Who are you playing against?

[Julien_Olynpic]

Let's discuss the question of who we play against in sports betting and betting in general, that is, in disputes on sports and non-sports events. We are accustomed to thinking that in centralized bookmakers we play against the bookmaker, and on prediction platforms like Polymarket we play against other players. But is this really true? This is a question that is not discussed enough and not understood correctly by everyone. Imagine a sports match where the bookmaker gives one side high odds and the other side low odds. Most players are confident that the favorite who is given the high odds will win and they start betting big money on this outcome. Very few players bet money on another outcome of the match (let's imagine for simplicity that the match is tennis and therefore it has only 2 outcomes) and the question arises: from what money will the winnings of the winners be paid out if the favorite wins? The bookmaker will basically have to pay out of its own funds. Therefore, he changes the odds to make the distribution of money on the outcome of the match more even. That is, he lowers the odds for the favorite and increases them for the underdog. If even in this case they do not bet money on the outsider, then in this case the bookmaker will have to pay the winnings from their own funds. It turns out that every time you play sports betting, you are not playing against the bookmaker at all, but in some sense against other players. The 20th century bettor J.R. Miller wrote about this well in one of his books. I have already cited his quotes in other topics. This is a fairly long quote from his book, but it explains this thesis in great detail.

To put it simply, the betting line is not a mirror image of the relative talents and strengths of the teams. Contrary to popular belief, THE PURPOSE OF THE BEtting line is NOT TO PREDICT THE OUTCOME OF THE MATCH. THE PURPOSE OF THE LINE IS TO DIVIDE THE GENERAL OPINION OF THE PLAYERS ABOUT THE GAME. This is a very important difference that is important not only for the players, but is especially important for the bookmakers. This is a key factor that the player must understand before he can hope for success. If the public opinion of the gaming public is not divided in normal proportion, a disproportionate amount of money will be placed on one or the other team. This circumstance will force the bookmaker to acquire an imbalance on one of the sides in the line. That is, the bookmaker will have to bet HIS MONEY on the game. This is not "good". This is already called gambling, and for any business it is bad and abnormal. Bookmaking is, first of all, a business, moreover, it is a service business, and, as in any other type of service, the bookmaker's profit must come from the commission for services. A BOOKMAKER DOES NOT PARTICIPATE IN THE GAMBLING BUSINESS. Its function is to act as a broker. Its role is to distribute transactions between players to the state of "I hold money in my hand, since I have separated players on both sides of the barrier relative to my line" - and its profit depends on the withdrawal of the commission for services on "divorce".
***
This little story shows why everyone should learn to "beat the line". It is relatively easy to understand. Bookmakers need to protect themselves from taking too much risk on one side of the bet. To avoid potential disaster, they must set the line to balance the opinions of their customers. Now that we understand exactly what is happening, it is clear that when you place a bet, you are not necessarily betting against the bookmaker. In reality, each bettor is expressing an opinion against the collective opinion of the entire gambling fraternity, or more precisely, each bettor is expressing an opinion that is the opposite of the opinions of the rest of the bookmaker's customers. In reality, high-volume bookies with huge amounts of money and a large number of customers do not care which of their customers wins and who loses. In fact, they often cannot even tell who is a professional player, because a player can have dozens of accounts open. Many small bookies often bet on their own lines, this is called "taking a side". If there is a disproportion in bets on one team or another, they sometimes take a risk if they think it is justified. Many people think this is unfair. They suspect the bookmaker of something, since it takes one side. People perceive it this way: a bad line is given because the bookmaker is doing some shady business. In any case, since many factors influence the creation of the line, and they are more a feature of the division of opinions of bettors than a forecast, sports betting is fundamentally an activity in which you can make money ("beatable position" - there is a possibility of winning). Any person who takes the time to become more informed than the majority of the gaming public will have an obvious advantage. The question is not how much smarter you will be than the experts, but that you can get more information than the majority.

[Smartprofit]

I agree with you. When I bet on sports, I am playing against other players (not the bookmaker).

My winnings depend on how much better my analytical skills are than the other players. Or how much more informed I am than the other players.

In order to win in the long run, I need a competitive edge. In analogy with poker, this is called "picking the right table to play". In order to win, I need to pick a table where there are weaker players than me. If there are stronger players than me at the table, then I am doomed to lose.

