Two kinds of sportsbook exist, they want opposite things from you, and knowing which you are on changes what you should bet.
Two kinds of sportsbook exist. They want opposite things from you, and knowing which one you are on changes what you should bet, how much, and what happens if you do well.
| Sharp book | Recreational book | |
|---|---|---|
| Business model | Thin fee, enormous volume | Large fee, casual customers |
| Typical hold, main lines | ~2% | ~4.5% |
| Maximum bet | Five or six figures | Often three, sometimes less |
| If you win consistently | They take more of your action | They cut your maximum to pocket change |
| Promotions | Almost none | Constant |
| Prop and parlay coverage | Narrow | Enormous |
A sharp book treats a winning bettor as a data source worth paying for: your bet tells it where its number is wrong, and it would rather know. A recreational book treats the same bettor as a cost.
Being limited means a book has cut your maximum stake, often to a few dollars, usually without warning and rarely with an explanation. It is the normal outcome of winning at a recreational book, and it happens far faster than most people expect — sometimes within weeks.
Using someone else's account — a beard — breaks every sportsbook's terms and is grounds for confiscating the balance. It is also the kind of thing that ends in a legal problem rather than a limited account.
The practical arrangement most serious bettors end up with uses each type for what it is good at.
Availability differs by state and by country, and the set of books that will take your bet is not a matter of preference. Work with the ones you can actually use, and use more than one.
VigWatch does not take bets and is not paid to rank one sportsbook above another. What the board does is price the same market at all of them at once, which is the part that matters here.
Which sportsbooks VigWatch prices, and what each one is good for. Compare the books.