As a youngster one of my dreams was to become a professional gambler be it at the horses, blackjack tables or sports betting.

 I tried the first two disciplines out before concluding that I would always in the long term run second to the house and I have subsequently concentrated on sport where I have been able to hold my own albeit I long ago shelved the idea of doing it for a living.

Those old child hood memories were rekindled though when I was directed to a You Tube interview of legendary Las Vegas punter Billy Walters. The clip, an extract from the 60 mins show on CBS saw Mr. Walters giving rare insight into certain parts of his highly secretive and successful world.

Born into a poor family he cut his teeth hustling in pool halls and on golf courses before moving onto sports betting where he is both respected and feared by the bookies.

The man has a set up which gave me goose bumps with computers and TV’s everywhere. This is effectively his control room and from here he monitors the prices directing punters in the sports book room to the correct bookie. The amounts he talks are staggering and on the day in question he wagered over $2million showing a profit of some $250k when the games were completed.

Refreshingly he acknowledges having bad days, losing weeks and even months but never a losing year.

His formula is simple in that he prepares his own lines or handicaps before the bookies price up and the bigger the difference the bigger the bet. Of course getting to these handicaps requires incredible skill and lots of work with statistics and things like team news and weather conditions all come into play. He employs a range of consultants to assist him, none of which know who the other is. 

Mr. Walters is in effect the central point that brings all of this knowledge together in a strategy that has seen him amass the sort of fortune that allows you to own golf courses and travel on a private jet.

I was inspired by the story while at the same time aware that what Mr. Walters does is not easy and is as much a job as any position you would find on the stock exchange. Either way you look at it though this man is living the dream!

  
This article was written for the CitiGaming supplement of the Citizen Newspaper and was first published on the 20th of January 2011.

Brent Graham is a blogger on www.goodforthegame.co.za and presents a sports betting radio show every Thursday night from 22h00 – 22h30 on 1485AM Radio Today or Channel 169 of the DSTV Audio Bouquet and to get on his free weekly e-mail list just send a message to brent@goodforthegame.co.za titled “Best Bets”.

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