This Week: Hansel Wei on Betting Basketball. Read the whole article in Hansel's Zone at GoSportsBet.

Like football, basketball is bet against a spread, with a 10% vig. It’s an easy enough system to conceptualize, unlike runlines (baseball), pucklines (hockey), or any of the other bizarre betting methods used in some sports. Unlike football, however, there are no key numbers. While some analysts and some readers have suggested that four and five are “key numbers,” these margins in fact have more to do with how the game is played in the final minutes than any inherent likelihood that games will end with this point margin. When a team’s lead is four or more, the losing team needs multiple possessions to tie the game and as a result is more likely to foul in order to stop the clock. So, while the nature of how football is scored leads to various “key numbers,” basketball does not have these to account for. In basketball, there is simply less luck involved. When making sports wagers (a task with inherent risk involved) we as professional handicappers and you as someone choosing who to bet on want there to be as little “luck” involved as possible, because the more room for “luck,” the greater chance that something can go wrong in our calculations! Think of all the ways luck plays into football. There is the coin toss to start the game, and particularly importantly, to start overtime. The ball itself is shaped in a way that increases the chances of “bad bounces” and can be hard to catch or control. The difference in conditions for games can quite literally be like night and day, rain or shine (or snow?), or summer and winter. So your team looked pretty good one week, on a nice indoor field. How can you have any confidence they’ll play the same way when it’s -10 out, it’s snowing, and it’s getting dark? Exactly..

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