Having a bookmaker who claims a commission on each game reduces my potential winnings / increases my potential losings. But I am playing against other players.

[Crypt0Gore]

I agree with you. When I bet on sports, I am playing against other players (not the bookmaker).

My winnings depend on how much better my analytical skills are than the other players. Or how much more informed I am than the other players.

In order to win in the long run, I need a competitive edge. In analogy with poker, this is called "picking the right table to play". In order to win, I need to pick a table where there are weaker players than me. If there are stronger players than me at the table, then I am doomed to lose.

Having a bookmaker who claims a commission on each game reduces my potential winnings / increases my potential losings. But I am playing against other players.

It is already too late once the game starts, how can you know if the player will be a better one than you or the other way? Tell me if j am missing something because you said it is about picking the right table, so how will you pick the right table so that you win?

Playing against other players still have everything to do with luck, just pray that you are matched with someone who have less experience than you and that's all, so far there is nothing in this gambling space that makes winning a easy thing, everything is all about luck and luck only.

It is a complete lie if someone says otherwise, whatever works is the player been lucky.

[Ruttoshi]

Of course, you are betting against other players and that's why you see that if you bet on an underdog team and it turns out to be a win, you will make more profits compared to those who bet on the professional club, because the professional club will have more people betting on the club and the underdog few. So the many bets on the professional club will be shared among  those few gamblers that bet on the underdog and their profits will be big.

On the other hand, the opposite is the case, if few gamblers bet on an underdog club and they got defeated, their money would be shared amongst those many gamblers that bet on the professional club and their profits will be small.

[ChiBitCTy]

If you're betting sports you're playing against vegas odds makers.  They are ELITE, and most every single outlet uses them worldwide.  This is how its been for many many years.

Now if you're playing daily fantasy let's say, you're playing/betting against a few people trying to have fun and then system gamers.  You almost never win unless you're building multiple teams inside one competition.  Also, not sure how prevalent it is anymore, but often the winners were those who worked at places like Draft Kings..they knew how people kept winning and just did the same.  Why I find daily fantasy betting horribly boring.

[SmartGold01]

I think this is the tricks which most gambling and casino site does in order to make bettors lose as they bet to equalized and regularized the inflow of cash on their sites. So what I understood correctly from this post is that we think is the right options while making our analysis is actually the opposite, and no bookies would actually makes gambler understand their logic, and logically when we understand all these there wouldn't be that much lost while placing bet on sport games and most people often tends to bet against the bookmakers because they felt is right options but when the results would come out you see mass loss.

[Agbamoni]

Brilliant thoughts from you. I figured a lot from what you have just said. When am gambling I play against other gamblers. The odds are most times tempered by the bookers when they realize that a lot of gamblers are choosing the odd or reflecting it. So in reality, it is one gambler against the other, not the bookmaker. When we gamble against the bookmakers we certainly cant win.

Every single day the bookmakers win against a lot of gamblers.

[Stepstowealth]

Let's discuss the question of who we play against in sports betting and betting in general, that is, in disputes on sports and non-sports events. We are accustomed to thinking that in centralized bookmakers we play against the bookmaker, and on prediction platforms like Polymarket we play against other players. But is this really true?

I like to think of sports betting or any other gambling that generally involves luck as gamblers gambling against luck or chance.
We the gamblers make random choices without any idea if our choices are either in support of chance or luck, or if our choices are against it. Bookmakers just align themselves to make profit from you knowing that Chance or luck will always have the biggest advantage, and by aligning themselves with it, they have the better advantage as well in the business.

[CryptoHeadlineNews]

That is, he lowers the odds for the favorite and increases them for the underdog.

Yes, that's true, as such strategy only helps the bookmaker remain profitable in the gambling industry, knowing fully well that people will always want to bet on games that are most likely to win, so that if eventually they are lucky enough to win, the amount to be paid to it's winners wouldn't be much, as compared if higher odds are giving to games most likely to win. Which will literally cost the sport booker much, despite paying winnings from the amount of money lots by other gamblers

In reality, each bettor is expressing an opinion against the collective opinion of the entire gambling fraternity, or more precisely, each bettor is expressing an opinion that is the opposite of the opinions of the rest of the bookmaker's customers.

