Issue #35: Meet in the Middle
In betting, you can be on the right side or the wrong side. Or you can find a happy medium.
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Finding the Sweet Spot
Bookmakers hate it, bettors love it. Middle betting, when done properly, can be profitable for the public and a loss for those who set the lines — especially when following these guidelines.
Learn Line Movements
You have to be a bit of a handicapper before lines open up — similar to the stock market when in the pre-market and after hours some traders who have a good feel for how things will go. That’s the type of feeling you have to have as a first step towards becoming good at uncovering middles and betting on the middle opportunities.
Get In Early
Now you’re paying close attention to the line openings – whenever they might come. If it’s baseball, you’re paying attention in the afternoons every day. If it’s football, you’re checking weeks ahead if the lines are up.
Consider which teams are beloved by the public and think about their situations. Will the public be piling in based on what happened the previous week? Will bettors overreact to one bad week?
Also, a key injury from a previous might cause a line to open thinking the player is active, so you can bet the line if you believe the player won’t be and then bet the other side once the player is announced out.
Typically, sharps get the jump on it and you can see totals in cold weather places like Denver, Cleveland, and Green Bay start to tumble in December and January. Look at the forecast and see if you can get some value early in the week before everyone else follows suit.
Middling With Live Betting
To open up that area where you can find a middle, you need that volatility and live betting offers plenty of it. The biggest challenge is that you have to have a good feel for which way the line will go.
One popular strategy that bettors like to deploy is watching a big favorite go down early. Let’s say the Lakers are a 10-point favorite but they start the game in a 20-10 hole. The live line and point spread are going to drop quite a bit on them. That allows you to buy in on the Lakers a lot cheaper than the initial price of -10. If they storm back and make a comeback, you should see the line revert to where it started and then you’ll have a window of opportunity.
You still have to be careful with how you middle with live betting as there is more opportunity because of the frequent line moves but also more risk.
Using Teasers
Here you’ll need more than one outcome to go your way but you give yourself more space to catch a middle.
A great example of this is with the latter stages of the NFL postseason. Typically, by the Divisional Round, the lines are very sharp and the teams are evenly matched. While it might be hard to determine if a team will cover a four-point spread as a dog, bumping them up by 10 to +14 makes the decision a lot easier. And even if you go the other way and take the favorite +6, you might be in the middle of an area where both sides win the bet.
Using Promos To Your Advantage
Most recreational bettors will just let the bets ride while sharps will arbitrage the lines to secure a profit. What you could do is try and take advantage of middles where possible.
One example is a FanDuel Same-Game Parlay, assuming you play three legs or more. They’ll often toss you a few of these for free, so what you could do is have a couple of obvious selections and then your third one could be the point spread for the game shifted. And then maybe you bet the regular and aim for a middle.
Another option is with player props that are boosted or altered. Let’s say DraftKings is offering a promo on Kevin Durant to score 20+ points tonight at +100 but the regular line is at 27.5. You could bet the boost and then go to the regular line at a different sportsbook and take the other side, so that you create a seven-point middling opportunity for yourself.
Hedging Out, Cashing Out
If you’re trying to catch a middle and you fail, you can always hedge out of it. If you bet on the Packers early in the week and the line didn’t move the way you thought it would, and a middling opportunity never presents itself, you can bet the other side to cover yourself.
An even better option is betting at places like BetMGM, DraftKings or BetRivers. You can cash your bet out at any point before the game starts and get almost all of your money back. BetMGM will return your full bet stake if the line hasn’t moved. Cross-reference that with simply hedging your bet and take the path that costs you less.
It’s Tricky To Turn A Profit
The biggest challenge is that the game has to land in the middle. Many times you might get a total with a three-point window to middle but it doesn’t land there. Or you might catch a +6 and a -4, but then the final margin is 10. The problem is that you’ve lost the juice on one of your sides and are not profitable on this wager.
Of course, there will be times when you win your middle but you have to crunch the numbers here and realize that you’re looking roughly 9% on your money each time you middle and it doesn’t work out (at -110). Of course, if you’re getting lines that match up, then middle away and you never have to worry about the juice. However, what’s closer to the reality is that this can cost you.
Not All Are Equal
Your ideal scenario is using an odds comparison tool and finding two books that are off on the same line, betting both sides and giving yourself a window to win both. What would be better is if the odds matched and you weren’t exposed to losing the juice.
If you bet on Joe Burrow to have over 240.5 passing yards and suddenly it’s announced the starting running back is not healthy, his total jumps to 260.5. Now you have a space to find yourself a middle betting chance but at the same time, you’re sitting on a pretty good bet too. The value is on your side. The same might happen when you’re betting a side and a big dynamic in the game changes in your favor. You’ll have a runway to land in the middle but the expected value of you winning the original bet might now simply be worth keeping.
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