If you think about it, though, sports and astrology are a perfect match. What other field of human endeavor provides such objective, immediately verifiable results? With so many matches every day, athletic competition generates constant feedback, allowing us to continuously improve and refine our methods. But does it work? How would you go about doing it? There is a scarcity of good, published material on the subject, but opinions are certainly easy to come by.

First, Know Your Sports

One of our first considerations from the astrological perspective is that there are many different kinds of sports and one size does not fit all. For instance, there is a big difference between team sports and individual sports, just as there is a big difference between Shaquille O'Neal and Michelle Kwan.

While this may seem a little too obvious to merit mention, you might be surprised at the number of astrological research projects that have lumped all sorts of athletes together in a sample and subsequently delighted the skeptics by failing to demonstrate anything of statistical significance.

The skills and conditions necessary for victory in different sports vary widely. Football and baseball are markedly different games. Ice hockey and soccer, while more similar in design, differ vastly in surface. The same is true in individual competitions. For example, while swimming and track races tend to run along the same lines, winning a gymnastics or figure skating event is very different from winning a sprint.

That's not to say that the same astrological methods won't work across the board, but you do have to ask the right question to get the right answer! Just as you wouldn't want to venture into financial speculation without a thorough knowledge of the markets, it's unwise to assume that astrology will give you any kind of a predictive edge unless you first gain a thorough knowledge of your chosen sport and its athletes, especially if you cherish any hopes of profiting through this kind of speculation.

The Stars of the Game: The Horary Approach

Many astrologers approach the sports question as a type of modified excercise in horary astrology. Horary astrology is a time-honored technique wherein a single chart is cast for when and where a question is asked in order to determine that question's answer. In keeping with the astrological theory that the beginnings of things contain within them their end, the chart for the beginning of a match is used to predict the final outcome.

Different houses of the game chart are chosen to represent the two sides, whether home team vs. away team, favorite vs. underdog, or whatever is appropriate to that particular contest. The planetary rulers  of the signs on those houses are evaluated and their relative strength is determined using a variety of techniques, both ancient and modern. The side with the strongest ruler(s) is generally declared the winner.

One seeming advantage to this method is that you only have to use one chart, which some may find appealing. One drawback is that there is a great divergence of opinion between astrologers over which house rules what. For instance, many claim that the Ascendant or First House rules the home team and the Descendant, or Seventh House, rules the away team. Others claim the opposite. Obviously, they can't both be right (or can they?) but they all claim to get splendid results. Let's just say that the definitive analysis on this has yet to be done.

The Natal Approach

Other astrologers focus on the birth charts of the competing parties, attempting to determine who is best supported or worst afflicted by the astrological conditions during the match. In a contest between two individuals, they would use the athletes' birth charts, and compare them to the game chart.

However, in a contest between two teams, they might use a birth chart for the teams, or charts for key personnel on each team or some combination of the two. And just what constitutes a chart for a team? Some astrologers like to use the chart of a team's first game, while others prefer to use a chart for the beginning of the team franchise. Again, there is little to no consensus on this issue.

Which Way is Better?

In sports prediction, it's hard to hide behind the scoreboard. You are either right or wrong and there is very little grey area, unlike personal forecasts, which can be highly subjective. Rather than debate the merits of these two distinct approaches, I prefer to point out that there are only a very few astrologers on this planet who generate a consistent profit from the accuracy of their sports predictions.

I like to think that any number of methods could work for you if you are objective and disciplined in your approach, but that could be just another sentimental opinion. For the record, in my work I don't use horary at all, and I rarely use team charts. I'm not saying that they do or don't work, but that I've gone in other directions that work better for me and are more reflective of my personal worldview.

What's Your Worldview?

Do you believe that the outcome of a sporting contest is predetermined before the match even begins? Your response to that question could have everything to do with your choice of astrological techniques and how you would go about solving the problem that sports prediction poses.

If you are of the determinist stripe, believing that everything is preordained and that we mortals have little choice in our fates, you may prefer the horary approach. Reducing human endeavors to a battle between planetary rulers doesn't leave a whole lot of room for individual efforts or contributions. If, on the other hand, you are more philosophically inclined toward freedom, and see man as the author of his own fate, you may prefer methods that use individual birth charts and compare individual efforts.

How can we hope to predict if the outcome isn't predetermined, and if it is, why do they bother to play the games? I hope to answer these questions to the best of my ability in part two of this article. Until then, happy sports watching!