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SportsInsights.com Article -- College
Football: Home Dogs and Betting Against the Public (2003-2007)
It's almost
"back-to-school" time! The students will be
"hitting the books" -- and for us -- that means the
college football powerhouses will be pounding each other!
SportsInsights.com
is pleased to present this year's update on
the College Football marketplace. Like last year, we'll look
at how college football dogs -- and home dogs, in particular -- fared
over the recent past. We also updated our charts
to show how
Betting Against the Public
can be used to improve "Home Dog" performance.
Our research has been updated to include the 2007 season.
SportsInsights' exclusive betting percentages for college
football include five seasons' worth of data -- and over 6,200 college football games.
The information
on this site is for entertainment and educational purposes only.
Use of this information in violation of any federal, state, or
local laws is prohibited.
College Football Dogs and Home Dogs
Bettors often talk about underdogs. How
have dogs done over the past few years in college football?
And what about "home dogs?" Table 1 shows the results
contained in our database since 1998. We purposely show results over individual
years to highlight how performance can jump around -- even over
entire seasons.
Table 1 –
College Football Dogs and Home Dogs
| Period |
Dogs |
Home Dogs |
| 1998-2007 |
50.4% |
51.6% |
| 2001 |
52.4% |
49.3% |
| 2002 |
50.2% |
50.0% |
| 2003 |
48.3% |
51.4% |
| 2004 |
52.1% |
60.2% |
| 2005 |
51.4% |
50.7% |
| 2006 |
51.0% |
48.7% |
| 2007 |
50.6% |
51.3% |
| Last 5
Years (2003-2007) |
50.3% |
52.2% |
Here are some key "takeaways" from the chart:
- The results continue to validate
previous
academic research --
that there is a bias towards underdogs, and in particular,
home dogs.
- The results show that although there is a bias, the
sports marketplace is relatively efficient, so that the vig
is difficult to overcome.
- Performance can fluctuate dramatically. Similar to
the investment world, past performance is not necessarily an
indication of future results.
- In this article, we highlighted
all 2003-2007
periods in yellow to make comparison amongst the various approaches and
tables easier to read.
SportsInsights' betting percentages are available starting
in 2003.
Home Dogs Getting Points
Table 2 shows the performance of Home Dogs receiving a given
amount of points.
Table 2: College Football Home Dogs
Receiving X Points
| Period |
0.5 or More Pts |
3 or More |
7 or More |
14 or More |
|
2003-2007 |
52.2% |
52.1% |
52.7% |
52.9% |
| 2003 |
51.4% |
52.7% |
52.8% |
51.0% |
| 2004 |
60.2% |
58.0% |
61.2% |
57.4% |
| 2005 |
50.7% |
49.1% |
45.9% |
46.2% |
| 2006 |
48.7% |
50.0% |
49.6% |
56.8% |
| 2007 |
51.3% |
51.6% |
54.3% |
53.8% |
Betting Against the Public -- on Home Dogs
Last year, we saw that combining "Betting Against the Public" with
betting on "Home Dogs" -- was a profitable betting strategy.
We updated this information to include the 2007 season and
present the results in Table 2's format for comparison purposes.
Table 3: College Football Home Dogs and
Betting Against the Public (30% Level)
| Period |
0.5 or More Pts |
3 or More |
7 or More |
14 or More |
|
2003-2007 |
54.6% |
53.6% |
53.7% |
53.8% |
| 2003 |
60.0% |
58.7% |
58.5% |
53.1% |
| 2004 |
60.6% |
58.8% |
59.3% |
56.8% |
| 2005 |
51.0% |
48.3% |
47.6% |
53.1% |
| 2006 |
50.0% |
50.0% |
50.6% |
56.8% |
| 2007 |
54.3% |
54.5% |
54.9% |
50.0% |
For the purposes of this chart, we selected games where the
Public was 30% or lower on the Home Dog. Note how Betting
Against the Public consistently adds value over Table 2 (Home
Dogs, as a standalone system). Indeed, our series of
articles has show that Betting Against the Public can add value
to just about any handicapping approach. We hope
that you will use SportsInsights.com's numerous sports investing
tools and data to improve your handicapping!
Disclaimer
We do not guarantee that the trends and biases we’ve found will
continue to exist. It is impossible to predict the future. Any
serious academic research in the field of “market efficiencies”
recognizes that inefficiencies may disappear over time. Once
inefficiencies are discovered, it is only a matter of time
before the market corrects itself. We do not guarantee our data
is error-free. However, we’ve tried our best to make sure every
score and percentage is correct.
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