why are parlays bad?

[housenuts]

i was told parlays are bad because they don't pay you the proper odds. i decided to look into this myself.

i just went on sportingbetusa and found 2 Even NHL lines. i parlayed them for $10 to win $30. so if i do that 4 times, i end up even. (in the long run, assuming the even lines are correct)

so that takes no value away from me. all it does is increase variance. is there something i'm missing?

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i was told parlays are bad because they don't pay you the proper odds. i decided to look into this myself.

i just went on sportingbetusa and found 2 Even NHL lines. i parlayed them for $10 to win $30. so if i do that 4 times, i end up even. (in the long run, assuming the even lines are correct)

so that takes no value away from me. all it does is increase variance. is there something i'm missing?

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lol because if your side is even, the other side is -110 or higher, meaning the odds of either of your bets covering is calculated by the oddsmakers as 48.78% (or worse).

the only parlay i've been able to win regularly are within the same game, like team -6 and the over. Even then it's so easy to lose. I like doing 6+ team parlays because they're fun, like the lottery, you know you're probably going to lose. However they tend to make Sunday very entertaining if it looks like you have a shot at winning it. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

your parlay is only as good as the individual bets it contains.

The simplest way to see why parlays are generally bad is to take the amount of money you are investing in your parlay and apply it towards a straight bet on one of your teams. Then if that team wins put the original bet and winnings on your next team and so on and so forth... if you win all the bets at the end of your "parlay", compare what you have with this method to what you have with your book's parlay pay-off. You will lose the same amount, your original wager, in either case should the "parlay" fail.

[MasterShakes]

They're not bad IF you are a winning gambler. If you are able to pick at a winning rate (i.e. 53/54% or so), then you will win more playing parlays than you will playing individual bets. However, you will be dealing with a lot more variance.

Also, be sure to find a book that pays 14:5 on 2 teams, and 6.5:1 on 3 teams. There are enough out there that this should be relatively easy. Don't play more than 3 team parlays.

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Also, be sure to find a book that pays 14:5 on 2 teams, and 6.5:1 on 3 teams. There are enough out there that this should be relatively easy. Don't play more than 3 team parlays.

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I'm not a math guy so I bring no credibility to the table but this is good advice. I do know from an application sense that when I moved out to Vegas last year I promised myself that I would not play any higher than 3 team parlays and I'm hitting roughly 80% of them. Every weekend, I see people at Green Valley Ranch line up with 10-15 parlay cards playing every possible combination they can come up with. Again, I'm not a math guy but that looks like a losing way to bet, to me. :-)

yeah and they probably know that. I doubt they would care if they lose, just for the fun it.