MLB Shocker of the Month - Thursday! (Thu 7:10PM)
With games going every day, oddsmakers can't keep up with every change on the baseball diamond, such as injuries, bullpen overuse, road travel and emotional factors. They REALLY blew it on Thursday, making a dog of a team that should be favored. Go inside the stats and collect with Jim's Baseball Shocker of the Month before the oddsmakers wake up!

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Jim Feist's NBA Playoff Total Powerhouse - Wednesd (Wed 9:35PM)
Totals offer just as much value as sides, many times even more so, and what better way to build your bankroll than with a basketball TV total winner from Jim Feist! This is a terrible total that oddsmakers misjudged. Grab this NBA PLAYOFF "Total" POWERHOUSE and play with the Las Vegas big boys WEDNESDAY!

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10-4 on Totals: Hi Roller NBA Playoff Total Power! (Thu 9:35PM)
Jim Feist is 10-4 with NBA playoff totals, including the Pacers/Heat Game 1 under on Sunday! Totals offer just as much value as sides, many times even more so, and what better way to build your bankroll than with a High Roller basketball total winner from Jim Feist! This is a terrible total that oddsmakers misjudged. Grab this High Roller NBA PLAYOFF "Total" POWERHOUSE and play with the Las Vegas big boys Thursday!

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Baseball Wagering: Build Your Bankroll with Dogs

by: Jim Feist

by Jim Feist

NFL picks and football predictions are just around the corner, but there is still plenty of baseball to profit from. One area of football handicapping that can apply to baseball is not being afraid of underdogs. Many baseball bettors have difficulty bringing themselves to bet on underdogs. They are thinking, "How can I bet on a bad starting pitcher?" This kind of thinking leads to bad habits, such as playing too many favorites. You need to reverse this thinking. Instead, examine the overall records of teams and you will find in many areas a bad team wins more often than you might think, while a more dominant team is not as dominant as you may at first believe.

For instance, the Oakland Athletics are not going to make the postseason, stuck in last place in the AL West. Yet, they are close to a .500 team at home. There are plenty of spots to find them as a home dog, such as when they came from 10 runs down to beat Minnesota. And the Pirates are another last place team, yet they have a winning home record.
 Here are some teams that have been consistently bad during much of the decade, the Kansas City Royals and the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. The bullpens were bad, the starting pitching was not deep, team defense was below average, while the offenses struck out too often and did not walk enough.

However, what was the record of the 100-loss Royals in 2006 at home? 34-46. That is not terribly bad, especially when you realize they were a home dog most of the time. For instance, the Royals opened the 2006 season with four straight home games. They lost the first two games as +120 and +135 dogs. OK, so a bettor on the Royals was 0-2 and getting ribbed by his friends for backing an awful team. However, the next two games the Royals were +155 and +145 dogs against the White Sox and won both, 11-7 and 4-3. The betting record may be just 2-2 overall, but there was already a significant profit because of the return as a dog. 

Look at it another way: The Royals starting pitching those four games was terrible, sending out Scott Elarton, Joe Mays, Jeremy Affeldt and Danny Bautista. I understand you look at those pitchers on the card each day and think, "There is no way I could possibly back those guys!” They were matched up against well-known pitchers, too, in Kenny Rogers, Jeremy Bonderman of the Tigers and John Garland and Javier Vazquez of Chicago. Starting pitching is not everything, however, and it is who wins the game that matters. 

Tampa Bay lost 101 games in 2006 before turning things around last season. Yet, their 2006 home record might surprise you: 41-39. Yes, they were very competitive at home even then. If the 2006 Devil Rays played all their games at home they might go 82-80, which is a far cry from a 100-loss team. In 2007 the Rays started the season 4-3 at home, then faced Boston in a three-game series. As dogs of +145, +125 and +160 for the three games, Tampa Bay won 2 out of 3. This was a team that had a winning home mark coming into the series, but was still not getting respect from oddsmakers because Joe Public was thinking, "I cannot back Tampa Bay against the Red Sox."  

Understanding money management is essential to surviving in the world of 11-to-10. Many baseball bettors make the mistake of looking for "games that are less likely to lose" and mistakenly load up 50% of their bankroll on one game, or feel much safer backing the favorites regularly. To turn a consistent profit in the sports betting world you need discipline and focus. One has no trouble searching for dogs with NFL picks and football predictions, and the same should apply when searching for undervalued baseball teams and getting over the fear of backing underdogs.

Jim Feist Past Articles

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Tourney Matchup Tips
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