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Lines and odds, where do you stand?
Greetings fellow posters,
Coming back into SBR after a long time and staying away from the Sportsbooks finally exercising my profession, here I come to you all and let you into some information you should already know but some may not still, if you have any questions, I will be more than glad to help you out to the limit of my own knowledge.
In this long adventure working at the books I've been from a wagering clerk to the head of a small sportsbook, and it's been fun and I have no complains, that been said, let's cut to the main topic, the lines.
You all should know there's two ways the sportsbooks publish and move their lines. There's the way I did it myself, posting from scratch as soon as there was market and moving the lines based on the action I was taking or posting them and letting the market lead you, both will be explained next.
The first one is the basic linesmaker's job, you go ahead and publish the line as soon as you can so you can take as much action as you can, and this is seen in Sportsbooks whose business includes a large portfolio divided into post-up and credit players, but they are the ones sweating the action. With such system you will see the lines periodically changing depending on the action as you all know, but that will depend specifically on the book's preference, some like moving their lines according to single bets making the difference in money bigger on one side than the other, adding all the bets up and considering such difference to lower the fav or some other books base themselves on the infamous hold percentage (lines-wise) and what this means to them, for example, say we wanted a desirable 20% and my line has reached 120/100 action, one side has 20% more action on it making me wanting to lower it. Again, this varies from shop to shop, linesmaker to linesmaker. Now, once a line changes 5 cents, a penny, whatever that will mean a brand new line to the sportsbook since what we live on for is the vig, vigorish, juice, however you want to call it. Gross, it's what we want to balance at the end, from when the line opens to when it closes, but everything is held apart until that point. This last part is just some inner information that does not affect you as a player.
Now, on to the second point on lines moving, here fall the shops that exist for the sole purpose of selling their business to agents all over the wolrd. THe agents or more commonly known bookies are the ones risking their own money to satisfy their players, not the book but them. Some of these locals have access to some website they rent along with the sportsbook service, some others just take the action themselves the good 'ol way basing what they offer on the market out there. This is the key of this division of the industry, the lines are posted and offered based on what the market has overall. Books that offer this Pay Per Head service to locals wouldn't care about the money that is being layed on the lines, they just publish the action that is available out there and tail such lines to the very end, willing to offer the sharpest lines. That's why you will often see your local offering the exact same line as CRIS, 5Dimes, Pinny, my Grandmother, etc all up to their preference and more specifically the agents preference. Some books even have systems specially designed to mimic such lines to the second while the lines managers worry about what they have open and for who they have it as well as thinking what they'll have the following day. As you may see, it's totally different one from the other.
What does all this bull I've been writing about help you for? Simple, if you read lines and want to get the best deal at the earliest possible price even if this means 5 minutes before the games, you know what to ask for in case you book with a local or you will know who to pay attention to. In my life I've seen amazing handicappers able to get the edge from a line that just moved as well as the patient ones who wait until the line moves to their goal.
Happy betting and best regards fellahs, like my buddy Diogee said, on to tomorrow! Booya!
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I live in CR stil, I'm working in something else than booking and I'm gambling for the fun of it, life is good my man
Originally Posted by Iwinyourmoney
