Any game, whether it is football, basketball, baseball, hockey, golf etc. is going to have some degree of randomness.

As stated earlier in this blog series and at many points in the future – we will continue to say –  “randomness is the enemy” of sports bettors – the bookmaker is not enemy – the bookmaker just facilitates the wagers you want to make.

The bookmaker cannot make you do anything you do not want to do.

Examples of “bad” randomness include: double doink missed field goals, barely missed free throws at the end of a game, calling timeout when your team does not have any timeouts left, missing a shot on a slick green by a foot and then having the ball roll back into the water etc.

Examples of “good” randomness include: Coming back from a 28-3 deficit in a Super Bowl, hitting a game winning shot against Kentucky with 2.1 seconds left which capped off a 10-10 FG-FGA and 10-10 FT-FTA night for the shooter of the final basket, being in the lead on the fourth day of a golf major – for many consecutive golf majors – and never surrendering that lead etc.

Bad things happen to bad teams and bad players and bad teams.

Good things happen to good teams and good players.

As we know – you cannot make the same sized bet all time – otherwise you are going to get your head handed to you.

So when betting on teams or individual players, there needs to be an over-emphasis on good teams/players and an under-emphasis on bad teams/players – doing so lessens the effect of randomness.

For right now, the best way to separate the teams and players is to label them A, B, C, and D.

For sizing purposes, only games with at least one “A” team/player can get a larger sized bet – everything else is skewed towards smaller sizes.

Why? Because anything can happen with a subpar team/player.

We can only isolate randomness in the things that are most predictive – and that is in the form of  “A” teams and “A” Players.

I will discuss this ranking system in future blogs and how “The Crowd’s Line” will deliver the ABCD rankings to you in a crowdsourced manner – for now though, it is up to each of us independently rank teams and players independently.

For me, as it pertains to NCAAF and NFL Football, here is the criteria for an “A” Team:

1 – Great Coach
2 – Great QB
3 – Great Defense
4 – Relatively Healthy Roster

In NCAAF, my A’s are:

• Ohio State
• Alabama
• Clemson
• Penn State
• LSU
• Wisconsin

*It does not mean I bet the teams to win, cover etc – it just means I have a high degree of confidence in how they will approach the game and execute their game plan.

In the NFL, I have no A’s right now – the NFL is wide open right now and really hard to handicap right now

The closest “A’s” ie my “B+” Teams are:

• GB Packers
• NO Saints
• NE Patriots
• SF 49ers

Once you have identified the “A”s and their upcoming games, the next thing you need to do is identify the most valuable bets and then size them appropriately.

To strategize and size the bets correctly you need the help of the guiding hand of crowdsourced information.

The Crowd’s Line has this information – no one else does.

We are going to show you how to use crowdsourced information to size your bets optimally which will lead you to winning more, losing less, having more confidence, having more control – and most importantly, having more fun.