Gambling Locks of the Weak (Get it)

Alright, someone smarter than me tell me.  I signed up for Bovada.  Wanna throw $5 on the spread of -17 and $5 on the over of 47pts.  The risk is $5 each, the win is $4.55 and $4.76 respectively.  Do those win amounts reflect what I would win on top of the $5 wager or would I lose some pocket change even if those bets hit?

 
1995 Redux said:
Alright, someone smarter than me tell me.  I signed up for Bovada.  Wanna throw $5 on the spread of -17 and $5 on the over of 47pts.  The risk is $5 each, the win is $4.55 and $4.76 respectively.  Do those win amounts reflect what I would win on top of the $5 wager or would I lose some pocket change even if those bets hit?
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If you pay $5 to Bovada for both bets ($10 total), Bovada will pay you back $19.31 if you win both bets.

Basically, if you are betting even odds, which most point spreads and over/unders are set at, you never win as much as you wager.

When I was big into gambling in college, we would do all of our bets in multiples of $11, in order to win multiples of $10.

 
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Need to use for instance the Omaha papers lines on Wednesdays. So everyone is using the same lines. Or since teach is running this, teach can post the lines he uses and we all choose games with those.

 
ColoradoHusk said:
If you pay $5 to Bovada for both bets ($10 total), Bovada will pay you back $19.31 if you win both bets.

Basically, if you are betting even odds, which most point spreads and over/unders are set at, you never win as much as you wager.

When I was big into gambling in college, we would do all of our bets in multiples of $11, in order to win multiples of $10.
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Okay thankya.  I looked at the risk and the win and I'm like, "surely I get my bet back like normal plus the payout if the bet".  But it was my first online wager and thought maybe I had been duped.

 
1995 Redux said:
Okay thankya.  I looked at the risk and the win and I'm like, "surely I get my bet back like normal plus the payout if the bet".  But it was my first online wager and thought maybe I had been duped.
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Yeah, online sites and casinos can be tricky where you have to pay upfront for the wager, and then when you win, you get the original wager and the winnings back.

It's much easier with bookies when you tell them all the games you want to bet, and then you settle up at the end of the week.  With that it's a simple plus and minus, and you either owe or collect.

 
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I started with $25 and put the $10 on Nebraska plus a handful or so of $1 bets on teams to win playoff or super bowl or NFC/AFC.  Goal is to nickel and dime it all season and have money ahead at seasons end.

 
Red Five said:
not to stick up for matty, but 3 vegas shops have it -16.5 (see link in above post)
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Yeah, I know. It's not a big a deal. We ran into a few minor line discrepancies last year too, it's just for fun and it's on the honor system. If anybody starts posting lines that are way out of whack, we'll make 'em feel really bad  :( Usually a half or full point won't make any difference anyway. But if Nebraska wins by 17 and Matty wins and I push.... :angry:

Plus, everybody should be using a currently available line from their source. You shouldn't be going back to the beginning of the week and taking a 2 or 3 point better opening line than you can get the day you post it. But, if you want to put your picks in early on an opening line before it moves, that's okay in my book. 

 
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1995 Redux said:
I started with $25 and put the $10 on Nebraska plus a handful or so of $1 bets on teams to win playoff or super bowl or NFC/AFC.  Goal is to nickel and dime it all season and have money ahead at seasons end.
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If you want to keep it a little more straight forward, just pick your nice round number for what you want to win, $1.00, $2.00, $5.00 etc. and then wager ten percent more, $1.10, $2.20, $5.50.  That way you won't have all those odd cent amounts to deal with. Like ColoradoHusk said, the standard is $11 to win $10 but you can apply that to smaller amounts.

 
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