Most people would probably start their Online Sports Betting Primer by assuming that most of their readers are already ready to gamble. And they would probably be correct.

However, I have been in this business for a long time, and I know that there are many people who simply can not handle this activity.

I am not necessarily referring just to those people with a potential gambling addiction. Rather there are many people for whom gambling is simply not an activity they would find pleasing or enjoyable, without even the added potential misery of losing money. And if you are not going to enjoy it, why even start?

So, before you even think about signing up for a sportsbook or casino, why don't you just ask yourself these questions:

1) How much money can you lose without going insane? (Part I)

This is not a money management (which we will get into later) question. Rather, there are some people who simply can not stand to lose any money whatsoever.

My wife is a great example. If she buys a $15 dollar vase and then breaks it a year later, she is livid at herself for wasting $15 - even if she got a year of use out of it. She'll whine about it for an hour. It drives me nuts. I don't see the point in dwelling on $15, but to her it is a major issue.

My wife shouldn't gamble. And if you find yourself sympathizing with her, then maybe you shouldn't gamble either.

Why? Because YOU WILL LOSE MONEY!!!

Gambling on sports is a fun and exciting challenge, and it brings a whole new level of enjoyment to watching televised sports, but it is rarely a wise investment strategy.

It takes lots of experience, practice, patience, and more than a little bit of luck to make money gambling. There are a small percentage of gamblers who are lucky enough and work hard enough to make money gambling. You probably won't be one of them.

If you haven't gambled before, you may get lucky and open up with a hot streak, but eventually you will begin to find yourself coming back to Earth and then slowly falling a bit behind. Otherwise, you will start off immediately falling behind. Either way, YOU WILL LOSE MONEY!!!

If you don't like the sound of that, then go put your money into government bonds. Because you are not a gambler.

If, however, you relish the challenge of trying to be one of the elite few who manage to find a fun and relatively inexpensive - and sometimes profitable - hobby that actually earns a bit of money, then you probably have the right mindset to continue.

2) How much money can you lose without going insane? (Part II)

I will delve deeper into this situation when we start discussing Money Management, but for the moment, consider the very likely possibility that you have just made a $25 dollar wager that lost on a strange play at the end of the game. In short, you just lost $25 on a bad beat.

You have a choice. You can keep wagering smartly, or you can think that you are "due for some luck" meaning that you won't have bad luck twice in a row and double your wager on your next game.

Bad idea.

If you think you won't be able to stop yourself from doubling-up, then you don't have the right mentality to gamble on sports.

If you chase your losses, YOU WILL LOSE MONEY!!! Maybe not right away, but eventually. If you keep doubling your wagers after losses, sooner or later you will go on a losing streak that breaks you. Trust me. It will happen. The laws of probability are more reliable than the law of gravity.

Yes, everybody does it sometime, and everybody learns their lesson the hard way when they find themselves suddenly betting $150 per game when they thought they were never going to bet more than $25 per game.

If you honestly think that you can not possibly lose seven, eight, or even 10 bets in a row, you need to stop right now and take a probability course.

Or better yet, why don't you take a look through the records of the Survivor Contest Allstars? These are the guys who have compiled the longest winning streaks in the history of Wagerline's Survivor Contest. Yet if you browse their past picks, you will find that these guys regularly suffer losing streaks of seven, eight, or longer. Look and learn.

You will have losing streaks. The only way to protect yourself is to wager wisely.

If you don't think you have the patience to withstand a major losing streak without raising your stakes, then you do not have the right mentality to gamble.

3) How much money can you lose without causing financial problems?

This is pretty self-explanatory, but it is worth mentioning.

The good thing about wagering online is that, since you need a credit card, it is a lot harder for you to get yourself too deep in the hole. The credit cards will cut you off.

However this world isn't ideal, and lots of people have waayyyy more credit cards and higher limits than they need or deserve.

If you don't know how you will manage to cover any losses that you WILL incur, then you should probably delay your gambling fun until you have your finances sorted out.

