Originally posted on 07/16/2013:

Quote Originally Posted by benrama View Post
Yea you're probably one of the 5% Sando I'll grant that. But you are the exceptionin how you manage your bankroll, study the game and know your sports, and I figure this is not your professional income but just a side gig.

I've done OK at most sports but never lost an AFL season either (though i have an unusual strategy) but my point is simply that as I earn more in the real world it becomes less and less attractive from an investing perspective to be a sports better. I'd have to be wagering amounts that would get me banned at most books other than Pinny, for starters.

So the question is not just, can you make a living betting sports but will you make most money doing so. Even those that can in theory make money (and this is at best 5% of betters, though 50% probably delude themselves they have what it takes) are probably better off spending that same time in other pursuits. Successful sports betting never leaves your CV in better shape.

For me now I'm better off being happy being marginal profitable and spending more time building my wealth elsewhere.

Great work tonight on the Eagles by the way - I actually think they had apretty poor game error and discipline wise and still won by 20.
They will be a definite finals contender.

Your absolutely right mate, this is purely about supplementing my current income, I do have a job. Sounds like the biggest difference between you and me is that you have a really nice corporate job, where as I’m just a boring old security guard. I got lucky however and landed at a company that actually pays pretty well, and I also receive a fortnightly pension from the army, so money’s not really an issue. For me gambling is a way to make some extra cash. I have zero debt and don’t want any, so when I want something nice, like for example at the moment I’m saving up for a new sportsbike, it is a slow process, actually saving the money instead of just hitting the bank up for a loan. It has taken me a very very long time to get where I am today, i.e into that proverbial 5%

I’ve had years of losing, gambling the rent money, having people tell me I have a gambling problem, even hitting up pawn-brokers for cash – you name it, I did it.I have been doing this for 17 years and even that is a conservative estimate, as I’m 35 now and was playing 5 card draw for big money when I was 14 (I worked as a golf caddy in NY and used to win or lose $150+ sometimes in a day. Might not sound like much but this is $US and back in 1992). I have tried almost everything, pouring thousands into a single pokie machine, buying entire rolls of scratch lotto tickets, and for years betting big on the nag’s and dish lickers. I have bought many many systems for racing, the worst being a $9000 horse racing system called Technology 21. Nothing worked of course, however in the background I had always dabbled on sports betting and occasionally did pretty well, despite having zero knowledge of BR management, unit sizing, etc, etc. As I got older I started getting very interested in finance and the stock market and started off by buying another stupid system for $4.5K called Star Trader – another failure. It took me a long time and a lot of wasted money to learn that 99% of these systems are crap. However I continued studying finance and forcing myself to read the financial review everyday (painful) and building up my knowledge, whilst at the same time I discovered the poker craze. I used to travel around the country playing in Chess tournaments for absolute peanuts and then I heard a story about a guy who won $10K in a poker tournament… This was 8 years ago, well before NL ‘holdem and PLO became mainstream. Back then the games were weak and for 18 months I made a comfortable living travelling back and forth between Adelaide and Melbourne and beating up on guys at 2/3 and 3/5, just low limit stuff.

Like my good buddy and fellow Raiders man Rohan22no I discovered that gambling for a living is a soul depriving and truly degenerate business. I was making money no worries, I used to think I was the “king of the Adelaide Poker Zone”. My g/f worked at the cas, I was tight with all the security, I used to go to the dealers home games, one of my best mates was a boss in the poker zone, etc. I truly walked around like I owned the place. But I discovered that I don’t want to just gamble for a living. Unlike many poker players, money is not my god, I actually don’t even care about it that much, I’m a simple guy with simple tastes and in situations like when I would talk to my mum, I could tell she was embarrassed that her son played poker for a living. When people asked me what I did for work, I would make up some shit like “I trade on financial markets”, as I was also embarrassed to say yeah I’m a “professional” gambler.

Long story short I ended up losing hundreds of thousands of dollars on some very speculative decisions in the ASX. I was actually doing really well, making nearly $50K in my 1st 6 months in the market but that turned out to be a disaster as I began thinking of myself as the next Warren Buffett and onceI started messing around with the penny stocks, especially in super speculative mining and defence markets it all went to shit. How did I have hundreds of thousands of $$ to lose in the 1st place? I had a really bad accident in the army, it was the end of my career and I got a very large payout and a pension for life. After my stock market disaster and a long lay-off from all forms of gambling I started messing around on Betfair with trading (the object being to achieve a “green book” i.e no lose position) and eventually after months of hard work I developed my own trading system’s for NBA and tennis, and also a variation of the old classic “lay the draw” strategy for soccer. Again everything went really well and I was owning Betfair, despite being at a dis-advantage to the rest of the god damn world because of Australia’s horrible live betting laws. I seriuosly contemplated moving to NZ as I was convinced I could make $10K+ every week if only I could trade on a level playing field with the rest of the world. What happens next? Same story as my stock market trading - got too big for my boots and everything went to shit. Lost so much money so quickly I actually went on a long term tilt to the point where I would lose 2-4K on a single tennis match and the actual monetary impact of this would not even register on my psyche.

It has taken me very long hard painful road to get to where I am now. I have learnt many lessons. I have read probably 30-35 books on the combined subjects of finance, poker, sports-betting and gambling in general. Now after losing hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime of gambling I do win. Finally. I am fanatical about sports. No doubt there are people at SBR just waiting for my collapse, because no-one can handicap multiple sports successfully, right? Well I just do my own thing. I don’t care what others pre-conceived notions are. I actually only bet on sports I know. Do I really follow 10+ sports that closely? Absolutely. When I say I am obsessed with sports I mean that literally. My idea of watching relaxing TV is fox sports news, ESPN sports center, AFL360, etc. When I am driving I listen to podcasts (AFL – mondayitis, NRL – nrl unleashed, etc). When I was 15 I could name the starting 5 of every NBA team and most of the benches too. I was playing blackjack with Shane Warne and Brett Lee once at the casino and was all ready to take Warnie on in a debate on the state of Australian Cricket - I actuall thought I knew more than he did haha. I think nothing of flying down to Sydney and then straight back to Adelaide to watch 1 game of league, a $600 trip. Enough examples, you get the point…