The most important thing for me to consider in betting sports or playing poker tournaments is bankroll management. This is the best lesson I learned in my early years of playing poker and I'm lucky to have learned it so early. Several years ago I created a structured sports betting strategy and I'm going to share it with you all.
First off, I keep specific bankroll designated to sports betting and separate from everything else. I mostly focus on NFL and the NBA Playoffs and put hours upon hours into each bet. Occasionally I will bet an MLB or NBA regular season game based on a number of rare factors but for the most part I've learned to stick to what I'm best at.
My Bet Structure.
The first thing I do is access my bankroll at the start of each season to determine what my unit size will be. For me, 1 unit is always 1% of my bankroll to start the season and I do not raise the unit size for the entire season regardless of how I'm doing. Meaning if I'm winning a lot, I do not raise my unit size to start betting more. Conversely, if I'm losing a lot, I do not raise my unit size to chase my losses.
All of the bets I place for MLB or NBA regular season are for 1unit. Both sports are very tough to beat in the long run and have very high variance so it is not a good strategy, in my opinion, to risk much more than this. NFL and NBA Playoffs are where I make the bigger bets.
For NFL I generally keep my sides and totals between 1 and 3 units meaning the biggest bet I will make is usually for 3% of my bankroll. However, every season there are always a few games where I find something I really like so I allow myself to bet a maximum of 5 units when those games come along.
NBA Playoffs have the least amount of opportunity to find bets and I am very selective with which bets I place. My favorite and most successful bets over the last 10 years has been picking which team will win each series and also betting which teams will win their conference. These bets sometimes involve laying a big price. Each year, I always risk the most on an NBA Playoff bet. I allow myself to risk between 1 and 10 units on any given bet with anything over 5 units being rare.
I have found it very helpful to stick to my guidelines and keep my bankroll management my number 1 priority. It's a simple system but I have stayed disciplined which has prevented me from risking to much of my bankroll and going broke when a downswing has happened.
From here on out, I will continue posting my bets and start adding the number of units I'm risking now that I have covered all of this. Cheers all!