4) Do you have anger or depression issues?

If you have a tendency to punch walls (or people) when things are not going your way, then you are not cut out for gambling. And if you have a tendency to dwell on the negatives... Ditto.

You will suffer bad luck. You will lose wagers through sequences of events that are unfathomable.

If you are the type of person who can not easily put those unfortunate circumstances behind you, then you will not enjoy gambling at all. And if you are not enjoying it, then you are probably in it for the wrong reasons. Get out.

I have an acquaintance who has the technical ability to be a fantastic handicapper. He knows the game of football inside and out, and when he has his head on his shoulders, he's awesome. Every football season, he seems to start the season on an incredible run. For about eight or ten weeks, he's the happiest guy in the world. But sooner or later, he will have a bad weekend. Usually, it is just bad luck. It happens to everybody.

But once he has a single bad week, he completely changes his mentality. He'll hole up in his apartment and get himself into a big funk. He'll stop looking at the games the same way he did before. He'll stop having fun. Suddenly, he's lost three or four straight weekends and now he's questioning whether he should actually start fading his own picks. By the end of the season, he's inevitably lost a pile of money.

In short, he is a great technical handicapper, but he simply doesn't have the emotional detachment necessary to maintain a even keel during the season's ups and downs. As a result, he's an overall handicapping washout.

If you can't handle losing gracefully, it will probably turn you into a bad handicapper, and you will lose even more often.

5) Can you manage your personal finances?

One of the paradoxes of sports gambling is the fact that most people probably DO win more wagers than they lose, and yet most people lose more money than they win.

While a big part of this is naturally due to the fact that the odds are in the favor of the sportsbook, an even bigger factor is the fact that most gamblers simply do not know how to manage their finances.

I'm talking about money management, and having a smart strategy to maximize your winnings while minimizing your losses. It seems quite simple, but you would be amazed at how often newbies will scratch their heads and wonder how it is possible that they finished the football season with a 110-90 record, and yet they still managed to lose $300 or more.

Managing your gambling finances takes dedication, discipline and determination, but smart money management is what allows people to truly have fun gambling without getting themselves into a financial hole.

There are many different money management theories that I'm not going to get into right now, but they all have one thing in common: Usually the people who manage their personal finances poorly will also do a poor job at managing their gambling money.

Take a look at your current personal finances and be honest with yourself. Are you able to follow your budget somewhat faithfully? If so, then you will probably be able to have fun gambling, and might even eke out the occasional profit.

If not, then maybe you should sort out your personal finances before you start gambling. Hint: If you don't even have a budget, then you probably should take that as a sign that you need to get yourself financially organized.

6) Can you manage your life?

This seems like a pretty broad question, but it cuts to the root of the issue.

People who run into problems while gambling usually find that they have other issues as well.

Problems at work. Problems at home. Problems elsewhere. Whatever.

Yes, everybody has problems. But again, if your goal is to have a bit of fun, then why would you put yourself in a position where this hobby could cause you more problems than it is worth?

For instance, if you have a job that could be adversely affected if your boss found out about your gambling, then it is not worth it. It isn't. What's the point in making a $100 bet, if it could cost you a $50,000 per year job? Be smart, dude.

Similarly, if your spouse has strong feelings against you gambling, rightly or wrongly, and you can not convince them that you are gambling smartly and harmlessly, then it probably isn't worth the hassle. No matter how unreasonable they are being, why put your marriage in jeopardy over a few bets? Not only won't you be able to truly enjoy your big wins, but you will suffer twice as much following losses. It's just not worth it. Find another hobby.

Bottom line: If you are feeling miserable about anything and think that gambling will somehow be the answer, then you probably should stop now.

OK, that is it for the first part of this Primer. Hopefully you learned a little bit about yourself and whether or not you are a candidate to be a happy longterm online sports gambler.

Because, as I have said already a couple of times, if you are not going to have fun while you do this, then exactly why do you even want to get involved?