Betting against the public, also known as fading the public, is one of most popular and simplest Sportsbetting strategies used by modern day bettors, especially in American Football (NCAAF and NFL) and MLB games. The grand idea behind this strategy is that the public is often wronger than right, so betting against the side that the public is supporting should be often right (and profitable) than wrong for the against-the-public bettors.
Profiting by Betting Against the Public
According to data collected from hundreds of betting years, the public has been proven to love wagering on the chalk (the betting favorite) and going for OVER total. The psychology behind this human tendency is linked to the fact that sports media outlets, who are the No. 1 informants to most of our betting trends, tends to over-hype scoring and winning teams, thus tailoring the mind of the general public to love, support and often go with winning and scoring teams, even when it is not advisable to do so.
As a measurable fact that has been proven by betting pundits, one which you can confirm for yourself in due course of your betting endeavors, there is an increase of 1-3% in win percentage when you bet on an UNDER total or an underdog.
Recent statistics from Sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark confirm this fact, indicating that, in the last 8 NFL seasons, large underdogs were the best bets—with the underdog winning 55% of the time in which 70-75% of the public wagered on a favorite of 7-plus points.
In addition, college football bettors that wagered against road teams that received between 77-80% of the betting action won nearly 56% percent of the time.
Rejoinder and Final Remarks
Even with the above-mentioned trends, it is worth noting that no betting trends ever stay constant. Furthermore, Sportsbooks are very good at discerning trends among bettors, and if things aren’t going well for them, they can decide to flip the script. Like they say at my home town… Now that birds have learnt to evade hunters by flying without perching, the hunters have learnt to shoot without missing. The only question that remains is—do you want to be as smart as the birds or the hunters? Figure that out… and you’ll definitely be on the winning side more often than not, more so in regards to betting against the public.
