The general rule regarding parlays is: DON'T.
Parlays generally carry an increased house edge than straight bets, therefore you give the book a bigger advantage over you when you play them. That, alone, is reason enough to suppress the misplaced feelings of greed coupled with fear that often lead to betting parlays. People think they are risking less with parlays, but they are not. They believe they can win more with parlays, however they cannot. The bigger win with parlays is far outweighed by the bigger possibility of losing. Parlay bettors are in fact risking more, with less possibility of collecting.
A parlay is not an individual bet. It really is two bets -- a one-unit bet on one team and a two-unit bet on another. Which team gets the two-unit bet? In point-spread betting at constant money odds, if both teams win or both teams lose no matter which team gets the double bet. When one team wins and something team loses, however, the double bet is presumed to possess been on the loser. How smart is that for the bettor? Go ahead, make a parlay. We'll wait until both games are over, and in case there is a split we'll put the double bet on the loser. If your bookmaker sold you a parlay with that line, how many of you would still make the bet?
A parlay can be bad money management. In a parlay you either bet double on the second team, or nothing on that same team, dependant on whether the first game won or lost. That adds an element of luck to your betting it doesn't must be there. The skilled handicapper is definitely seeking to make smart investments. He tries to remove the effect of luck to the greatest extent possible in order to make his results as predictable as possible.
As with every rule, however, you can find exceptions. The exception to the rule regarding parlays occurs once the two bets are co-dependent.
I knew one bookmaker who was taken for thousands because he didn't understand the co-dependency of certain bets. He allowed a player to consistently parlay the initial half with the overall game. The ball player parlayed totals by combining the over in the initial half with the over in the overall game, and the under in the first half with under in the game. Both parlays were made in the same game. Every time the player won he'd win 2.6 times his bet. Betting $100 on each parlay, if one of these won, the player would win $260 and lose $100 on the other parlay for a net win of $160. He could never win both parlays. If he lost both parlays he'd lose $200.
Initially, this were a great chance for the book. The normal coin-flip odds of winning one parlay out from the two are 50-50. As far as the bookie was concerned the bettor should be winning $160 half enough time, and losing $200 half the time. The bettor, however, making $500 parlays, was ahead more than $20,000 after 6 months, and the book started to look at what the bettor was doing more carefully.
The problem for the bookmaker was that the two halves of every parlay were co-dependent. By the end of the first half, the bettor was almost never in a 50-50 situation.
Take the Thursday night game between Utah and Air Force. The game total was 53 and the initial half total was 27. At the end of the initial half, the score was 31-21, for a complete of 52 first-half points. The initial half of among the parlays, the "over" in the initial half was successful. For the parlay probability to be correct, there should now be a 50-50 possibility of winning the "over" for the overall game. Obviously the chances of winning the "over" in the overall game weren't 50-50 but better than 99% in favor of the "over." The player only had a need to win the first 1 / 2 of the parlay to be virtually assured that he would collect 2.6 times his money instead of just $10 for $11.
Before you rush out to try this, remember that most off-shore books are far too smart to let you parlay first half to game. If they do let you do this, start worrying about collecting because that book will soon be taken to the cleaners.
You can find, however, some less obvious co-dependent parlays that can be made at many books. One kind of co-dependent parlay is the parlay of the medial side and total in the same game.
Any game where the total is less than double the spread can provide you an edge in parlaying side to total in exactly the same game. We've already discussed, in a prior article, how exactly to use these anomalous side and total combinations to hedge one another and boost your win with very little increase in risk. Such a bet, however, needed that you have an opinion privately or the full total. Parlaying is another method to boost your potential win on these games, or even to develop a potential win should you have no opinion.
You can find two games this Saturday that qualify. They are Virigina -25 over Duke with a complete of 48 �, and Kansas St. -24 � vs. North Texas with a complete 46 �).
In the Virginia game, if you believe that Virginia covers the 25 points, then they must hold Duke to no more than 11 points or the game will go over the total. The more likely it becomes through the game that Virginia will cover 25 points, the more likely it becomes that the game will go over 48 �. bj88 winning margin, the more likely the game will review. If you like Virginia to cover the spread, and you also believe that Duke will not be shut out, then your probability of winning a parlay on Virginia and the over are greater than the standard 25%. Likewise, if the scoring stays low, it is less likely that Virginia covers the 25 points. Because of this, the probability a parlay of the under with the underdog will win is higher than the normal 25%.
Assuming you have no opinion on the overall game, you can parlay the favorite with the "over" and the underdog with the "under" and collect sufficiently often to exceed the losses when both parlays lose. In the only real other game meeting the qualifications this week -- Friday's game between California -30 against New Mexico State with a complete of 58 -- the under has already won with the underdog for an absolute two-parlay spread.
The closer the posted total would be to the spread on the side, the better win-rate will undoubtedly be on the parlay "spread" bet. The co-dependency in side to total parlays is not as strong as parlaying first half and game totals (if it were, most books would not allow such bets), but there exists a sufficient co-dependency in the games with low totals and high spreads to make the strategy profitable long-term.
Not all bookmakers will allow you to parlay the medial side to the full total in exactly the same game, because increasingly more are realizing that these bets are sometimes co-dependent. But, enough books still do allow such bets so that you can consider including such bets in your professional betting arsenal.
If your bookmaker provides "if/reverse" bets, it is possible to replace the parlay bet having an "if/reverse" bet and achieve greater success.