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(Target's sports betting experiment continues to prosper! For current information, please go to the Sethbets website)
My motive for telling the world about Target without asking for anything in return has been regularly questioned since I first started posting on the topic back in 1997.
And my only regret about not "peddling" my betting strategy is that too many people out there assume that if something is being offered for no money, then no money is probably the most that it's worth!
It's ironic, because the Internet may be one of the most effective money-making tools to come along in generations, and the guy who invented it (not Al Gore!) felt that donating it to the whole wide world for free was the right thing to do.
Target, of course, is nowhere near in the same league as the 'Net - but gamblers who are tired of losing who take a little time to study it will quickly learn that it is simple, effective, and above all...logical.
My sports betting trial, which is over $150,000 ahead after 13 months, has demonstrated that paired - or twinned - wins occur often enough for us to make money even against a house edge higher than 10%.
Against casino games, especially the two I recommend the most, negative expectation is less than -2.0%, and second wins come along with a frequency so reliable that long-term profits are almost impossible to avoid.
The one drawback is that the Target process requires discipline, confidence and a realistic bankroll - three assets that are beyond the reach of most gamblers.
Casinos and bookies prosper even in hard times because most of their customers not only expect to lose but want to lose, and when those customers are told over and over again that they can't win in the long run, they're happy to believe it.
Anyone who says otherwise has to be a crook, right? And if they keep saying it over and over again, they have to be crazy.
Why have I kept this up for so long?
I don't doubt that I am at least a little bit crazy (it's a description that fits all the interesting people I know!), but I am confident that if just a few smart people give Target a try, it will spread like wildfire.
And my hope is that when it does, perennial losers will turn into winners, and an industry that has had the odds in its favor for far too long will become just a little less profitable.
Despite full knowledge that gambling wrecks families and ruins lives in all sorts of other ways, it has the enthusiastic blessing of governments all over the world, because what politicians snidely refer to as a "tax on stupidity" is always easier to enact than legitimate taxation.
Since I like to gamble, does this make me a hypocrite? Maybe. But after years of seeing the devastating effect of the double-whammy of "free" booze and easy paycheck cashing, I don't see how anyone can dare to claim that losing is fun or remotely recreational.
I guess I should add that I never, ever drink alcohol when I'm in a casino, and the only money I ever play with is the bankroll I brought in with me. ATMs almost as common as slot machines are a government-endorsed scourge that only help casinos, never their customers.
I have been suggesting since I started this blog in March of 2009 that the only sensible way to learn and appreciate Target is to try it out for free, and since the beginning, my regular posts have included a link to an excellent blackjack simulation.
Play that for just a few minutes, and you'll see paired wins popping up more often than weeds in warm, wet soil - that's statistically guaranteed.
Once in a great while, you'll hit a frustrating trend in which mid-recovery wins are one-shot events over and over again, and that's why no one should ever try the Target method without an adequate bankroll.
How much? There's only one answer to that question: Enough.
And the good news is that as time goes by, your bankroll will steadily grow, and having enough will become less and less of a problem.
Casinos have two major weapons on their side - deep knowledge of player psychology, and table limits.
The house knows that gamblers on a losing streak will always either reduce their bets to a level that makes recovery impossible, or start betting wildly and haphazardly with the same effect.
Very few of them bet a spread wide enough to handle a prolonged negative trend, and almost no one who gambles has the temperament required to win consistently.
Gamblers are impatient people, by and large - a superstitious bunch who believe in luck and hope over and over again that next time, they will be able to turn a few hundred dollars into several thousand.
Truth is, if you want to make a few thousand, you will have to start with a few thousand (and I don't subscribe to some old fart's comment that the only way to double your money in a casino is to fold it over and put it back in your pocket).
I have always used spreadsheets to analyze and hone Target, so I know my numbers inside out, upside down and backwards.
From time to time, winning with Target is tough. But it is never impossible.
I feel guilty about the time I have spent recently on Bodog's funny-munny games, but all statistics have value, and I always get a kick when Target beats the odds yet again - even when I have no chips to cash in at the end of a session.
For example, in 6,320 rounds of baccarat, there were 777 isolated wins and 676 mid-series wins that were followed by a second consecutive win.
That's a player disadvantage of almost 7.0%, you might deduce. But you'd be wrong, because 313 of those "singles" were bets that turned a losing series around without needing a second win, thanks to Target's limited double-up rules (-5,-25,+75 for example).
In the very last Bodog baccarat session I played, I used a stripped-down version of Target without win or loss progressions, simply applying the rule that after a mid-series win, the bet must be LTD+.
Betting a $5 minimum and a $250 max, I "won" $1,015 against an AV of -24/479 = a 5% house edge!
It's just math, strictly applied in a consistent, unemotional manner.
And it works.
To date, Target without the Bodog table limits is ahead $105,000 against the same outcomes, winning the equivalent of 8.22% of its total action against an overall house edge of 2.23% and in spite of Mr. Expert, Ph.D.'s unequivocal prediction of a LOSS of $28,500.
The "twins" data for 4,957 Bodog blackjack outcomes mirrors the baccarat summary: 831 potential turnaround opportunities, with 478 paired sets and 521 isolated wins, 173 of which ended a losing series profitably because of Target's double-up rules.
Trust these numbers: there's nothing fake or flaky about them.
It never hurts to reexamine the mathematical wisdom of the argument that "progressive betting can't win."
If you are several bets behind and you choose not to increase (or progress) your bet values in pursuit of prior losses, you will need to get ahead more bets than you have lost in order to get out of trouble.
Given a persistent house advantage, that's not likely to happen.
If you reduce (or regress) your bets in a downturn, your prospects diminish still further - only a prolonged winning streak will save you, and given bets that are smaller than those you lost, you're looking at an infinitesimal probability.
Since at any time in a game with a negative expectation, you must always expect to lose more bets than you win, only a carefully-calibrated increase (progression!) of your bet values will compensate for the probability that you will win less often than you lose.
Of course, if you keep pushing out more and more chips willy-nilly with no hint of a consistent strategy, you're not likely to win that way either!
What you need is a plan. Did I mention that I have one?
An important reminder: The only person likely to make money out of this blog is you, Dear Reader. There's nothing to buy, ever, and your soul is safe (from me, at least). Test my ideas and use them or don't. It's up to you. One more piece of friendly advice: If you are inclined to use target betting with real money against online "casinos" such as Bodog, spend a few minutes and save a lot of money by reading this._
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