What’s the best way to get started with online sports betting now that several online sportsbooks are available in Maryland? 105.7 The Fan’s Jeremy Conn chatted with PressBox about taking advantage of promotions, building parlays and more.
This has been edited for content and clarity.
PressBox: Marylanders were inundated with promotional offers from several online sportsbooks that went live just before Thanksgiving. How should bettors settle on an online sportsbook that works for them?
Jeremy Conn: I endorse FanDuel … and it is my favorite app to play on. I downloaded four of the top ones and I’ve played on three so far. Some are easier to navigate than others, but there are so many freebies up front that I’m trying to get my wife to sign up, I’m trying to get everybody I know to sign up. DraftKings was giving away eight [$25] bets. There are just so many freebies to take advantage of and they’re no risk. So if you sign up and you deposit $10, $5, whatever it may be — or there might be a price match where you deposit $200 and then you get a free $200 in bets — take advantage of that stuff on all of them. Then you get to figure out which ones you like more and which ones you’d rather play on. … Right now, I would just tell everybody to take advantage of all the freebies out there.
PB: The wide variety of wagers available to bettors can be overwhelming. What is the best way for beginners to sort through all that?
JC: I would start off with just some straight bets. If you want to do simple parlays, you can. I know DraftKings and FanDuel will offer same-game parlays where you have to bet two things on the same game, so you can dive into that if you want. … I would take it easy. I was just talking to somebody else who said their son won $1,000 in the first week. I remember the first time I was betting on horse racing. I hit the triple and won a ton of money the first time I bet. The next 15 races I proceeded to lose. There is something to be said of just taking it easy, especially if you’re new to it, and not just going crazy betting all the money on one thing. There are people who are going to take advantage of the freebies and just withdraw the cash, which I think is fine, too.
PB: Is it easy to get sucked into bets that have huge potential payoffs? Or is that a fun way to put a couple bucks down?
JC: For a lot of the long-odds stuff you see adding up if you’re going to do a 10-team parlay, what a lot of people do is bet the moneyline. “Oh, I got eight out of 10.” Well, yeah, the two you lost on were -400 favorites that you expect to win. I think you can do more with mixing in some of the moneylines. Pick some of the spreads and go with [fewer] games — maybe a five- or six-game parlay, but for your favorite bet play the spread and play the moneyline in others. Those can help you out. A lot of people are doing 12-team parlays or 20-team parlays for $10. That’s not going to kill you, but the likelihood of you hitting is minimal — even if you’re betting all the favorites, which most people do. I think you can get into those and dabble a little bit, but with your free bets what I would try to do is build your bankroll, just bet on your favorite games.
PB: Your daily picks are available at PressBoxOnline.com. How should readers handle your picks?
JC: With my plays in specific, if you were going to bet one game, I would bet the game that I have listed as my top play of the day and bet that. I usually list five games as my top plays unless it’s a smaller slate, but I go through everything and pick out my favorite plays and I would just bet those. … For example, if my top play was a $100 bet, all the other plays would be $25 bets. My top play of the day, maybe that’s a $200 bet for someone. I’m just [using those numbers as examples] if people are looking at my plays. My lock is a little bit different in the NFL. I feel the most confident about that. I’ve had a week to look at things, so sometimes I’ll go a little bit higher prices on those as well.
PB: When do you usually discuss your top plays as part of “The Big Bad Morning Show” on 105.7 The Fan every weekday?
JC: Sometimes it’ll be throughout the show, but we have a segment called, “The Daily Line.” It’s always in the 9 o’clock hour. I remember one day we did it at 6:45 and I’m going, “I don’t have any lines for these games. How am I supposed to give people picks without lines being out?” I’m a guy who loves information and loves to see where the money’s going, so I like a little bit of time to process that and see what’s happening. It’s 9:15 or 9:30 every day on the show depending on if we have a guest in the 9 o’clock hour that needs to go later, but it’s always in that 9 o’clock hour.
Photo Credit: Photo by Jonas Leupe on Unsplash
Issue 278: December 2022 / January 2023
Originally published Dec. 21, 2022