2026-07-19 · Validated Research Team
Nine sports betting strategies tested across soccer, the NFL and MLB
We tested nine mechanical betting ideas across major European soccer, the NFL and MLB. None is validated. The football and baseball screens demonstrate why a high hit rate or a positive recent window cannot rescue a negative full-sample price-adjusted result.
| Strategy | Window | Bets | PF | Max drawdown | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Closing-odds favorite bias | 2019–2025 | 3,499 | 1.062 | -29.4% | Inconclusive |
| Late line-movement continuation | 2015–2025 | 3,337 | 0.959 | -77.4% | Rejected |
| Best-price consensus value | 2019–2025 | 357 | 1.219 | -24.4% | Inconclusive |
| NFL home underdog ATS | 1999–2025 | 1,684 | 0.895 | See report | Rejected |
| NFL divisional home underdog ATS | 1999–2025 | 668 | 0.894 | See report | Rejected |
| NFL rested home underdog ATS | 1999–2025 | 123 | 0.805 | See report | Inconclusive |
| MLB home underdog moneyline | 2012–2021 | 5,446 | 0.949 | -100.0% | Rejected |
| MLB road favorite moneyline | 2012–2021 | 6,011 | 0.940 | -100.0% | Rejected |
| MLB low-total home underdog | 2012–2021 | 2,403 | 0.963 | -86.7% | Rejected |
Favorite bias
Backing closing favorites won 63.3% of bets, but PF was only 1.062 and the bootstrap interval for mean profit crossed zero. A high hit rate did not translate into a sufficiently large or stable edge.
Line momentum
Following late odds movement failed outright. PF was below one and the equity path suffered a -77.4% maximum drawdown. The holdout did not rescue the rule.
Best-price value
Betting when one bookmaker offered a meaningfully better price than the market consensus reached PF 1.219 across 357 bets. It cleared three of five available gates, but drawdown reached -24.4% and the evidence set did not support a full 11-gate verdict. This is the candidate worth retesting with richer bookmaker coverage and a frozen threshold.
NFL home underdogs
The broad rule backed NFL home teams receiving 1.5 to 6.5 points. It lost across 1,684 regular-season bets with PF 0.895, then deteriorated to PF 0.854 in the frozen 2020–2025 holdout. Restricting it to divisional games did not help: full-sample PF was 0.894 and holdout PF remained below break-even at 0.966.
Adding a two-day rest advantage left only 123 bets. That screen was also negative at PF 0.805, but is labeled inconclusive because it failed the frozen 250-bet sample prerequisite. The source is the nflverse schedules archive; closing lines support historical screening, not proof that a named sportsbook quote was executable at a particular timestamp.
MLB moneyline screens
Moderate home underdogs (+105 through +180) lost across 5,446 bets at PF 0.949. Moderate road favorites (-170 through -110) won 55.1% of games but returned only PF 0.940—the price paid erased the apparent hit-rate advantage. Both 100-unit fixed-stake bankrolls were eventually exhausted.
The low-total home-underdog screen was the most interesting failure. Its 2019–2021 holdout reached PF 1.061, but the full 2012–2021 sample remained negative at PF 0.963 and did not beat outcome permutations. We publish the recent improvement as a research lead without promoting it to a surviving rule.
The MLB closing odds were published in Christopher Treasure’s Kaggle dataset, with game results attributed to Retrosheet. Ambiguous and neutral-site home assignments were excluded using pre-result venue fields.
Bottom line
Win rate alone was misleading across both sports. Price paid, payoff asymmetry, drawdown and chronological stability determined the verdict. See the complete sports strategy board.
By Validated Research Team (Methodology v1.0 — 11-gate validation). Part of 11-gate validation. Backtests are not investment advice.