1. How Do Baseball Betting Lines Work
2. How Do Football Betting Lines Work

How mlb betting lines work Vegas sport bet online usa. Dk galop Spor Bahisleri. Spor Bahisleri de montreal dj. William hill sport bet las vegas. Spor Bahisleri poland warszawa poker games. Here you can find out more about NFL betting lines and an explanation on how they actually work. Also get up-to-date lines and picks.

Point spread betting is the most popular way both American football and basketball are wagered online. It is also used as an alternative wagering option in other sports. To explain quickly: if the point spread lines in an NBA game are Lakers -3.5 / Celtics +3.5 here the minus sign (-) indicates the Lakers are a 3.5 point favorite. Those betting Lakers -3.5 would need them to win by 4 points or more, otherwise their wager is a loss. On the other side, the plus sign (+) indicates the Celtics are a 3.5 point underdog. Those betting the Celtics +3.5 win their bet if the Celtics win the game outright or lose by 3 points or less.

In this article I’ll discuss point spread betting in great depth including the ins and outs. I’ll also cover and link to intermediate betting strategy. First, if you’re already familiar with pointspreads, the following are my top 4 recommended online sportsbooks.

• Why We Like’em
• Offers the best sign up bonus which can be used for point spread betting.
• The first website to post point spread odds. This is ideal for shopping early lines.
• Often has the best value on underdog point spreads.
• Has point spreads priced -105 (risk $1.05 to win $1, instead of $1.10 to win $1)

Because the point spread lines used often varies between online bookmakers it makes sense to shop the lines at all four bookmakers listed above. For example, if three sites have an NFL team -3, and you find another having -2.5 obviously you should make the bet at the site that is offering -2.5, so long as the odds are the same. There’s an old saying in sports betting “I know far more winning line shoppers than I do handicappers”.

Point Spread Betting Explained

Note: If you are experienced with sports betting you may wish to skim past or skip this section where I cover the very basics for the benefit of readers who are brand new.

The first thing to understand is point spread betting is only one of many ways to bet on a game from any sport. It is possible to bet just on which team will win with no point spread involved. To give an example let’s say in the NBA the Atlanta Hawks are one of the best teams and are playing at home against the Orlando Magic who are not a very good team and have injuries. The bookmaker might set odds on this game as Hawks -700 (risk $7 to win $1) / Magic +500 (risk $1 to win $5). This type of wagering is called moneyline betting. If you click that link you can learn more about betting on teams to win straight up.

The problem with moneyline betting is most gamblers prefer closer to an even money wagering proposition. With this in mind, for the same game the bookmakers will likely set the point spread odds as Atlanta Hawks -10.5 -110 / Orlando Magic +10.5 -110. The -110 is the price and means for every $1.10 you stake you’ll profit $1.00 if your bet wins. As you can see the odds are much closer to even, and I already explained how the point spreads work in the opening paragraph of this article.

Let me now explain some terminology and details you should be familiar with:

How Do Baseball Betting Lines Work

Betting Line – understand when someone asks “what is the line” they are referring to the point spread. In the used example the Atlanta Hawks have a line of -10.5 (spoken, “minus ten point five” or “minus ten and a half”) and the Orlando Magic have a line of +10.5 (spoken: “plus ten point five” or “plus ten and a half”). Another term sometimes used is: hook. What’s the line? “ten and a hook; Atlanta is the favorite”.

All Lines Have a Price – unless otherwise specified all point spread bets are -110 (risk $1.10 to win $1.00). In some cases the lines will be specified. You might see Hawks -10.5 -115 / Magic +10.5 -105. In this case the bookmaker feels the Hawks are slightly more likely to cover. The -115 means risk $1.15 to win $1 and the -105 means risk $1.05 to win $1.

Reduced Juice – popular US betting site www.5dimes.eu on game day offers point spread bets at -105 base. This does not always mean sides are -105, you might find Hawks -10.5 -104 / +10.5 Magic -106, or you might find -101 / -109, the point is that their reduced odds use a -105 base instead of a -110 base. You can find their reduced juice odds by looking under the column of the sport you’d like to wager and then clicking the box next to the word “reduced”.

Half-Points and Pushes – as already mentioned the half-point in a betting line is referred to as a hook. A line of -10.5 has a hook where a line of -10 does not. With -10.5 it is not possible to tie. With -10 it is possible to tie. In the event you do tie, for example betting -10 and having your team win by exactly 10, this is called a push. In this case your stake is returned and the outcome is as if you never placed the bet.

Line Shopping is Key

The importance of line shopping cannot possibly be understated. If for NBA basketball you were to beat the consensus point spread by an average 1-point (for example: bet +7 when most sites have +6), as long as you managed your bankroll well, it would be near impossible to lose over the long-haul. Also the difference between betting -3 -105 and -3 -110 is massive. At -105 you only need to win 51.22% of your wagers to break even. At -110 you need to win 52.38%. Understand line shopping is not always easy.

