What do bookmakers know about the sports scene that ordinary punters don't?

[jones24]

Do any of you read the odds movement of a match to actually try and predict the outcome or is that just plain stupid?

I suppose a bookmaker has certain information of a match that an ordinary punter wouldn't.

Why do they put the odds for a supposedly favourite team to win at low odds of 1.7 sometimes and even lower at 1.3 sometimes?

[djefferis]

All about balancing the ledger. Even amounts of money on both sides equals guaranteed profit for the book.

As to why some dogs are bigger than others, its simple bias. Bettors love winners, long term winners (like the yankees in mlb) always command a premium, even when its not deserved. If there were no premium, action would be unbalanced.

Books generally know nothing more, just how to get their players on the side they need them to be on.

[lukahh]

they generally dont know.
the sofisticated ones would have history statistics of sharp bettors (insider information etc) and if they see them all on one side of the match, they may suspect something. but in general - they dont really care, as long as they receive balanced action or hedge on betfair.

[jones24]

Ok so by reading the odds movement of a match you can sort of see what the majority of punters are betting on and so on. Here's another question:

Do the majority of people get their bets correct? I would figure that for most matches there are equal number of ppl rooting for either team.

[vyomguy]

They know inside stuff in NBA and NCAAB....basketball is the easiest game to fix. Football, MLB and NHL are tough to fix.

In NBA, referees control the spreads and totals...so easy to fix in basketball actually. Books win EVERY year in NBA and NCAAB.