How exactly to Bet Parlays in Sports

The general rule regarding parlays is: DON'T.

Parlays generally carry an increased house edge than straight bets, therefore you give the book a bigger advantage over you when you play them. That, by itself, is reason enough to suppress the misplaced feelings of greed coupled with fear that often lead to betting parlays. People think they're risking less with parlays, however they aren't. They believe they can win more with parlays, but they cannot. The higher win with parlays is far outweighed by the higher probability of losing. Parlay bettors are actually risking more, with less probability of collecting.

A parlay is not an individual bet. It really is two bets -- a one-unit bet on one team and a two-unit bet on the other. Which team gets the two-unit bet? In point-spread betting at constant money odds, if both teams win or both teams lose no matter which team gets the double bet. When one team wins and something team loses, however, the double bet is presumed to have been on the loser. How smart is that for the bettor? Go ahead, make a parlay. We'll wait until both games are over, and in case of a split we'll put the double bet on the loser. If your bookmaker sold you a parlay with that line, how many of you'll still make the bet?

A parlay can be bad money management. In a parlay you either bet double on the second team, or nothing on that same team, dependant on whether the first game won or lost. That adds some luck to your betting that doesn't need to be there. The skilled handicapper is definitely seeking to make smart investments. He tries to get rid of the result of luck to the best extent possible to make his results as predictable as possible.

Much like every rule, however, you can find exceptions. The exception to the rule regarding parlays occurs when the two bets are co-dependent.

I knew one bookmaker who was simply taken for thousands because he didn't understand the co-dependency of certain bets. He allowed a player to consistently parlay the first half with the game. The ball player parlayed totals by combining the over in the initial half with the over in the game, and the under in the initial half with under in the game. Both parlays were manufactured in the same game.  khuyến mãi new88  and every time the player won he'd win 2.6 times his bet. Betting $100 on each parlay, if one of these won, the ball player would win $260 and lose $100 on the other parlay for a net win of $160. He could never win both parlays. If he lost both parlays he'd lose $200.

Initially, this appeared to be a great chance of the book. The normal coin-flip odds of winning one parlay out from the two are 50-50. So far as the bookie was concerned the bettor should be winning $160 half the time, and losing $200 half the time. The bettor, however, making $500 parlays, was ahead a lot more than $20,000 after 6 months, and the book began to look at what the bettor was doing more carefully.

The issue for the bookmaker was that the two halves of each parlay were co-dependent. By the end of the first half, the bettor was hardly ever in a 50-50 situation.

Take the Thursday night game between Utah and Air Force. The game total was 53 and the first half total was 27. By the end of the first half, the score was 31-21, for a total of 52 first-half points. The initial half of one of the parlays, the "over" in the first half was a winner. For the parlay probability to be correct, there should now be considered a 50-50 probability of winning the "over" for the overall game. Obviously the chances of winning the "over" in the game were not 50-50 but much better than 99% in favor of the "over." The player only needed to win the first 1 / 2 of the parlay to be virtually assured he would collect 2.6 times his money instead of just $10 for $11.

Before you rush out to use this, remember that most off-shore books are far too smart to permit you to parlay first half to game. If they do allow you to do this, start fretting about collecting because that book will soon be taken to the cleaners.

There are, however, some less obvious co-dependent parlays that can be made at many books. One kind of co-dependent parlay is the parlay of the side and total in the same game.

Any game in which the total is less than double the spread can give you an advantage in parlaying side to total in exactly the same game. We've already discussed, in a prior article, how to use these anomalous side and total combinations to hedge one another and boost your win with very little increase in risk. This type of bet, however, needed that you have an opinion privately or the full total. Parlaying is another solution to boost your potential win on these games, or even to create a potential win for those who have no opinion.

There are two games this Saturday that qualify. They're Virigina -25 over Duke with a complete of 48 �, and Kansas St. -24 � vs. North Texas with a complete 46 �).

In the Virginia game, if you believe that Virginia will cover the 25 points, they must hold Duke to no more than 11 points or the game will go over the full total. The more likely it becomes during the game that Virginia will cover 25 points, the more likely it becomes that the overall game will go over 48 �. The wider Virginia's winning margin, the much more likely the game will go over. If you like Virginia to cover the spread, and you also believe that Duke will never be shut out, then your possibility of winning a parlay on Virginia and the over are higher than the standard 25%. Likewise, if the scoring stays low, it really is not as likely that Virginia covers the 25 points. Subsequently, the probability that a parlay of the under with the underdog will win is greater than the normal 25%.

Assuming you have no opinion on the game, you can parlay the favorite with the "over" and the underdog with the "under" and collect sufficiently often to exceed the losses when both parlays lose. In the only other game meeting the qualifications this week -- Friday's game between California -30 against New Mexico State with a complete of 58 -- the under has already won with the underdog for a winning two-parlay spread.

The closer the posted total would be to the spread on the side, the better win-rate will be on the parlay "spread" bet. The co-dependency in side to total parlays isn't as strong as parlaying first half and game totals (if it were, most books would not allow such bets), but there is a sufficient co-dependency in the games with low totals and high spreads to make the strategy profitable long-term.

Not all bookmakers will help you to parlay the medial side to the total in the same game, because a lot more are realizing that these bets are sometimes co-dependent. But, enough books still do allow such bets that you can consider including such bets in your professional betting arsenal.

If your bookmaker provides "if/reverse" bets, it is possible to replace the parlay bet with an "if/reverse" bet and achieve greater success.