I mentioned on here a couple times before that I turned 40 a little while ago. It's funny, when I was a kid I couldn't imagine being 40. I remember always seeing all the 'over the hill' Happy Birthday cards for 40 and 40 year olds use to seem so old. And now here I am. Still pretty much the same person I've always been. More responsibilities, way more perspective and experience of course, much more self-aware and less of a slave to emotions and feelings, but 40 doesn't bring about a whole new you. Wherever you go, there you are.
But anyway, I thought I would do a listicle thing here for things I wish I knew 10 to 20 years ago, sports betting/trading-wise and just overall. So here we go.
1) Don't take yourself too seriously (or not serious enough).
I suppose this depends a bit on your personality type. If you're one to not take anything seriously at all then just invert the following advice.
When I look back on my younger years, I tend to end up at one common theme: I took myself way too seriously. I was bad at taking a joke, even though I was kind of an annoying ball buster. I could dish it but not take it. When you see that from outside, you realize how bad of a look that is. Letting an insult roll off your back, especially when it's done in any kind of joking manner, is actually powerful. I used to always think it was the opposite; that if you 'let' someone get one on you, no matter how jokey it is, then you've suffered some defeat. But that isn't the case at all. Of course, as is the case with anything, you can go too far with this. You can't be the punching bag of the group. But you don't want get the label as 'sensitive'. You don't even want to be close.
In the same vein, don't take friendship/group drama too seriously either. This is maybe a lesser important point these days since it seems like no one hangs out with anyone anymore, but when I look back at my life, I get self inflicted douche chills at a lot of the 'fights' and interpersonal drama I was involved in. It was such a waste of time and energy. None of it really mattered in the end. Like, at all.
2) Make your own money/INVEST early.
I suppose this could be two separate ones but we'll bundle them together here. Ever since I was 14, I always had a regular job plus 'side hustles' as they're called today. Selling dime bags to friends, putting on local DIY punk shows and charging at the door, car detailing, poker (playing and running a game), booking, then finally sports betting and investing. I've always had a lot of hobbies and I'm always looking for ways to combine them with making at least a little bit of money.
Jobs can be soul crushing. You need your own little thing that you can run 100%. Even if it just makes you something like $20k a year, if you make $100k at your job, it's like a free 20% raise. My 'side' projects have always really been my driving force when I think about it. I sort of consider myself a full time sports bettor/trader who runs a company on the side (which is half a joke since my real career takes up way more time and energy, but sports betting and trading are generally on top of mind for me always).
And for the second part: invest early. I cannot stress this enough. If I had invested some of the money I made when I was betting full time, I would honestly be pretty close to set for life. Inflation is so much worse than anyone realizes and you simply cannot keep your savings in cash. Stocks, Bitcoin, real estate; whatever you're comfortable with. Albert Einstein called compounding interest 'the 8th wonder of the world' for a reason. And these days it's super easy to do on your own, too.
3) Make connections.
This is something I was excellent at when I first started seriously sports betting. Especially in PPH land, using other people is sort of like using leverage. You can multiply yourself exponentially. Getting accounts, finding other sharps to give accounts to (and take a piece of), and anything else you can think of. You really have no idea what's out there until you look. At this point in my life, I'm a bit more of a lone wolf, but I still have a dirty agent and know a sharp group I can tap into if I come across any accounts they can use. The thing about networking is there is no limit. You meet a guy who knows a couple guys who each know a couple guys and so on. All of a sudden you're in a different world. Something to consider if you've always been a lone wolf guy.
4) Never explain, never complain.
I got this line from the British Royal Family. It's a great line to keep in mind. For us sports bettors, it can be somewhat of a lonely existence sometimes. Literally NO ONE in your life understands what you do. I have been doing this for 20 years now, and some people in my circle still think I'm some sort of bookie. To most people, the idea of being a long term winning sports bettor is like someone being a long term winning scratch ticket winner. It just doesn't exist to them. And guess what. You are NOT going to change their minds. Don't bother trying, either. With a spouse or someone really close, if you can literally show them models, they might start to wrap their heads around it, and I've found that real finance guys can understand it. But for 99% of the people in your life, just don't worry about them understanding it. They won't, they can't, and they don't want to.