Since all the money made from the games bet on a casino are usually in the custody of the casino itself, and not other individual just as this theorem state, it's very obvious for people for people to have thought they are gambling or betting against the sport booker, unknowing to them that the money a casino has is usually a collection of what other gamblers may have played and lost it

[bittraffic]

I'm not sure if it does matter who we are betting against when we are in platform. Basically we need the platform to facilitate the betting and that trust will not be an issue between two bettors in sports. Besides, all these gamblers want is to win a bet.

But its good to know its how it works. I guess it be good not to know who lose money or else I would feel sorry to the individual who bet against me if I win.

[Doan9269]

Let's discuss the question of who we play against in sports betting and betting in general, that is, in disputes on sports and non-sports events.

If you're a sport betting gambler, then you may have to choose between betting on the player or the team, this is because you will have to rely on your skills and experience in making a bet, there is more to understand by sport betting and the need to make it a conservative game within what we already know, this is not like the casino games we often play as against the system, in so many cases, it may not really matter about what or who we are playing against, but the things which constitutes what we know and understand about the bet we are playing.

[Kasabus]

I agree with you. When I bet on sports, I am playing against other players (not the bookmaker).

My winnings depend on how much better my analytical skills are than the other players. Or how much more informed I am than the other players.

In order to win in the long run, I need a competitive edge. In analogy with poker, this is called "picking the right table to play". In order to win, I need to pick a table where there are weaker players than me. If there are stronger players than me at the table, then I am doomed to lose.

Having a bookmaker who claims a commission on each game reduces my potential winnings / increases my potential losings. But I am playing against other players.

Yes, I am also playing against with other players, the finer they are, the more challenging it is for me to beat them. I won’t never see the bookmaker as a my opponent, they’re only just a tool.

You know, it’s a good game if you can see you’re playing against with challenging people, but of course you need to be stronger than them, so that despite of feeling luck, there will be a sure win in the long run. Although outcomes can be uncertain, but if you have good background on the game and you have reliable experience on the kind of game, winning won’t be that too far.

[alegotardo]

Let's discuss the question of who we play against in sports betting and betting in general, that is, in disputes on sports and non-sports events. We are accustomed to thinking that in centralized bookmakers we play against the bookmaker, and on prediction platforms like Polymarket we play against other players. But is this really true? This is a question that is not discussed enough and not understood correctly by everyone. Imagine a sports match where the bookmaker gives one side high odds and the other side low odds. Most players are confident that the favorite who is given the high odds will win and they start betting big money on this outcome. Very few players bet money on another outcome of the match (let's imagine for simplicity that the match is tennis and therefore it has only 2 outcomes) and the question arises: from what money will the winnings of the winners be paid out if the favorite wins? The bookmaker will basically have to pay out of its own funds. Therefore, he changes the odds to make the distribution of money on the outcome of the match more even. That is, he lowers the odds for the favorite and increases them for the underdog. If even in this case they do not bet money on the outsider, then in this case the bookmaker will have to pay the winnings from their own funds. It turns out that every time you play sports betting, you are not playing against the bookmaker at all, but in some sense against other players.

When a large number of people bet on a favorite, the bookmaker will obviously reduce the odds for that outcome and make it less profitable for bettors, encouraging bets on the "underdog" team and thus balancing the bookmaker's book, as there will always be someone willing to try for a better profit even if it means betting against the odds. If an unexpected result occurs and the bookmaker has to pay out more than expected, they are certainly the ones who bear the loss. However, over time, bookmakers have become quite perfect in their predictions and in their ability to guarantee the advantage in their favor, so even if they lose occasionally, on average they will always make a profit.

And yes... you are betting against other players and the bookmaker will always take its share of the profits regardless of who wins (most of the time).

[Saint-loup]

As you said it comes from the last century, now we are almost in 2025, 25 years in the 21st century things have changed. Now you have internet so people can easily look which odds are offering other bookmakers and go to another sportbook if it is more interesting to place his bet there. So I don't think bookmakers can "scam" like some have been able to do in the past decades. Now there is a market.

