I'm seeking advice for a theory I have about the NCAA bracket. It involves betting teams on their odds to win the whole event, and then betting against those teams each round. One major difficulty is predicting future lines so I've compiled data over the last few years to help gather some ranges of scenarios.

It would be a help to talk through this with anyone who has made similar attempts or any mathematically minded people interested in crunching some numbers.

I can go into more detail later but basically the idea is to bet teams to win who aren't expected to win, bet against them every round until they lose and return a profit. One downside is of course, if that team wins it all, so there has to be a high enough original bet to win that it could withstand up to 6 bets against.

The 4 seed could be an ideal example though I'm sure there are others. Assume a 4th seed is 40-1 to win it all and I place $100 on them, in round 1 they will be favored over the 13 seed so I take the underdog plus the points at -110 and bet $165. If it hits, I win back the original bet plus $50 profit and I still have my team alive at 40-1. If my team blows out their opponent they will face either the 5 or 12 seed and it's very likely they will be favored, even by a small amount, so I'd take the points again.
Now it gets a bit more difficult if they advance because they will likely face the 1 seed and that means the 40-1 team is an underdog so the points no longer help, now I have to bet the moneyline on the 1 seed to win (maybe something like -200). And for that 3rd round through the final game, my original bet will likely stay as an underdog which means those bets need to increase in size enough to cover past losses and not exceed the amount of money which the original bet pays ($4,000 in this example).

I could offer more detail and examples and math but will leave it here for now until I know if there is anyone able to help on here. Thank you in advance.

You are just over complicting a martingale which doesn't work. There is no mathematical way to turn a series of -ev bets into a +ev bet.

What does "ev" mean?

I am willing to be proven wrong but I don't think martingale is a fair term for my question. This isn't like betting on 'black' and doubling the bet until it hits.

Clearly hindsight is 20-20 but I did all calculations for a number of teams last year and it worked every time. Of course that's partly because none of the teams played all 6 games. So I ran further simulations with scenarios of teams playing all 6 games as sort of a worst case scenario and this also proved to be a winner in some but not all situations. I'm hoping to figure out the differences in those winners and losers which looks to mostly be related to the opening odds.

I do honestly appreciate your comment and hope you'll understand this is a serious question, at least to me, and it's ok if im proven wrong but i think there may be value to be found with a deep enough inquiry.



On an unrelated note, do you know a site which offers previous years game lines? While I have odds to win for the last few NCAA brackets, I've only found game lines for 2016 which offers me far too small of a sample. Thanks

I aint no mathematician, but a lifetime of betting tells me this is not a winning method if for this single reason only:

The house advantage on the initial "to win championship" bet is so large that when combined with the juice/advantage on individual game bets one simply cannot overcome them without the perfect storm of positive results.

I cant comment on any other aspect of the "system".


Hell try if for small stakes and I think you will be happy!!!!
Happy that you only did it for small stakes that is

Winning tourney strategy = bet on the team from the ACC.

I had this thought too but I went back to last year's bracket and every single scenario resulted in a win. That's a small sample size but it resulted in all winners. I then looked at more 'worst case scenarios' that didn't come true in last year's bracket but would offer me more data. For example, what if Michigan State didn't lose in round one and would have faced other opponents, estimating those game lines and calculating wagers on those games. So far those scenarios, have all resulted in profits.
There are specific criteria for who is being bet to win in my theory and I wouldn't be here talking about it if the system was perfect. I'm hoping to learn flaws with what I'm proposing so I can trash it but I haven't yet found any contradicting info.

you make a great point about the value of bets to win. But it's also good to consider that there isn't a large amount of money wagered on season long to win bets, relatively speaking, so those numbers don't necessarily reflect what we will see in daily matchups and daily line movement come tournament time.

Haha. A good idea this year but a loser in recent history (1-5) the last 6 years

Of course it will win in most years, until an outsider wins. It's just the same as betting on a handful of favorites to win and making a small profit each year.

I agree with your point that limited sample sizes can be too small to show enough possible outcomes, but what do you mean about an outsider winning? This strategy includes betting both teams in the game. I have both a bet to win it all on one team and bet the points or moneyline on their opponent, every week.

Ok, I didn't quite follow before but think the point still stands. You are basically covering a lot of outcomes, but I expect not all of them. In your small sample where it hasn't failed you just haven't had the worst outcome.

Without seeing a proper example of your backtesting it's hard to explain, but the tournament odds are just a combination of the expected odd for all possible matchups.

if you'd want to have a peek at my back testing id much appreciate it.

As for your point in bold. That's a very great point and one I've thought about too. Please correct me as I never spoke with anyone who set lines, but it has always been my belief that future odds were a combination (almost a parlay, if you will) of the expected odds that team would be assigned for all 6 games (6 in our example). Do I have that right? But they can only estimate scenarios so if my team was going to play the winner of Team A v Team B (assuming the odds of this game favor team A to win 3 out of 4), and my team would be +200 vs team A and +120 against team B, the bookmaker would take the chance of my team facing Team A (3/4) and team B (1/4) and therefore assume odds of +180 for my teams expected future matchup. Do I have this correct? My post is already getting long so I will end here for now but I'd like to address the part in bold again further after I better understand this point about predicting future odds. Thank you.