5) Have principles.
This is something I've touched on a few times here before. I don't know if this is just a me thing, or a millennial thing or what, but I feel like I didn't even understand the concept of values or principles until I was an adult. I don't ever remember hearing those words growing up. I think our parents came from a generation that had more of a 'take it as it comes' mindset. My dad has a saying which he got from his dad, which is 'let your conscience be your guide'. Sort of a 'whatever, it's all groovy' mindset. And the older I get, the more I have come to hate that idea. You need principles and values, you need to stick with them, and you need to really think about them beforehand. Stress test your ideas. Know yourself and what you care about and what's important to you and live accordingly. Be a man of your word, as best as you possibly can be. These are fundamental, important aspects to being a person, especially a man, and I feel like you're just supposed to learn that on your own at some point I guess? I don't know. It seems awfully important to not pass down. I know I will with my kid(s).
5a) Covid was an acid test for your life.
If your life was severely effected by covid/the lockdowns, you might want to revaluate things. I think you want your life to be pretty sectioned off from whatever idiot, lying, stealing, government floating head happens to say or think or do that day or term or whatever.
Bonus sports betting specifics:
6) Know if you're a Degen Dennis or a Scared Scott.
Modeling sports had a fairly profound change on me and the way I think about things. Among others, one thing that always stuck with me is that every model you ever make will inevitably have some sort of bias. For whatever reason, models will always tend to lean one way or the other. In my first hockey play props model, it always loved guys who got a lot of primary assists. My NBA props model loved unders on slower paced teams (which was a good exploit in those days but the model liked it a little too much). You have to know what your models bias is and react accordingly. Sort of like in golf, if you know you always hit your driver so it fades left, you have to aim more right than you normally would. So know what kind of a person you are. With sports bettors, they generally fall into one of two types: the degen, spraying, over-betting type, or the too-cautious, sky is falling, can't recover after two losing weeks in a row kind of guy. Know which one you are and what to do about it. If you're somewhat of a degen, if you'll chase losses and sweat games, this may not be the smartest career path. On the other hand, you do have to be able to see money differently and a dollop of 'degen' can be a good thing.
I've always been a little bit too scared. It keeps me in action for decades but I think I missed a chance to really swoop in for the kill when I was full time. Similar to being a good poker player, you want controlled aggression. Enter few pots/trades but be really sharp about the ones you get into.
7) Be pleasant.
Something I've gotten way better at as I age. Pretty self explanatory honestly. 'Pete, you know how often in this business it comes down to 'I just don't like that guy'!" - Mad Men.
8) Write things down.
I'd pay good money to be able to go back in time and just tell myself to start this blog 10 years earlier. One thing you start to realize as you get older is how fragile everything is. People you thought you'd be friends with forever just fall off the map. Places change and entire years can get foggy. One of the most disorientating experiences of my entire life was going back to one of my favorite college bars a year or so after I graduated. It was like being in outer space. It was like I had never been there before! Everything was different. The faces, the music, the bartenders, the atmosphere, it all felt completely new. Truly, being back in that bar for a couple hours that night is seared in my mind. It goes to show how much things change even when you don't realize it. 'You can't go back'. Maybe it's you that changes. Probably both. Either way, I think it's a good idea to have some sort of record of your life. You'll be way more thankful for it down the road than you'd think.
This applies to sports betting too. Especially modeling. When I first started making models, the only thing I cared about was getting to the output I wanted. I'd grind away for days, tweaking and reading and whatnot, and finally come up with a good model. Then the next season would roll around and I'd have such a hard time remembering what did what or why I did certain things. So give yourself little notes as you work on things.
One more thing I'll say on this topic: have kids! Don't be so afraid of it. It really does change your life for the better. It's the answer to that nihilistic, nothing matters, 'what's the point of anything' little ball way down in your stomach that never goes away. The point is to pass your genes on forever so that you can live forever in some tiny, tiny way.
I suppose that's about it for me today. Check back soon!
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