How Do Football Betting Lines Work

An example where a decision comes into play: let’s say for an NFL football game the New York Jets are +6.5 -110 at all websites but Bovada has +7.0 -120. This is a difference of risk $1.10 for each $1.00 you want to win or risk $1.20 for each dollar you want to win. Is the extra half-point worth it? How do we decide? This is where this article gets slightly more advanced than the basics.

Predicting Probabilities

In order to decide if +6.5 -110 or +7 -120 is a better bet we need some sort of a base to work with. If you’re a handicapper you can probably handicap the probability that a +6.5 wager wins. Considering you’re reading this article you’re likely not a handicapper. My advice is to gain this base by calculating the no-vig market price using odds from www.pinnaclesports.com. They don’t accept US players but that’s okay, we’re not betting here – we’re simply using them to gain information. For the reason on why to use Pinnacle refer to my article: the evolution of the betting market.

How to Calculate No-Vig Probability

Let’s say the odds at Pinnacle are Patriots -6.5 -105 / Jets +6.5 -103. The first thing we need to do is convert -103 and -105 to required break even percentage (also referred to as implied probability). We can do this using our odds converter. Enter -105 under American odds and see this is 51.22% and enter -103 and see this is 50.74%. Notice if we add these two probabilities together 51.22%+50.74% is 101.96%. The reason the probabilities are higher than 100% is due to the vig (also known as juice or markup) which is how the bookmakers earn profit.

To remove vig from the probabilities divide each by the total probability. In this case the math is 51.22%/101.96%=50.24% and 50.74%/101.96%=49.76%. Notice 50.24%+49.76%=100%. We’ve now calculated the no-vig probabilities. This is telling us the market no-vig probability for Jets +6.5 is 49.76%. We now have a point spread probability needed to evaluate whether +6.5 -110 or +7 -120 is a better bet.

Calculating Bet Value with Different Half Points

We now know +6.5 is expected to cover 49.76% of the time. To calculate the fair percentage for +7 we need to figure exactly how often underdogs will lose by exactly 7 points. For this I’ll use the -4 to -9 column of the NFL push chart mikevegas posted on Roughing the Punter. Here I see +7 exact is expected 6.0% of the time. Understand when moving from +6.5 to +7 we are only picking up half of that 6%. The other half is in our opponents -7 line, while half is in our +7 line. So expected cover/push rate of +7 is the 49.76% for 6.5 plus half of the 6%. This is 49.76%+(6%/2)=52.76%.

So what we now know is we expect +6.5 covers 49.76% of the time and +7 covers 52.76% of the time. So which is the better bet +6.5 -110 or +7 -120? For this we use the EV equation: (win probability * what you’ll be paid if you win) – (loss probability * amount staked)=EV.

First we need to use the same stake for them both, so we’ll say $100. At -110 a $100 bet pays $100/1.1=$90.909 and at -$120 a $100 bet pays $100/1.2=$83.333. We now have all the data we need to use that equation.

• +6.5 -110 solves as (0.4976*$90.909)-(0.5024*100)=Negative (-)$5.00
• +7 -120 solves as (0.5276*$83.333)-(0.4724*$100)= Negative (-)$3.27

Here we’ll note both lines are –EV, however staking $100 on +7 -120 will average less of a loss than staking $100 on +6.5 -110. So if we must bet here we’ll go with the +7 -120 option.

Not All Point Spreads are Equal

It is important to understand that not all point spreads are equal. Take baseball, according to the book Betting Baseball by Michael Murray, when home teams win it is by exactly 1 run 31.7% of the time. When the road teams win it is by 1 run 23.6% of the time. The reason why should be obvious. When the home team takes the lead in the bottom of the final inning, they only go up by 1 run, unless the game ends in a walk-off home run. The actual probability depends on the moneyline and game total. Just when two teams are evenly matched understand +1.5 for the road team is much greater value than 1.5 for the home team.

In American football there is a huge disparity between the values of specific point spreads. For example in NFL football -5.5 -110 and -5 -114 have about the same difference in value as -3 -110 and -2.5 -135. That’s a 4 cent and a 25 cent change when moving a half point on each. This could actually be better stated that when dealing with market prices -5.5 -110, -5 -114, -3 -110 and -2.5 -135 all have the same expected value. The reason for the difference is 3 is the most common margin of victory in football, where games are decided by 5 points only on rare occasions.

The same is also true in basketball but only to an extent. For large point spreads say over 10.5 the distribution is far more random. However, as explained in my article buying-half points in basketball end game strategy in close games makes certain small point spreads more likely to occur.

In other games like soccer, ice hockey and field hockey where goals are scored one at a time with a low frequency per match, half points are worth a ton.

In order to analyze all this you’ll need to develop push charts. How is covered in my detailed article on football teaser betting. For more on the topic of point spread betting you may wish to read the articles I already linked to here, as well as buying half points in football and basketball teasers. You can also follow additional links from inside those articles to gain a much better understanding of how to bet sports with an advantage. This article here has provided you a decent overview. We encourage you to read further and wish you the best of luck.

