The sports betting landscape is constantly changing and new tools such as Prop Professor are popping up to help bettors gain an edge. This article explains in depth two sports betting strategies that are quickly growing in popularity: EV+ betting and arbitrage betting. These betting strategies aren't new, but new tools are making them accessible to everyone and the growing number of sports betting sites is adding fuel to the fire.
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What is +EV betting?
+EV betting is a data-driven strategy that focuses on long-term profit and finding value with each wager. The "EV" in +EV betting stands for "expected value" and the plus sign indicates that a wager has a higher probability of winning than the implied odds indicate. +EV betting, also referred to as EV+ betting or Plus-EV betting or positive EV betting, requires patience and oftentimes wagering on games you wouldn't normally bet on.
The simplest way to understand expected value is using a coin flip, because we all know that the probability of a coin landing heads or tails is 50%. Imagine for a moment that I offered you +105 odds if a coin landed on tails as pictured in the table below. Betting on heads wouldn't be a good deal (minus-EV), but tails would be a Plus-EV opportunity because we can expect that, over time, this bet will be profitable. In other words, the probability of the coin landing on tails (50%) is higher than the implied odds (48.78%). If implied odds are a new concept for you, our odds calculator can help. Simply punch in the odds for any bet and instantly the implied odds appear.
| OUTCOME | PROBABILITY | ODDS | IMPLIED ODDS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Heads | 50% | -120 | 54.55% |
| Tails | 50% | +105 | 48.78% |
Notice how betting on tails in this hypothetical wager is not a get rich quick scheme. In fact, you could easily wager $100 on tails 10 times and end up losing money by the end of those 10 coin flips. However, over time, if you bet on tails thousands of times, you can expect to be profitable because the math is on your side.
In this way, betting volume is your friend and that's why +EV bettors often stick to a consistent unit size and place a large number of wagers over a long period of time. Most successful +EV bettors aren't experts on all the teams or players they're betting on, and some of them aren't even sports fans. Instead, +EV bettors are focused on the math and finding a way to use numbers to their advantage.
For more information on +EV betting, check out Prop Professor's in depth +EV tutorials and join the discord community chats.
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How To Use +EV For Sports Betting
In the coin flip example above, it was easy to identify that tails is a +EV wager because we all know the true probability of a coin landing on tails. However, things aren't as cut-and-dry when it comes to sports betting. It's tougher to calculate the true probability of the Jaguars upsetting the Chiefs on Monday Night Football when we have to account for variables like weather, bad referees, and fumbling.
That's where tools like Prop Professor come in handy, because it's excellent at identifying expected value within the sports betting ecosystem. In other words, they do the math for you and compare the odds from multiple different sportsbooks in real-time so that you can find the edge from any sportsbook and make a high volume of +EV wagers without looking through all the different data sources individually.
Prop Professor allows you to customize your settings so that you only see +EV opportunities from sports betting sites that are available to you. So, if you live in a state that only has access to three sportsbooks and specific fantasy sites, you don't have to worry about the clutter of seeing bets you're not able to make.
Prop Professor lets you to put your bankroll size into the settings so that the app can recommend an appropriate bet size based on your bankroll. This is important because if you stubbornly stray off the path of the recommended bet sizes and start saying things like, "Well I really like this game a lot, I'm going to multiply the recommended unit size" it can defeat the purpose of +EV betting.
Think back to our coin flip example to illustrate this point, imagine if you were consistently betting $100 on tails and after several days you were up $600 in profit. Now imagine you increase your bet size to $1500 for the next flip, you can easily find yourself in the red. In this way, +EV betting is very much a practice of removing emotions and your own personal opinions and trusting that the math will make you profitable in the long term.
The odds screen at Prop Professor (see below) utilizes odds from 25 different sports betting sites, so even if you're not hunting for +EV bets, it will help you confirm if you're getting a "good deal" on a particular bet. In other words, if your sportsbook is offering the San Jose Sharks at +220 while every other sportsbook at Prop Professor is showing +240, +250, and +260, then that's a red flag that you're probably not getting the best value on that bet.
What is Arbitrage Betting
Arbitrage betting, also known as "arbing," is a sports betting strategy that involves betting on competing outcomes of the same game or event in order to ensure a profit. At first glance, this sports betting strategy might sound too good to be true, but because there are so many different sports betting options these days, opportunities like this do exist on a regular basis.
To illustrate an example of arbitrage betting, see the Red Sox and Yankees game at two different sportsbooks below. Notice how the Red Sox are underdogs (+105) at Sportsbook A and the Yankees are underdogs at Sportsbook B. There are no ties in baseball so the only possible outcomes here are that the Yankees win or the Red Sox win. Therefore if you bet the same exact amount of money on the Red Sox at Sportsbook A, and the Yankees at Sportsbook B, you can't lose. In both scenarios you will lose one bet, while winning a second bet at +105. A $100 wager on both underdogs would net you $5 profit in this example.
| TEAM | ODDS |
|---|---|
| Boston Red Sox | +105 |
| New York Yankees | -120 |
| TEAM | ODDS |
|---|---|
| Boston Red Sox | -120 |
| New York Yankees | +105 |
While the example above involves a moneyline of an MLB game, it's worth noting that many arbitrage opportunities are found in player props or more niche markets and platforms like Prop Professor do the digging for you.
Be sure to check out Prop Professor's how to guide on Arbitrage betting, after all that's how his business got started.
How to use Arbitrage Strategy for Sports Betting
Arbitrage betting isn't possible unless you have more than one sports betting app to work with. Any professional bettor will tell you that it's crucial to have as many sports betting accounts as possible so that you can shop around, and take advantage of arbitrage and +EV betting opportunities when they present themselves.
Even with the help of multiple sportsbooks, it's virtually impossible to make money with the arbitrage betting strategy without the help of tools. Imagine how much time it would take you to scan through dozens of sports betting apps and look at every single bet offered to try and find discrepancies you can exploit. By the time you found an arbitrage opportunity, the line may have moved on one of the sites which makes it impossible to take advantage of. Luckily we have Prop Professor to do the hard work for us. It's a great time to be alive if you're a sports bettor because we now have these tools that are updated in real time. That means outdated arbitrage opportunities are deleted after market movement makes them moot.
Remember, arbitrage betting is becoming very popular and everyone subscribed to these apps is seeing the same opportunities as you. That means line movement is inevitable and arbitrage opportunities sometimes last for only a few minutes or hours. This is why I recommend turning on notifications with Prop Professor Note: With Prop Professor, this requires downloading the iOS app so you can be alerted as soon as an exploitable arbitrage opportunity presents itself.
Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.
21+ and present in OH.
Betting Tools: Informed Bettor Makes A Good Bettor
Along with using subscription-based models such as Prop Professor, there are also all kinds of free and helpful betting tools here at Odds Shark. As mentioned above, we have extensive betting databases for every major North American sport.
Additionally, looking at betting calculators can help you increase your bankroll in a big way. We have a parlay calculator where you can practice building a out a parlay which also goes hand-in-hand with our hedge calculator. That calculator is very critical for parlay bettors, let's say you have a 5-game parlay that hinges on the Monday Night Football game. Pending the odds, a large bet placed on the opposite side of that leg could guarantee a profit while keeping your existing parlay alive as opposed to simply cashing out.
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