[peacebyinches]

Now, I’m sure I’m not the first person to think of something like this but I haven’t been able to find much on the subject through searches, so I would greatly appreciate some thoughts about the feasibility of this admittedly rough idea.



Basically, I am trying to conceive a way to use 3-4 team parlays in a way that significantly reduces risk and helps counter act the diminished value of parlays vs. single game wagering. My initial idea involves selecting 2 heavily favored CBB teams (lets say they both listed at -8 ATS) and playing the moneyline instead of the spread. Then select a heavy underdog that I determine is very +EV according to prior modeling, (for simplicity, let’s say they are listed at +8) and playing the moneyline of this game as well, combining these 3 wagers into a 3 team parlay. Hypothetically it would look something like this:
Team A: -500
Team B: -500
Team C: +370


Now, assuming there is little to no difference between my determined win % for teams A and B and the predicted win % according to the moneyline, Teams A and B have an 80% chance of winning. According to my logic it is reasonable to say that if we accept these conditions as true, Teams A and B will both win 64% of the time. A $100 bet on this 2 team parlay yields a meager profit of $44. Now, incorporating the heavy underdog, the profit jumps to ~$576. However, the odds of all 3 Teams winning is now significantly reduced to about 13%. Assuming that my prior modeling has determined that Team C actually has a 35% chance of pulling out the upset instead of 20%, the chance of hitting this parlay almost doubles to around 23%.


What I need help with is determining what the best way to hedge this profitable but risky parlay. I do not want to completely reverse my picks, but seeing as Teams A and B have the lowest value (in relation to the listed line) would switching my pick for either team be a reasonable way to reduce risk in this case?



Now it would look like:
Team A: +370
Team B: -500
Team C: +370


This parlay would yield almost $2600, but with an even lower chance of happening (according to my math around 6%). Here is where I am getting lost as far as calculating the value of this proposed parlay, am I going to end up in a lose lose situation, where it was only smart to play one parlay and not both, or is there some merit to this strategy.
Basically, the entire point of this is to incorporate a team that I determine as having immense value (Team C) into a parlay bet with reduced risk of long-term loss. Additionally, with enough line movements the potential for arbitrage seems significant here.



Let me know if this is a feasible idea, even just in concept, (I’m sure my math is a little off in places) and what if there is a better way of going about this. Thanks.

[FourLengthsClear]

It doesn't matter how you slice it, if you are adding 0EV plays (like a team at -400 that you deem has an 80% chance of winning) to parlays, all you are really doing in increasing the the likelihood of substantial variance.

If you can identify plays with high +EV at odds of +370, just straight bet them and you will do fine in the long run.

[peacebyinches]

Well, I certainly cannot refute your argument, however I should explain something that I forgot to in the OP. I have been noticing that personally my handicapping methods have proven to be very effective for certain games, I have been able to show a high degree of confidence when wagering those games, but the problem is that these are hard to come by. I simply cannot wager on very many games and I am certainly not going to fall into the trap of raising my bet size (especially with my miniscule bankroll) because of the high degree of variance involved.

What I am trying to accomplish with these small parlays is get as much value from these infrequent, "high confidence, +EV" games I have so far been getting, still keeping my bet size low and potentially raise the amount of opportunities for arbitrage. The purpose of incorporating a second, slightly different parlay is to actually reduce the variance of these wagers. One point I did overlook is that I would not ever, ever arbitrarily include 0EV games into these parlays, just games that do not have the strikingly high degree of value that the underdog moneyline I included in my hypothetical example.

[AlwaysDrawing]

You're better off just straight betting your +EV plays.

[Jayvegas420]

The success of your method would appear to me, to always be hinging on the +EV team & whether or not you are predicting it correctly.
The only hedge method I see, available to you with the two other mega favourites, is to bet "in play" if your "in play" lines are generous enough.

[Inspirited]

You're better off just straight betting your +EV plays.

indeed