Because I have no feel for the stock market I decided that I could make investment income by gambling on sports. I didn’t totally ignore research about investing in stocks because it is, after all, nothing more than a legal gambling operation. I read about a mock trading study where participants were given funny money and made hypothetical trades for existing stocks. The participants who made the most money had been in the Marines. That told me that discipline was a key to gambling. Develop a system that works and stay with it.

I was a bit surprised to see Baghdatis beat Sebastian Grosjean but I was shocked to see Baghdatis go up 5-0 over Lleyton Hewitt before Hewitt won his first game.

When I found out that I’d have to make hundreds of bets during a season to get better than random results, I gave up the idea. I decided to become a minor partner in a real estate partnership and go into the benign version of sports gambling known as fantasy sports even though the prize is paltry – three days at a fantasy tennis camp in Florida, airfare not included. Gimme a break. That is the prize for the most popular tennis fantasy league, ATP Fantasy Tennis, which is the one we play here at tennisdiary.

Fundamental to any tennis picking system is to go through the draw, first round to the final, and pick the winner of each match. Not an easy thing by the way. There are times when there are three tournaments in one week – a good indication of tennis’ problem at the moment, the best players seldom play each other because they’re scattered around the world. Since each team consists of eight players, it makes sense to pick the quarterfinalists. If there is more than one tournament, pick the players that will make the most money because teams are ranked by the players prize money.

The other thing I learned in my research is that you have to take risks. If your winning percentage is too high, say above 57 or 58%, then you’re not taking enough chances. You’re not taking advantage of bets that are riskier but would pay more.

One way to do that in fantasy tennis is to drop one of the quarterfinalists in your draw and substitute a money player – a player that few other fantasy players will pick but could go far in the draw. If you’d picked Marcos Baghdatis at Wimbledon, you would have added over $292,ooo to your team’s prize money because he is now in the semifinals. Not that I was smart enough to make this pick, mind you. I was a bit surprised to see Baghdatis beat Sebastian Grosjean but I was shocked to see Baghdatis go up 5-0 over Lleyton Hewitt before Hewitt won his first game. Hewitt managed to win the second set but Baghdatis took the last two sets for the 6-1, 5-7, 7-6(5), 6-2, victory.

Baghdatis was a good pick because he’s had conditioning and injury problems since his run to the final at the Australian Open earlier this year so few were expecting him to do well at Wimbledon. But he has a winning record against top-ten players and loves playing in front of large crowds in the big tournaments.

Roger Federer rolled over Mario Ancic, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4, and will now play Jonas Bjorkman in the semifinals. Would anyone have picked Bjorkman as their money player? He did get to the final at the grass tournament in Nottingham the week before Wimbledon, but he beat Seppi, Lopez, Vanek, and Calleri, not exactly household names. Not to mention the fact that he’s thirty four years old and has never gone past the quarters at Wimbledon before.

Go ahead and choose a money player but don’t be careless. It might have paid off here handsomely but it would probably get you in trouble over the course of a season.