports and it has become common practice.
It’s a lot to keep up with, but don’t worry, it’s just as simple as that original, “I’ll bet you they win today,” bets from my six-year-old.
You are at the right spot with our Beginners Guide to Sports Betting…
Where to Start
The first step is to find a way to place your sports bets. If you are in some states, such as New Jersey, you are in luck.
You have American websites to bet on, such as Fanduel.com.
These are easy to access, 100% legal in the states that allow it.
For the rest of you, there are plenty of other websites and casinos that allow it.
In Nevada and West Virginia, casinos allow in-house sports betting. As well as New Jersey. But, why go to the casino if you don’t have too?
As for the other 47 states, you have to turn to offshore online websites.
These are very safe websites that have been around for years, serving U.S. clients and giving us access to the sports betting world.
Below you can find a list of several that are accepting U.S. clients and offer cash bonuses for signing up. But first check with U.S. platforms, since they offer completely legal sports bets.
While offshore sports betting sites have been around for decades with no major problems, if that website gets sucked into issues with the U.S. government, they can step in and freeze all assets held on the website. This will tie up your funds in the process. If, in the rare case the website was illegally laundering money or engaged in other illegal acts, those funds could be gone. If all they do is offer sports betting, the U.S. is likely just looking for taxes.
To limit your risk due to this outside chance, I suggest not using these online websites like a bank account. Instead, keep just enough money in to keep you betting, and use multiple websites. As I’ll explain in a moment, some websites offer better odds on our bets, plus you’ll get a new sign up bonus at each site you join – a win-win situation.
Once you have picked your site(s), you are ready to deposit your funds for sports betting and get started.
Top Online Sportsbooks for U.S. Investors –
- MyBookie.ag Sportsbook
- Bovada.lv Sportsbook
- BetOnline.ag Sportsbook
- SportsBetting.ag Sportsbook
- Xbet.ag Sportsbook
Keeping Betting Simple
Our goal at Daily Sports Bets is to keep sports betting as simple as possible.
There’s no need to over complicate or use lingo that only experienced bettors would understand.
We are going to go over things in ordinary terms and produce great results in doing so.
We’ll focus on two types of bets, a straight bet and a parlay. But parlay’s take it to another level. So I’ll save those for a separate report, the Power of Parlays to tell you all about them.
For the Beginners Guide to Sports Betting, let’s stick to the basics and cover a straight bet – the easiest to make.
Straight Bets
A straight bet is the most common form of sports betting that exists.
You are simply picking your bet on a particular game. That’s it. Nothing fancy, just finding your ideal matchup, the bet you want to place, and going forward with the bet.
The three main things you can place a straight bet on are: winning or losing, spreads, and over/under.
Winning or losing is the most straight forward, but due to the odds, spread betting is the most popular.
The odds determine your payout.
So a straight bet for the favorite team to win, may only be paying out -185 odds. That means you need to bet $185 to win $100. Whereas, spread betting mostly has odds around -110 or better, which means you only need to bet $110 to win $100.
But with greater rewards, come greater risk.
A spread is the amount of points the sportsbook makers are expecting the winning team to win by.
For example, if the Boston Celtics were playing the Minnesota Timberwolves as a 4-point favorite, that means the spread is 4 points. From there, you can either pick Boston to win by more than 4 points, or Boston to win by less than 4 points.
If the game lands right at 4 points, it is considered a tie, and your bet is refunded.
The over/under is a great bet to make when you find an anomaly in the odds. There are two types of over/under bets. One is for each team and one for the game total.
Basically, do you think Boston would score more than 96 points, or less? Do you think Minnesota will score 100 points or less and do you think the combined game will score more than 196 points or less?
That is what the over/under bets are looking at – the scores.
While each of these apply to straight bets, they also apply to parlays.
Parlays are the most powerful type of bets, yet seldom used.
Many bettors think the odds are not on their side and avoid them completely – I couldn’t disagree more.
Check out my Power of Parlays report to see why.
How to Find Winning Bets
Everyone wants to place one bet, go all-in and retire right after.
That’s simply not how it works.
You have to strategize your bets, allocate your capital appropriately and understand that we won’t win every bet.
Now, with that said and out of the way, there is a formula behind finding winning bets on a consistent basis.
The trick isn’t to focus so much on a matchup you like, or your favorite team. Just because you watch the New England Patriots play every game this season, doesn’t mean you can make the right picks when it comes to their matchups.
And it may not be your fault.
The books are set up to tempt you into bets that are not likely to pay off. They spend a ton of effort to find spreads that are the most likely outcome, and often times, they are within a few percent of their targeted spread.
That can be a challenge.
Afterall, you’ve studied the Patriots all year, it would make sense if you placed bets on them too.
But, your bias of being a Patriots fan will likely lead to you weighing the odds slightly in their favor, making a ten-point favorite over the Redskins seems too small. Then the 24 to 16 final score busts your bet.
That’s why I base my approach almost entirely on stats.
The stats I focus on can vary from matchup to matchup, but I won’t make a pick without having the stats to support it. The points per game, points allowed, previous games, home court advantages, even injuries, and weather can have a statistical impact.
I examine the current environment, or level of the game, and look at how this group of players has performed before. I don’t go too far back, because looking at the Patriots with Brady and Belichick wouldn’t do me any good now that they are broken up.
But I am trying to understand who’s going to show up in those environments, how they have handled strong defenses before and dealt with the oxygen at mile-high stadium.
This is just some of the things to keep in mind.
There are a lot of stats that go into a pick, and not everyone one will have the same significance in each bet. But, finding a mismatch in these odds is the key to finding winning bets.
Like expecting the Patriots to score fewer than 21 points going up against a stout Steelers defense. Even though the last time they met, the Patriots exploited their matchup at tight end to explode to 35 points. And against other strong defenses, they still put up more than 21 points. That’s a time I would look at taking a team to cover the over/under for the team. Patriots to score more than 21 points.
In this case, I wouldn’t care who wins or loses, how many points the Steelers score, or any injuries on the Patriots defense.
This is just one example of what to look for, but it applies to any other straight bet as well.
Be sure to read through our analysis in Daily Sports Bets for all the insights into how we find winning bets.
This Beginners Guide to Sports Betting report is a great start in the sports betting world and sets up a bit of what you can expect from our services here at Daily Sports Bets.
In the end, we are here for you. To assist you in your journey from placing your first bet, to becoming an avid sports bettor finding your own winning bets each and every day. If there is anything we can do to help you along this path, feel free to reach out to us.
Our customer service team is ready for your emails. You can reach them at ryan@dailysportsbets.com.
Please allow up to 24 hours for our initial response. We look forward to hearing from you and exploring the sports betting world with you.
To profitable bets,
Your team at Daily Sports Bets