By William D Foote

Does anyone know why so many people lose at sports betting? Most think it is because of poor handicapping. While this can be true, it is not why most people lose. We know hundreds and hundreds of folks that are excellent handicappers or have access to winning picks that still lose their shirts year in and year out.

Quite simply, the vast majority of all gamblers maintain poor money management skills. That simple reason above all others is why they lose money. There are those that manage money poorly because they are uninformed and there are those that manage poorly because they are undisciplined. Unfortunately most often times, gamblers are uniformed and undisciplined.

We could write an entire twelve Volume Encyclopedia length case study on this subject. Given our space and time, we are going to summarize and hopefully you will get the gist. We want to talk about betting discipline and bet size. They actually go hand in hand.

If you are serious about success, it is imperative that you make a plan and remain disciplined. Your plan must entail proper bet size per unit or per game. You should never risk more than 5% of your bankroll on any one play with an average play being roughly 2% to 3% of your bankroll. We would guess that 99.9% of gamblers are wagering too much on each game and we strongly urge you to not fall into the same trap.

Most people will wonder, 2% of bankroll? How the hell am I going to make any real money that way? Our answer is very simple. Exert a little patience and a little discipline over a period of time. If you do this, 2% of a growing bankroll can earn you a full time living no matter how small your bankroll is to start. Not too long ago, we wrote an article showing how a $2,000 bankroll could turn into $7,000,000 in twenty years playing 4% on each game and picking only 55%.

It is imperative to bet a low percentage of bankroll to achieve success. Over the course of any season, and especially in the daily sports, you will encounter winning as well as losing streaks. If you are betting too high of bankroll percentage, one losing streak could eat up your entire bankroll and put you out of business. We cannot stress enough how important this concept is to your success.

A typical example would be a player that has a bankroll of $1000 and bets $100 on each game. One of two things will happen to this player. He will either hit a cold streak and be out of the game before he knows it, or he will hit a hot streak, up his bets to $200 or $300 per game and then hit a losing streak and be forced out of the game. Quite simply, there is no way to win if you are betting 10% of your bankroll on each game. Losing streaks will happen, as simple mathematics dictates this fact.

The next area we need to focus on is discipline. This is where most folks fail miserably. We have been betting full time for nearly many years. In the beginning, we were unsuccessful because we lacked discipline. We always could pick winners, but sticking to a very strict plan was the problem. If there is any one piece of advice we could lend amateur sports bettors it is this; you are not going to win every day or even every week. Do not concern yourselves with the battles and focus on the war.

Do you know how often we get emails from clients that sound like this, “I was wondering about the free service I am entitled to because of the losing week we had”. We will read this, scratch our heads for a moment and reply back. “Losing week? You should have gone 7-3 and picked up 9 units. We went 1-0 on Thursday, 1-0 on Friday, 4-0 on Saturday and 1-3 on Sunday. How did you lose money going 7-3?” To which the client replies.

“Well, I was betting $100 per game Thursday, Friday and Saturday and made $600. On Sunday I decided to up my bets to $300 a piece in the morning and went 1-2 and lost $360. Since I was down over $300 dollars for Sunday, I bet $700 on the Sunday Night Game. This way I could win back the $360 lost earlier in the day and still show a Sunday profit. Well, the Sunday Night Game lost and now I am in the hole $530 for the week and you all said of I did not show a profit I would get free service.”

Basically, this person had turned a 7-3 weekend into a lose money proposition. In other words, the picks he bet went 70% and he lost money. Day in and day out we receive similar emails with similar type circumstances.

The difference between professional gamblers and amateur gamblers is 20% the quality of picks they are playing and 80% the way they manage money. In the case we had described above, the individual failed to accept that Sunday was not going to produce a net profit for him (the battle). Instead of realizing that Thursday through Sunday was a great success that netted a significant profit (the war), they chose to lose site of the overall plan.

We wish we had more time and more space to help you all understand these concepts, as they are extremely valuable. It pains us to see folks lose over and over because they do not understand money management and the concept of long term profit as opposed to near term foolishness. Make a plan, establish a bankroll, stick to the plan and you will make money. Don’t do those things and you will not.