What Is the Moneyline in Sports Gambling?
Contents
The moneyline is a type of bet offered by sportsbooks that doesn’t involve a point spread. You simply pick a winner.
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Moneyline Definition
The moneyline is a type of bet offered by sportsbooks in which the bettor attempts to predict the winning team. The moneyline odds are usually expressed as a positive or negative number. A positive number indicates the underdog and the amount of money that must be wagered to win $100. A negative number indicates the favorite and the amount of money that must be wagered to win $100.
Moneyline Explained
In sports betting, a moneyline bet is simply on which team will win the game. It doesn’t matter by how many points; just as long as the favored team wins the game, or the underdog loses. For example, let’s say that New York is playing Boston in a basketball game, and Boston is favored to win by 6 points. In this case, a bet on Boston would be a moneyline bet.
However, if you are betting on the moneyline, you are also betting on the odds. Moneyline odds can be expressed as either positive or negative numbers. Positive moneyline odds indicate how much you will win if you bet $100 on the favorite team. In our example above, the positive moneyline odds on Boston would be -600. This means that if you bet $100 on Boston to win, you would win $16.67 (because you would divide your $100 stake by 600 to arrive at your winnings).
Negative moneyline odds work in reverse; they indicate how much you have to bet in order to win $100. So in our example above, the negative moneyline odds on New York would be +450. This means that if you wanted to win $100 by betting on New York, you would have to bet $450 (because you would have to divided your $450 stake by 100 to arrive at your winnings).
Moneyline Examples
In sports betting, a moneyline bet is simply betting on the contest based on a given price rather than a point spread. The favorite will have negative odds, while the underdog will have positive odds. The price indicates how much you need to risk in order to win $100.
For example, let’s say that Duke is playing North Carolina and you want to bet on the game. You see that the moneyline for Duke is -200 and for North Carolina it is +180. This means that if you bet $200 on Duke, you will win $100 if Duke wins the game. If you bet $100 on North Carolina, you will win $180 if North Carolina wins the game.
If the game ends in a tie, then your original stake is returned to you. In order for someone to win their moneyline bet, their team must win the game outright – there can be no ties. If there is a positive number next to the moneyline of your team, then that indicates how much you would win if you bet $100 on them.
Moneyline Betting
Moneyline betting is a type of sports wagering where the bettor picks a side to win outright. This doesn’t necessarily mean they think the team will win by a certain number of points. Often times in moneyline betting, bettors will find value wagering on heavy underdogs. This is especially true in sports like boxing and MMA where a significant discrepency in skill level can exist between opponents.
Moneyline Betting Explained
In sports betting, the term “moneyline” is used a lot. But what does it mean? It’s relatively simple. When you place a moneyline bet, you’re simply picking one team or person to win. There is no point spread involved. That means if your team wins, you win. If they lose, you lose.
Moneyline bets are available in virtually every sport. Football and basketball moneylines are the most common, but you can also bet on baseball, hockey, boxing, soccer, mixed martial arts and more. The key is finding sportsbooks that offer good value on moneyline odds. Otherwise, you’re just throwing your money away.
Moneyline Betting Examples
Let’s look at a couple of moneyline betting examples, shall we? For these wagers, we’ll use the following two games from the Jan. 1, 2020 slate of college football bowl games:
-Clemson (-265) vs. Ohio State (+205) in the Fiesta Bowl
-LSU (-350) vs. Oklahoma (+280) in the Peach Bowl
In the first example, Clemson is favored to win by approximately 2.5 touchdowns (-14 points), while Ohio State is a significant underdog (+14 points). The Tigers are priced at -265, which means you would need to bet $265 on them to win $100. With the Buckeyes, a $100 bet would net you $205 if they were to win outright.
In the second example, LSU is a heavy favorite against Oklahoma, with oddsmakers pegging them as 7-point favorites in most sportsbooks. A -350 moneyline means you’d have to wager $350 on LSU to turn a profit of $100, while a +280 price on Oklahoma indicates that a $100 victory would result in a payout of $280.
