Greke's Guide To Good Side Betting

[GrekeHaus]

When browsing through all the side bets I noticed something interesting. Despite the fact that most of you are very intelligent people and very skilled poker players, most of you are complete retards when it comes to using this system.

I made the system to give you all great power. You have the power to bet as much as you want and get whatever odds you want. However, with great power comes great responsibility. A bet is only a bet if somebody is willing to accept the other side of it.

Therefore, I offer you a handy guide for things to consider when offering up bets.

General Guidelines

1. When offering a bet, make sure that the bet will look appealing to someone else. This does not mean that the bet can't be +EV for you, but you should at least try to see why somebody would want to take the other side of the bet you're offering. It would be nice to be able to make an even money bet on Irie vs. Yugo in the first round, but who will want this bet? Everybody here knows that Irie is a better player than Yugo, so nobody's going to take this bet. The only person who willing to take it would be a person who didn't know this. Or, if the bet was large enough, someone who could convince Irie to throw his first round match.

2. If you've already made a bet that you know nobody would want to match, delete it. You're wasting people's time when they're browsing the site. I made a few of these initially, but that was only to help populate the site so that people could see how it works. I've since deleted these bets as well as some of SFB's more preposterous bets. You can do this by clicking on the "My Bets" link at the top of the page.

3. Don't forget the calcuttas! Small stakes closes in less than a week, so make sure to get your bids in!

Betting "To Win STTF-HUC"

1. An average player in this tournament is 15:1 against winning. Keep this in mind when making bets.

2. Don't be afraid to offer bets on "no" if you don't mind the risk. People will be more likely to take a -EV bet if the risk is lower. If you offer a bet on "yes", then anybody accepting this bet has to deal with the fact that not only might he be looking at a -EV bet, he's also risking a lot to win a little. Not many people are going to be willing to do this. On the other hand, someone might be willing to bet $20 to win $300 without thinking about it too much.

3. If there are n players better than a given player in the tournament, then the odds against that person winning are strictly worse than n:1. For instance, Suited has offered a bet on Raptor with 2:1 odds. Clearly, there are two people in the tournament better than him, so this is a bad bet. When making these bets, consider that person's place in the ladder.

Betting Mathups and Comparisons

1. Again, don't be afraid to lay odds on the stronger player. Most people like to bet less to win more, so you're chances of getting a bet matched are better if you are the one laying the odds.

2. Keep the general betting guidelines in mind. Nobody wants an even money bet on a player who's clearly weaker.

3. I only put a few player comparisons in there. There are probably a lot more that would make interesting bets. If you want to bet on who will win more games between two specific players (or two groups of players), ask me to add it for you.

Betting Totals

1. Although I came up with totals which I came up with were meant to be approximately even money, most of them aren't going to be exactly even money. You may need to lay odds to get one of these bets accepted. The one that comes to mind is Gigabet at 4. If Gigabet wins 5 games, it means that he'll probably win the tournament. Despite the fact that he's the best player, the field is strong enough that I don't think this is an even money bet.

2. I can add multiple lines for the same player. Just to show this, I added a Gigabet Win Total of 3.5. If you want to bet an over/under on a player, but would like a different win total, ask me to add it for you.

Misc Bets

1. I'm sure there are a lot of amusing prop bets that people can come up with. If something occurs to you, let me know.


Hopefully you're all slightly less retarded for having read this, and will now go out and offer "good" bets.