When you are in the market for a new car, do you just show up at a dealership, find a vehicle with the sweet color scheme, pay the seller and drive it off the lot? Of course you don't. You research your options, and today, the tools available to you when preparing to purchase that car are better than ever. Each dealership carries its own web site with what's in stock, so you can narrow down your focus before you get there.
It's Wise To Know Your Stuff
Your approach should be no different when you opt to get into the sports betting market. And just the like the automobile industry, there are web sites and databases galore than can help you when trying to determine what you should be wagering on and where you should be placing that wager.
Check With Your Sportsbook
You may not need to go far in order to unearth a helpful database to enable you to lay smarter wagers. Many of the leading online sportsbooks offer links to sports information databases right on their own sites. For example, BetOnline provides what it terms "useful links" that will lead you to databases covering such entities as defensive statistics, game logs and hot and not categories on leagues including the CFL, WNBA, NHL, NBA, NFL, NBA, and NCAA football and basketball.
You will find vast amounts of information here to help you determine your wagering strategy. Long before you decide to place a bet, it's the wise wagerer who makes the commitment to analyze trends and patterns in past meetings between teams, and even look at individual matchups, such as how a goalie, starting pitcher or quarterback has traditionally fared against an upcoming opponent.
Other Options
Perhaps you'd prefer an independent authority to glean your sports data information as opposed to taking it from the site where you are planning to wager. Luckily, in today's number-crazed, analytics driven sports world, the opportunities to unearth such research are easy to find and almost endless in supply.
Some sites will offer their data for free of charge, while with others you will incur a fee to access their information. Whether you want to splurge on a pay site or go with a freebie is entirely your decision, but with so many free sites out there to choose from, you might want to start with one of them before determining whether to pay out of pocket for further data.
Choices Galore
As noted above, there is an abundance of options at your disposal should you choose to get the sports betting data from an source independent of the online sportsbooks. ANd all of the league websites also contain vast arrays of data and historical information. Here's a look at a few of the better ones available for free:
Fivethirtyeight.com
Although launched as a political opinion poll analysis site, Nate Silver's web page, also known simply as 538, offers top sports analysis from some of the best statisticians in the sports world today. The site covers all of the major North American sports and utilizes its unique statistical methodology to predict everything from U.S. elections, to the Super Bowl, to regular-season NBA, MLB and NFL games. All of their data, including predictions for outcomes of upcoming games, is free to the public.
shrpsports.com
A database that includes every game score in the history of the NBA, NFL, NHL, MLB and NCAA basketball and football. You'll also find similar databases accessible on the CFL, World Cup soccer, Arena Football, men's and women's tennis and golf. You can utilize their search functions to break down head to head matchups between teams and further break it down to home and away results, as well as divisional and conference records and performances based on the day, week, or month. And it's all free.
Sportsdatabase.com
Although you must sign up and get a login and password, this database is also free to use and membership does not require any fee. They offer a Sports Data Query Language (SDQL) that enables you to research a database of historical box scores and upcoming schedules and features data such as temperature, playing surface, coaches and betting lines. There is also searchable trend data and this information is available for the CFL, MLB, NCAA basketball and football, NFL, NHL and WNBA.
Now, let's look at some of the better pay sports database sites:
Killersports.com
Housing the deepest and most revolutionary sports database out there, the Killer Sports site enables users the chance to assemble and save their own trends and tendencies, access team comparison tables, and statistics that are unique to the Killer Sports site. What you can do with this database is truly remarkable, and you aren't likely to find it anywhere else. They even publish weekly reports on emerging trends in the various sports.
Sportsinsights.com
They boast on their site that they offer innovatitive sports betting software that will enable you to place smarter wagers. They offer insights into real-time betting trends, detailing the number of bets and percentage of money wagered on each game and seek to explain why the sportsbooks are moving the lines on certain games. You'll find up to the minute data on weather conditions, injury lists and plenty of information breaking down each day's matchups.
Which Service Is For You?
Ultimately, this is a personal decision. All we can do is offer suggestions on the route that might be the wisest to take. If you are relatively new to sports betting, or are a recreational bettor who's in it for fun and excitement, then paying for a sports betting database service doesn't appear to be an astute use of your finances. Probably best for you to stick to the free public databases.
Then again, if you are an experienced bettor, someone who takes things very seriously and is heavily committed to sports wagering, utilizing the tools and information available at these top pay for use databases might just enable you to gain an edge on the sharps who set the lines at the major online sportsbooks. And it sports betting, every little advantage can make a big difference in your outcome.
