Quote:
Originally Posted by Trollheart
The key words here are "if you win big", which so far, sad to say, he doesn't seem to have done. Is it true then, the old adage that gamblers (we gotta call him a gambler now don't we?) don't play to win, they play to lose?
Note to Hawk: I'm not trying or intending to be preachy here. I'm genuinely worried that you're going to go so deep in you'll never get back out. You need to stop now.
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Not really, depends on the gambler. The odds are in the bookies favour of course, they reflect the likelihood of an event happening with a bit of overround so they can make a profit. But for infrequent bettors there are some ways you can use new customer offers and other things to reduce the likelihood of a loss so you're not actually betting to lose. I suppose its still gambling in a sense but if you know what you're doing you'll get the win as they are loss leaders and bookies do it all the time to get you signed up with them. Those bets have max stake limits (usually £10) so you can't win too much.
Also for the pro bettors it is about whether there is value in the bet you place not whether you actually win the bets. This sounds silly, but for example if you bet £10 on Real Madrid to win every one of their games this season in the league, that's 38 bets, you will obviously win the majority of those 38 bets but you won't be in profit at the end of it because the games they drop points will outweigh any profits you make and there is no value in those bets. But if you bet on value regularly you will be in profit.
Then you have the people who bet a lot but don't know or care where the value is or are addicted to the buzz of gambling and they end up chasing their losses. That is when it's a problem and you're just playing to lose.