Sure. There are a lot of gambling games that are terrible bets, but lots of fun. If you keep to smaller bets so the entertainment cost is no different than going to a movie or something, great. There’s nothing wrong with buying a lotto ticket for a few bucks for fun, or putting a little wager on a game to make it more exciting.
But when I go to 7-11 and wait in line behind someone clearly retired and poor as they use their government cheque to buy their $50 worth of scratch tickets (picking out each one carefuly), or buying 50 lotto tickets to put in the special ticket wallet heavy users can get, it makes me pretty sad.
We have a friend who got divorced and blew $100,000, her entire settlement, playing video lottery. She blew it in less than a year, and became destitute.
Government told us forever that they had to ban gambling because it was destructive and preyed on the poor and the weak. Then the government got into the business, doubled the vig, and put VLT terminals in every dive bar in the province to attract the poor, drunk, and stupid. Now they get more money fleecing gamblers than they get from income tax in Alberta. So much for morals.
And back on topic, look at the professional sports leagues in the US and gambling outside of the Vegas sports books. The change from vehemently against it to completely in bed with it was instantaneous.
Yep. And coincided with their ability to wet their beaks.
In Edmonton, the gaming commission increased the rake in poker so high they drove players out of the casinos and into private poker rooms, which were legal. The government busted them anyway. Took everyone’s money, confiscated all the equipment, then lost in court because playeing poker without a rake is not illegal. The private rooms re-opened, and the government busted them again. Repeat. Eventually, even though no one was convicted of anything their legal fees killed them. The message was received and the private clubs went away.
Then the high rake killed the poler games anyway. Now you can only find a few tables in the entire city, all no-limit because you can’t beat the rake at limit poker.
The high rake in live poker probably helped create the online poker boom. AI will soon kill it.
My grandfather was a doctor, and one of his patients was prominent in the local Mafia. His receptionist got friendly with the guy. And after a while she started to get anonymous phone calls from a man who would just say, “bet on this horse in that race”. At first she thought it was a joke, some kind of telephone troll. But she checked the paper, and this horse always won that race.
There are certainly people who have information about the horses and the jockeys that you don’t have.
Certainly. There is a common scam around information as well, which works like this:
Walk up to people at the track and strike up conversation. Tell them you got a hot tip from a jockey friend, and horse X is going to at least show. Give them the information for free.
Repeat with as many people as you can, giving them all different horses.
After the race, the people whose horses came in the top three come back and say, “you were right!” Now you say, “yeah, and horse Y is going to show in the next race”. Again give them all different horses.
After the race you might have a handful of people left for whom you have just given two accurate bets. Now they believe you actually have real information, so they ask for the next race. At this pint you say, “Hey man two freebies is enough, And if you bet on my horse it dilutes my odds. So this is costing me money. If you want the next horse, it’ll cost you $100” (or however much you think you can fleece).
Get out of Dodge before the next race is over.
This scam works even better online. Start a gambling newsletter with a free copy and a very expensive paid version. Blast the world with an E-Mail announcing your new expert picking service, and give everyone a free pick. Again, spread the picks around so that every possible winner results in thousands of people whose ‘free pick’ came in. Maybe repeat it with that subset if you have to, but eventually you get those people to pay for your expensive pro gambling sheet - which is useless.
A nuance here is that you actually wouldn’t make it so obvious. Gamblers know that you don’t always win so all you have to do is game the system so that some people get, say, a 25% return over a few bets. Then you not only get them hooked, but it takes longer for them to realize they’ve been scammed and they’ll continue to pay for your expensive fake prediction sheet.
All this is to say that if someone you don’t know offers you a ‘hot tip’, run away.
That same scam is done at industrial scale for hot stock picking. Send thousands of emails time 3 or 4 different plausible tips. Repeat with tbe people who you got lucky with the first time. Etc.
Then sell 'em your expen$ive newsletter full of financo-babble.
To tell you a story if you can make living at sport betting.
First off: NO. You can’t.
You can get lucky sometimes.
But to have a real life, Get a job
Second: quit looking for a get rich quick way out. There’s not one.
The math skills won’t help you. If you’ve got a little cash you can buy lottery tickets w/o skills and be as successful as trying to figure out the spread and betting right.
My Daddy played the ponies for many years. It took a big chuck of his day studying the Racing form and relying on sketchy tips he got at the track.
He bet on football through a bookie.
He seemed/thought he was lucky. Realistically he probably wasn’t. He had money to throw away and thought of it as a hobby. So it was ok.
But no he did not rely on it as a living. At all.
It was a fun game to him.
The irony is especially high in England, where players have been suspended from playing for betting on sports while playing in a jersey literally sponsored by a betting company.
You may notice the Hollywoodbets advertisement on his shirt.
That sounds about right, and I’d extend that to any race. The favourite wins about one-third of the time. Interestingly, the professional handicappers whose selections and or commentary are published in track programs and the Racing Form, are also right about one-third of the time. And they’re the best at what they do, just like a baseball player who can hit .330 is regarded as the best at what he does.
But Sam is correct: anybody who claims to have a hot tip at the track, almost certainly doesn’t, and is playing you for a chump. Besides, like I said, there are enough professionals and experts publishing their selections in commonly-available sources that no stranger with a so-called hot tip is needed to enjoy a day at the track, even for the novice.
In the NFL, the favorite wins about 67% of the time. But the ‘Moneyline’ odds (betting a team to win) are often set so that a heavy favorite pays very little profit on a bet. As described above, you would win maybe a few pennies for each dollar bet…if the team won. According to this article, had you bet the moneyline favorite on each game in the 2022 NFL season, you would have a -3% ROI.
Down at the pub we occasionally drink Irish Car Bombs competitively, where the last one finishing pays for the round. I haven’t lost yet, my car bombs have all been free.