Last night we offered up a lot of picks… I mean A LOT…15 hot picks and 8 warm picks to be exact. This isn't uncommon, especially when there's a lot of games on a given night. Some may be asking, "who the &*#@ is going to bet that many times in one night?"
After you're done reading this, you'll understand that it's actually a statistically smarter move to bet on more games with less money than it is to only place a couple of bets per night.
Let's first talk about 'bet volatility'. Bet volatility means that the fewer bets you place, the more volatile, or erratic your results will be. For example, if I took only 2 picks from last night's lineup to bet with, and those would have won - I would have been at 100% win percentage and would have been happy. On the other hand, if I were to pick 2, one winning, and one losing, you'd be at 50%, losing money, and probably would have been pissed off for the rest of the day. This is not to say that someone betting fewer games is bound to lose more, there's just a lot more risk involved when only placing a couple of bets.
On the other hand, if you were to bet with 10 to15 of these picks, each with a smaller bet amount (but totaling the same amount I would normally bet that night), your results would be much less erratic and at a steady increase over the course of a season. For a season, if I only bet once per night (72 times this season) the results are going to look very volatile (see the example graph below). This is why you'll have amateur bettors with crazy good win percentages in one week but when you check back in on them the following week, they're going negative. More proficient bettors will wager less money per bet (we generally recommend 1%-5% of your bankroll) but will place a higher quantity of bets.
You've heard mom say, "Don't put all your eggs in one basket!" In sports betting terms it goes, "Don't place your entire bet amount into only a couple picks in a night!" Spread your wagers across multiple bets, diversify your portfolio…you get the picture!