Moneyline Strategies
The moneyline is one of the most common bets in sports gambling. A moneyline bet is simply picking a team or player to win. No point spreads or other fancy bets, just pick who you think will win.
Moneyline Strategy #1
The easiest moneyline strategy is simply betting on the heavy favorites. These are the teams that are expected to win by a wide margin, and you can usually find them at the top of the moneyline odds. For example, if a team is -250 on the moneyline, that means they are favored to win by a margin of 250 points. In this case, you would need to bet $250 on that team in order to win $100 if they win.
Moneyline Strategy #2
If you are new to sports gambling, the moneyline may seem like a foreign concept. Don’t worry, we’re here to help! The following article will give you a crash course on what the moneyline is and how to use it when making your sports bets.
What is the Moneyline?
The moneyline is a type of bet that is available in almost all sports. It’s very simple – you are essentially just betting on who will win the game. There is no spread or handicap, so it doesn’t matter how much one team wins by – all that matters is that they win.
How do I bet on the Moneyline?
When you bet on the moneyline, you will see odds like this:
Chicago Bulls +155
Minnesota Lynx -165
The number next to the team indicates how much you will need to bet in order to win $100. In this example, if you wanted to bet on the Bulls, you would need to bet $155 in order to win $100. If you wanted to bet on the Lynx, you would need to bet $165 in order to win $100. It’s important to remember that these are not decimal odds – they are fractional odds. This means that your bets are not going to be even money – if you win, you will win more than your original bet.
How do I calculate my winnings?
If you want to know how much you stand to win if your bet hits, simply use this formula:
(odds x wager)/100 = potential profit
For example, if you wagered $50 on the Bulls at +155 odds, your potential profit would be: (155 x 50)/100 = $77.50
This means that if the Bulls won, you would get back your original $50 wager plus an additional $77.50 in profit.
What if I lose?
If your team ends up losing the game, then you will lose your entire wager. This is why it’s important to only bet what you can affordto lose – there is always risk involved when placing any kind of wager.
Moneyline Strategy #3
There are a lot of factors that go into choosing a winner when gambling on sports, but one of the most important is the moneyline. The moneyline is the odds that are associated with each team in a given matchup, and it can have a big impact on how much you stand to win (or lose) on your bet.
In general, the favorite in a given matchup will have negative moneyline odds (e.g. -200), while the underdog will have positive moneyline odds (e.g. +150). This means that if you bet $100 on the favorite, you would need to bet $200 in order to win $100, while a $100 bet on the underdog would net you $150 if they won.
Of course, these numbers can vary quite a bit from one matchup to the next, so it’s important to do your homework and find the right moneyline for your bet. With that said, here are three moneyline strategies that can help you maximize your chances of winning.
1) Avoid heavy favorites: It may be tempting to bet on a big favorite (-300 or more), but these bets come with a lot of risk. Not only do you need the favorite to win, but you also need them to win by a wide margin in order to offset the large amount of money you’re required to bet. Unless you’re confident that the favorite will win by multiple goals or runs, it’s usually best to steer clear.
2) Back underdogs at home: Home-field advantage is real in sports, and it’s often reflected in the moneylines for matchups involving two reasonably evenly matched teams. When one team is significantly better than another, they’ll usually be favored even when playing on the road. But when two evenly matched teams meet, the home team is often given better odds than they would be otherwise. This is because betting sites know that casual bettors are often more likely to take the home team simply because they’re familiar with them. So if two teams are nearly even on paper and one is at home, it’s often worth betting on the home team at plus-money odds.
3) Bet series underdogs early: In most sports leagues (especially major ones like the NBA and NHL), teams play several games against each other over the course of a season. When betting on these series matchups, pay attention to how each team has fared against their opponent in recent meetings – especially if those meetings took place recently. If one team has dominated their rival recently but is still being given plus-money odds in the series matchup, there’s often value to be found there.