Yes, that's the basic premise for tournament odds.

Based on this way of setting future lines, might it be a better bet to select teams before the bracket is released as this includes the most guess work by the bookmaker who is unable to use other teams in the bracket to best set odds. Of course I realize this can work in both a good and bad direction. Though any team with a bad situation could possibly be ignored as a single lost Wager and not chase it while the other teams improved odds would possibly absorb such losses.

Would you agree with that premise of betting pre-bracket?

You can't say in advance whether it would be better or worse. I don't know anything about NCAA, but isn't is seeded? In that case the bookmaker probably estimates the seedings before the bracket is announced, so doubt it makes much difference?

For anyone bet, the odds will either go up or down based on whether they got a better than expected or worse than expected draw, and you can't predict which will happen.

Just bet the team(s) you think have value before the draw, after the draw, and ATS (probably) every game until they are eliminated. Only way to get full on CBB, imo.

The teams are ranked prior to the "bracket" but those rankings aren't direct indicators as to who will be ranked in the "bracket". I'm sure Vegas has their own more accurate ranking. However when the "bracket" is released on march 12th, only the will Vegas know who each team must face and how far they must travel to get there. It's quite possible one team can be ranked 4 and face very tough opponents late in the region which is many states away or that same team can be 4 and play an hour from home with opponents they match well against.


In my experience the future Odds mostly all change after the bracket gets released.

Ok, but I expect the overround is the same before and after. Therefore some teams you'll be better of betting before and some teams after. The only way you can know which is which is if you are better at predicting the bracket than Vegas, which I doubt you are.

Maybe just a little. Lol

I appreciate all the feedback from people who took time to send me messages or make a reply but i haven't yet heard enough of a case to counter this theory. The only way I will know for sure is to actually put my plan into action.

I will make another post with all my picks as I make them. I welcome all to follow along and feel free to ask questions or make comments. I will posts everything related to this strategy in terms of teams I take, odds and calculate wins/lossss. I for one hope the final number is a positive one. GL to everyone else too!

Just use your own example for how it could go horribly wrong. You put $100 on a 4 seed at 40-1 to win the title. So you win $4k if they ship.

Round of 64: you bet $110 on the underdog 13 seed plus the points. Your team covers. You are down $110

Round of 32: you put $220 on the 5 seed plus the points (if they are even an underdog). your team covers. You are down $330

Round of 16: You play the 1 seed and the line is -200 (will probably be much higher). You put $800 on the 1 seed moneyline. Your team wins. You are now down $1130.

Round of 8: You play a 2 seed. Let's assume the 2 seed is -200. You put 2400 on the 2 seed, which will give you an overall profit of $70 if they win. But your team wins. You are now down $3530.

Round of 4: Now what? You only win $4k if your team ships. You have already lost $3530 betting against your team. Your team is playing another 1 seed. You can't now bet $7k on the 1 seed because if your team wins again you will be screwed.

Round of 2: same as above.


Obviously you will win most years because the team you pick will likely lose in the first 2-3 rounds. But if your team ever makes it to the final four or finals and covers the games in which they are favorites, you will be screwed.

I realize I should have used a more specific example. The one I used, as you correctly pointed out, is a failure.

Also, it depends on individual circumstances (& odds) but it's not always viable to bet the spread in those opening rounds. For example, a team like a 4 seed will be favored in their first and likely second game so depending on their future odds, i may need to risk their game in hopes the favorite wins a game or two.

By no means am I calling this a guarantee and it's also a selective process to picking teams. For example, in 2015, the four 4 seeds had odds to win of: 40-1, 66-1, 66-1 & 100-1. The 100-1 of course lends itself best to my plan. In 2016 though the four 4 seeds odds were: 10, 20, 28 & 40-1 meaning none would be viable options.
The 3 seeds historically are interesting as their highest numbered odds over the last 3 years has been 45-1 in 2014, 50-1 in 2015 and 40-1 in 2016. Assuming they win their first two games, a hedge at -200 for next 4 rounds returns a profit. Of course if they lose in the opening 2 games that's a loser but it's a single unit loser rather than the moneyline loss by betting a favorite.

The -200 is of course the arbitrary number but I did look back at past odds of seeds and -200 isn't all that far off over the average. I'm overestimating the -200 for most 3v2 matchups, but it's not a number far off from what we've seen.

I very much thank you for your post and do hope you'll reply again.

Thread should have been locked after this post.

I've already proven that statement false. That's not what I'm doing.



Your comment about picking teams with value is exactly what I'm doing, and then heding against them. Why does a thread need to be stopped for that plan?

It is actually exactly what it is. Why would you go into a bet you see with value hedging the other side maybe 6 times. Lol.

Also again not a single to win bet has value. You are not making them valueable by hedging them. As stated a bunch of negative ev bets don't magically become plus ev (expected value) by betting more of them. Worse yet if you foundd a positive ev bet in the to wins ( which you won't) making negatives ev bets on the other side hurts your expected value. You don't understand ev, hedging or what a martingale is. Good luck with your magic system.

Actually it's worse!