why its tough to beat the book

the juice of course but lets look at  typical situation , will use 100 as wager, easy to work with, and 100 bets  per game the book is holding

game one....split 50/50  so at 100 per the book collects 5500 and pays out 5000..nets +500

game two....book is one sided  70/30  and the 70 wins....book pays out  7000 and collects 3300 on losers....net loss  -3700

game three....little one sided again but 60/40  and 60 loses....book collects 6600 and pays out 4000  net +2600

on those three games the book collected net 3100 on the two positive results and lost 3700 on game two....net overall loss of 600....not good u say but the point is the book only had net loss of 600  on those games....add it up , the book "won" 140 wagers and "lost "  180....thats a win % of 43.7...140/320.

If a bettor went 140-180  he would  lose 180x110=19800 and win 140 x100= 14000....net loss of  -5800

over time the book will always come out ahead as you cant compete with that disparity, and many times the book will win the lopsided games  where action is heavy on one side....YOU may be the one that overcomes it but that's fine as the book has plenty of fish it will catch

I undertsand what you're saying but you are assuming the bettor flat bets all games. Using a labby line you would make money at 40% hit rate.

Let's assume you win 4 of 10 (L L W L W and repeat) 40%. A typical labby line progression would like like this:

• Starting 50-50
• Loss 50-50-110
• Loss 50-50-110-176
• Win x-50-110-x
• Loss x-50-110-x-176
• Win x-x-110-x-x
• Loss x-x-110-x-x121
• Loss x-x-110-x-x121-254
• Win x-x-x-x-x121-x
• Lose x-x-x-x-x121-x-133
• Win x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x (line clear, profit $100 by going 4-6)