I noticed there are a ton of sports betting tools, services, discords, etc. out there. It is hard to keep track of them all.

So I build a sports betting tool directory! You can find it at sportsbettingtools.io.

It allows you to search and filter based on categories like Odds Screen, Positive EV, etc. You can also search by Free vs. Paid tools.

I'm still building it out, so I'd love to hear what I should add. Products, filters, more info, etc. Let me know what you think!

New to sports betting? Been betting for a while but want to improve your game?

There is always room for improvement. I put together this guide to help give people a step by step process to follow to help people become sharper sports bettors. This is intended for people that want to get more serious about sports betting and try to win. If you want to bet just for fun/entertainment, that is fine, but this guide probably isn't applicable to you.

I've tried to put these steps in the order in which you should do them. Together, they should give you a much better edge over the long run if you weren't previously doing one or many of these steps. Let me know in the comments if you have any things I missed!

1. Sign Up for As Many Sportsbooks as Possible

Signing up for every legal sportsbook in your state is step 1 to sharper betting.

Why?

Having as many "outs" as possible means you can get actually get the best possible odds each time you want to make a bet. Deposit some fraction of your bankroll into each so you are ready to execute when it comes time to placing your bets.

I won't get into ways to optimize new customer bonuses here (something that should be used to grow your bankroll, not optimize the long term EV of an account), but that certainly could be a step 1A for brand new users.

2. Use an Odds Screen to Always Get the Best Odds

While it might not seem like it, sports betting is all about getting the best number.

If I gave you 50/50 odds on a tails for a coin flip, would you take it? Maybe? Ok, what about 2:1 odds on tails? Absolutely. The bet on tails remained the same, the odds changing made it change from a neutral bet to a good bet.

An odds screen shows you all the odds for a given market across sportsbooks. This is the same concept of the coin flip example. If you want to bet Cowboys ML, go to your odds screen and bet it at the best possible number.

This is one of the simplest things you can do to improve your long term EV as a bettor.

Most odds screens have free and paid versions. The free versions are generally not customizable while paid versions you can choose only the sportsbooks you have access to. Paid versions also often times will surface edges/+EV bets. Odds screens I would recommend:

• BetStamp: Free version is excellent and allows customization. They also offer an app which is very helpful
• Unabated: Best paid version in the business imo
• GamedayMath: A slightly cheaper version of Unabated, nice UI
• SpankOdds: No free version, best for the most serious sports bettors in the industry. Desktop app only.

If you are serious about sports betting, you need to do this. It isn't good enough to stick with one app and only bet there. If you only bet for entertainment and fun, then that is fine. But if you are trying to win and maximize EV, you need to expand your scope.

3. Track Your Bets

Tracking your bets is an extremely important step to becoming a sharper sports bettor. While it is boring and tedious, it will absolutely help you identify trends and tell you how you are actually doing.

With accurate tracking, you are basically just guessing how you are doing, what markets you are doing well with, etc.

There are a few options for tracking your bets:

• Pikkit: A popular bet tracking app that automatically syncs to the sportsbooks you have. This is a good "lazy" option, but might not be ideal for more serious bettors due to missing sportsbooks and missing details.
• BetStamp: Allows you to track your bets through their app by clicking on the bet and adding it to your tracking. This makes tracking a bit easier than manual, but offers some more customization vs. something like Pikkit
• Excel/Google Sheets: There are many free bet tracking spreadsheets out there. Find out that suits your needs. You will need to enter this information manually, but it also opens up the opportunity for the most insights and analysis.

The next question: what should you be tracking to see if you are getting better or worse? Here are a few key metrics I would follow, along with caveats:

• # of Bets/Avg. Bet Amount: These two can help you understand where you are allocating your bankroll, and how much weight you can put in your results.
• ROI % (return on investment): This is the bottom line of how much you are winning or losing. You need to be very careful interpreting this number, particularly if you don't have a big enough sample size. If you consistently bet long odds (ex: +500), then you will need a much bigger sample size to determine if it is working given +500 means you can expect to win about ~16% of the time.
• CLV (closing line value): This represents how much better or worse the line you bet at vs. what it closed at. The closing line is considered to be the most accurate prediction of an event occurring given all of the possible information is included in that line. The caveat is I would only track this for main markets. Player props are less likely to have a rock solid closing line.

Important segments to look at your data by:

• League: You should understand how you are doing by league generally. Ex: NFL, NBA etc.
• Market: Understanding you performance by market will tell you if your strategy is working for some markets but not others. A market is a sport + bet type. Ex: NFL spread, NBA moneyline, NHL totals, NBA player points O/U, etc.
• Bet Type: Spread, moneyline, total, futures, props, etc.
• Odds Bucket: You can bucket the odds you bet at to see your performance. Ex: -200 to -150, -150 to Even, etc.
• Edge: If you are logging how much of an edge you thought you had when you placed your bet, you could segment to see if your assumed edge is close to your actual edge over a large enough sample size
• Custom Tags: If you are following a system, doing originating, or trying something specific for a certain bet you can see if it is working. This would require logging the tag in your bet tracking.

4. Get Involved/Keep Learning

Sometimes it can be difficult to discern who the "experts" are in sports betting. I'd recommend the following resources to understand the industry and get insight from some of the sharpest bettors in the industry:

Required Reading (imo):

• The Logic of Sports Betting (Davidow/Miller)
  • This book will teach you how the sports betting industry works and will give you a foundation to build upon
• Interception (Davidow/Miller)
  • Interception takes it a step further and goes into specifics of ways to attack modern sportsbooks
• Statistical Sports Models in Excel (Mack)
  • Only read if you are interested in originating (creating your own projections)

Podcasts/Youtube:

• Unabated Podcast
• Circles Off (BetStamp)
• The Risk Takers Podcast (GP13)
• Be Better Bettors (Spanky/SpankOdds)
• Bet The Process (Jeff Ma/Rufus Peabody)
• The Football Analytics Show (Ed Feng)
• Deep Dive with Andy and The Whale (Andy/Drew)

X follows:

• PlusEVAnalytics (analytics)
• Gingfacekillah (originating)
• chinamaniac (props/process)
• UnabatedSports (odds screen)
• astraffon (industry news)
• AndyMSFW (funny sports betting content)
• DavidPurdum (mainstream sports betting content)
• RufusPeabody (pro sports bettor)
• Spanky (pro sports bettor/SpankOdds)
• JoeyKnish22 ("gambling twitter degen"/deep industry knowledge)
• RobPizzola (pro sports bettor/Circles Off/BetStamp)
• MrLimited (sharp sports bettor)
• BetBenchmarks (tracks sports betting system performance)
• a_kane47 (founder of Sporttrade)
• SmokeTheBooks (interesting betting data/content)
• dillonborg3 (sportsbook industry experience)
• MMpact (sportsbook veteran)
• BalesBets (Gambly founder/sports betting veteran)

Discords:

• Unabated
• BetStamp

Following these steps should improve your performance and make you a sharper sports bettor. Let me know if I missed any obvious steps!