College Basketball Spreads Are "Off" More Than Usual This Year
When looking for soft spots in college basketball spreads, it’s often better to get a jump start early and adjust accordingly, as opposed to laying back and waiting for teams to develop a clear picture of how they will perform in a given season. This is because the oddsmakers don’t know any more than you do. Their assigned power rankings to teams are based on what limited information they have combined with an element of public perception, which correlates to a projected value of each team.
This value becomes a moving target throughout the season as the oddsmakers adjust their power rankings based on whether a team has exceeded or failed to meet their projection. Keep in mind that the oddsmakers never really know more than you do, but their advantage is that are much more quick to react when the outcome of certain games or performance of certain teams do not meet expectations. It’s what they do with the information, as opposed to the information itself, that separates them from most gamblers. It’s also what they hope will separate you from your money.
Early in the season, the playing field is much more level because there is no substantial data from which to make adjustments. You can find value by researching the teams on your own, then deciding if you feel the oddsmakers have overvalued or short-changed a team based on your own analysis. In the early going, and particularly this season, the oddsmakers are keenly aware of public perception, and they do their best to avoid giving away “free money” to public bettors. In the early season, there are many tournaments that feature high-profile teams from major conferences. The oddsmakers are keenly aware that the public prefers these teams and, without much else to go on, a good percentage of the novice players will blindly bet the favorite without considering any other factors.
Knowing this, the oddsmakers like to charge a “tax” on the public players, and this comes in the form of anywhere from one to five extra points on the side of the favored team. In other words, you get what you pay for. It’s the oddsmakers; way of making the public pay a steep price for backing a high-profile team, while at the same time tempting more sophisticated bettors into considering the other side. You would be well-served by giving some thought to the latter. Although the favorite will likely be the better team, it’s the equivalent of playing with house money if you back the other side with the knowledge that you are getting extra points that you aren’t necessarily entitled to have. For instance, take North Carolina this season. The Tar Heels were a unanimous pre-season No. 1 pick, and there probably isn’t a more high-profile team among public bettors.
The oddsmakers cranked up the tax to ridiculous proportions on North Carolina, and if you saw this coming, you’re a richer gambler because of it. In their first 10 games, the Tar Heels were favored by 29 or more points five times, and never sniffed a cover in those five contests.
While betting against, or "fading", a team that is popular in the public view always is worth considering, it is even more valuable in the early season when the favored team is likely to draw more attention than usual. This is because there is a limited number of games from which to choose in the early going, and the oddsmakers will be extra wary of giving gamblers a free ride on the backs of reputable programs. Duke is another team that, based solely on reputation, will garner a ton of public interest in the early going. While no one ever got rich betting against coach K, the early season is the time to take a look. The Blue Devils were favored by 20 or more points five times in their first 10 games, and covered in just two of these contests.
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