Sports betting has become a phenomenon across the world. People all around the world will put wagers on a sporting event to create more excitement around a game for themselves. Let’s face it, you wouldn’t watch a 1-10 team play a 2-9 team without placing a wager. But once the wager is in, you’re absolutely tuning in and watching every second.
Betting lines are used for sportsbooks to put a price on a certain wager. If you’re looking at a team with -150 odds to win, they’re a favorite. If it pays out, you will receive less than you put in. However, if you bet on the opposite side and take a chance with a +150 underdog, you would make more profit if the team won. Read more about Moneyline betting here.
Who creates the betting lines that are used by sportsbooks?

Most sportsbooks have in-house oddsmakers that are in charge of creating betting lines in the weeks before games, especially when it comes to Opening Day or the NFL. In baseball, the oddsmakers are required to make the lines daily as games never seem to stop in the summer with the MLB.
Years ago, the oddsmakers didn't have that much information to look at when trying to make betting lines. Now there are analytics everywhere to come up with all of the lines much more accurately.
Back then, oddsmakers would really only have box scores to look at. Now oddsmakers can look up anything and everything which gives them an advantage over the average bettor. Of course, records and things like the weather are important, but deeper stats mean so much more to oddsmakers. They’re able to develop systems to figure out exactly how much a team will score and such. You know the saying, “Vegas is always right.” Unless you follow Doc’s Sports picks. Then it’s different.
How Lines Move
When a game starts out at -3 for a team and the line changes to -2 before the game begins, that means that there’s action on the game or an injury to a key player. There are 'sharp' bettors that place a large bet on one team that forces oddsmakers to raise an eyebrow and switch the lines. An oddsmaker is always watching action to see if a change is necessary on the lines.
Popular Ways to Bet
Point spread
A point spread is a handicap where you essentially give or receive points on top of the actual outcome of the game. The spread basically looks at how a sportsbook or oddsmaker thinks about what the outcome might be. For example, in an NFL game, if the Kansas City Chiefs are -3 on the spread, the oddsmakers believe that the Chiefs will win their game by three points. If your data and analysis say otherwise, you would be on the opposite slide and gain three points from their opponent. So, if you bet on the Chiefs with the spread, you would have needed them to win by more than 3 points to cash your ticket. If the score was 27-21, Chiefs, you would win your bet. But if it was 23-21, Chiefs, you would lose because the other side gained three points and won 24-23 theoretically. Betting on spreads allows you to pick a team to win with better odds. If you were to just pick the Chiefs to win that game, you would have to lay a lot of money on the Chiefs. Picking them against the spread gives you a chance to make money near an even line.

Moneyline bets:
Moneyline bets take some stress away. With a moneyline bet, you only need your team to win the game and don’t need to worry about how much they do it by. We’ve all been there where we’ve taken a team to win by 7.5 and then a team wins by just seven. Those are the worst bad breaks and losing bets possible and not fun to endure. After the game, you’ll then wish you had been on the moneyline instead. Those absolutely sting.
The problem with money lines is that you will have to lay a lot more money on the team to win. On heavy favorites, you’re looking at putting down $300 just to win $100 on teams that are -300 American odds. If the San Francisco 49ers were -300 against the Minnesota Vikings, all you would need is for the 49ers to win the game. However, if they are upset, you’d lose $300 trying to win just $100. Heavy money lines are very scary if your team doesn’t perform like they should be or how they were projected to.
Point total bets
With totals, or over/under betting, you don’t need to worry about who wins the game. You’re worried about how many points are scored in the game. For example, if you bet over 52 points on the New York Giants against the Philadelphia Eagles, you’d want the combined score between the two teams to be more than 52 points. Therefore, if the score was 35-28, you would have 63 points and score over 52 points. If the score was 17-14, you would have a total of 31 points and the total would go under. Therefore, you would lose the wager and the bet.
You don’t only have to bet on the total for the game, but you can also bet on the team total for a certain team. If you’re not sure about one side but you love the other side, you can isolate a team and bet their team total.

Proposition bets:
Many people make their money on proposition bets. Prop bets are available for most sporting events, and you can bet anything from a team’s total to how many yards a player will rush for to how many touchdowns a player will score. Prop bets are like playing fantasy sports but with odds.
Prop bets are extremely popular during the Super Bowl, where people go as far as betting on how long the National Anthem will be. There are some ridiculous props like what color Gatorade will be poured on the winning head coach. Unless you have insight on those bets, it’s hard to have concrete analysis for that. You’re basically just trying to hit the lottery.

Doc’s Sports is offering $60 worth of member’s picks absolutely free – no obligation, no sales people – you don’t even have to enter credit card information. You can use this $60 credit any way you please for any handicapper and any sport on Doc’s Sports list of expert sports handicappers. Get $60 worth of premium members’ picks free.