[danherbias07]

This is why some gamblers in sports are waiting for the odds to change that way they could maximize their profits. While the betting line is on, the odds will keep on changing and it's because of the gamblers putting their bets that must be balanced by the sportsbookies. It's like two jars that need to be filled with the same amount of water or else it will either spill or the other one will be dry.
We are always playing against each other and there's no way an online bookie would join the gamble by letting it go on without even balancing the bets. They only profit from percentage and that's it. They will not participate as that kind of idea could only ruin their business.

[stadus]

as you said it comes from the last century, now we are almost in 2025, 25 years in the 21st century things have changed

I believe it still hasn’t changed, that’s the principle of sports betting,  we’re essentially playing against each other, while the bookies are just facilitating our bets. Bookmakers are their to provide the odds, and its designed to ensure balanced action so that, at the end of the day, the bookies profit from the juice or commission they earn. Have you ever wondered why the standard odds for sports betting are -110 or 1.90? It’s because that 10% margin goes to the bookies as their cut.

[Inwestour]

I agree with you. When I bet on sports, I am playing against other players (not the bookmaker).

My winnings depend on how much better my analytical skills are than the other players. Or how much more informed I am than the other players.

In order to win in the long run, I need a competitive edge. In analogy with poker, this is called "picking the right table to play". In order to win, I need to pick a table where there are weaker players than me. If there are stronger players than me at the table, then I am doomed to lose.

Having a bookmaker who claims a commission on each game reduces my potential winnings / increases my potential losings. But I am playing against other players.

If you play poker, then I agree with you, you need to determine the level of the players at the table and understand how much stronger or weaker they are than you, but if you bet on sports, then in this case it does not matter to you at all who else besides you bets on the same event as you, because in this case you play only against the bookmaker, and for you it is only important that your team wins.

[avp2306]

as you said it comes from the last century, now we are almost in 2025, 25 years in the 21st century things have changed

I believe it still hasn’t changed, that’s the principle of sports betting,  we’re essentially playing against each other, while the bookies are just facilitating our bets. Bookmakers are their to provide the odds, and its designed to ensure balanced action so that, at the end of the day, the bookies profit from the juice or commission they earn. Have you ever wondered why the standard odds for sports betting are -110 or 1.90? It’s because that 10% margin goes to the bookies as their cut.

Well this is common misconception by some players that they are actually battling with the bookies itself, while the fact everything(odds) is adjusted based on the bets places by people so with those things already we can figure out that we are betting with other player and bookies is just taking profits from their bettors. I guess many people know about this already and maybe there are some people got confused about it.

Although this is good topic to discuss since somehow it can open some good thoughts for some people that got confuse about this situation.

Here is the supporting information about this  https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/bookie.asp

[traderethereum]

as you said it comes from the last century, now we are almost in 2025, 25 years in the 21st century things have changed

I believe it still hasn’t changed, that’s the principle of sports betting,  we’re essentially playing against each other, while the bookies are just facilitating our bets. Bookmakers are their to provide the odds, and its designed to ensure balanced action so that, at the end of the day, the bookies profit from the juice or commission they earn. Have you ever wondered why the standard odds for sports betting are -110 or 1.90? It’s because that 10% margin goes to the bookies as their cut.

In this digital era, if we playing gambling by online, we will not know who are our opponent. We only knows that the opponent gambling with us without we know for sure. Maybe they are robot or real people who also wants to get win from the games.

Yes, the era is already changed a lot especially with the grow of the technology that makes gamblers gets an easiness just to playing gambling. They can play gambling with other people who come from other country but we don't know who they are.

[eisen33]

In this digital era, if we playing gambling by online, we will not know who are our opponent. We only knows that the opponent gambling with us without we know for sure. Maybe they are robot or real people who also wants to get win from the games.

Yes, the era is already changed a lot especially with the grow of the technology that makes gamblers gets an easiness just to playing gambling. They can play gambling with other people who come from other country but we don't know who they are.

This may also be true, because now any bot can be programmed to act with delays, as if it were a real person thinking and making decisions, but in fact, if we play online, it will be very difficult for us to understand who we are playing with. It is best to play in an offline casino if you want to see your opponents and study their habits, by the way, even playing poker with friends at a table at someone's home gives more emotions (even if for chips without real money) than playing in front of a monitor.