Bet on This: Here’s How You Can Get into Betting on Sports
Are ready to learn how to bet on sports like a pro?
Before putting money on the line ask yourself these questions: “Can I afford to bet on games?”, “What types of ways will I bet on sports?”
Here are a few tips for sports gambling that will get you into the winners circle quickly.
Mind Your Budget
Before you start betting real money on games, make sure you have the discretionary income to place bets. If you are trying to bet your car payment or mortgage understand you are running the risk of potential losses.
Be mindful of your budget and make sure you have the extra money to spend before placing your bets.
Betting on Games/Matches
The most common way to bet on sports is to individually go through and bet on games or matches. This can be done in a number of ways but the most common way is to select a winner based on the points spread.
The points spread is the betting line the odds-makers in Las Vegas use to determine who has the advantage between the two opponents. One example is a football game between the New England Patriots and Buffalo Bills. (Check out this website for expert picks).
If the betting line has New England as a 3 point favorite, you can either choose the Patriots to win by three or more points or for Buffalo to win outright or lose by less than three in order for you to win the bet.
Another betting option during head to head games is based on the total number of points scored, commonly referred to as the “over/under”. Using the same scenario of New England vs Buffalo, if the point total for the game is 60 points, you can bet that the total score will be over or under that number.
This is another excellent way to bet on sports games and can lead to big winning depending on your strategies.
What if you want to really sweeten your pot and have a chance at winning big on multiple outcomes? This is when parlay betting comes into play.
Parlay Betting
Parlay betting can be easily defined as making predictions on multiple games, and needing all of them to come right in order to win. If you had a slate of NBA games to choose from and made a $10 parlay bet, you could potentially turn that into hundreds or thousands of dollars with the right picks.
The tricky thing about betting on a parlay is the major risk for potential losses. Suppose you select three NBA games to choose from on your parlay.
If you have two picks based on the point spread and one based on the over/under, a simple free throw on the over/under bet could be the difference between you winning and losing.
Parlay betting can be fun and allows you to achieve a bigger payout, but make sure you are extremely confident with your picks.
For solo sports such as boxing, betting is normally based on the money line. For example in the 2017 matchup between Connor McGregor and Floyd Mayweather, Mayweather was a -$500 favorite to win.
This meant that you needed to bet $500 on Mayweather in order to win $100. If you placed a bet on McGregor (who was +$400 on the betting line), you would have won $400 with a $100 bet had he came away with the victory.
Season Long Fantasy Leagues
What if you don’t want to bet on individual games or outcomes? There has to be another way for you to get your sports betting picks in without having to worry about the outcome of individual results.
This is where fantasy sports comes into play. We will first touch on the subject of season-long fantasy sports.
The basic definition of fantasy sports is you join a league, build a team either through a multiple round draft or purchasing players through an auction.
You then have the week to week matchups against other individuals in the league. Fantasy sports has exploded over the last 20 years and has gone from a small hobby to one of the best ways to gamble on sports in America.
Putting Money Down
Where does gambling come into play? Most paid fantasy leagues have a sign-up fee to join. The amount of the sign-up fee is based on the number of players in the league.
The total will then be divided up between the winner and runner-up or simply to the outright winner of the league.
This can lead to a big win at the end of the season if you’re team comes out on top. For example, if you join a 20 team fantasy football league with a $200 sign up fee, the winner of the league could walk away with up to $4000.
Winning fantasy sports isn’t just about picking the right players, as you have to look at each matchup for your players during the week. These matchups will help you determine what players can help you come away with the most possible points.
If you do decide to join your fantasy league you must be aware of all of the rules going in before placing money down on your team. These rules can include how much points are given per touchdown scored, or if points are given for each catch during the game (also known as a points per catch league).
Once you have a thorough understanding of the rules and feel confident in your abilities to win a league put some money down and sign up.
The most popular places to play season-long fantasy leagues are through sports giants ESPN and Yahoo!. Both companies offer free and paid leagues in a variety of sports.
We do recommend joining a few free leagues your first time out to make sure that you have some type of skill playing season long fantasy sports.
Daily Fantasy
Season-long fantasy football can be fun and very rewarding, but if you want instant gratification look no further than daily fantasy sports. Websites such as Draft Kings and FanDuel have been at the forefront of the daily fantasy movement for the better part of this decade.
Daily fantasy sports has a lot of similarities to season-long fantasy sports except you can collect your winnings instantly. The main concept is you have a specific budgeted amount of money available to use when choosing your team.
Each player is assigned a dollar amount as their salary and you must budget each position accordingly.
There are a number of ways to play daily fantasy. You can join contests that can include a handful of players or thousands of them. The fees for entering specific games can range from $.25 to hundreds of dollars.
If you end up with the highest total you will win the biggest pot for that game. Depending on the type of game you enter there may also be payouts for specific point ranges.
One example is a contest with 40,000 players can payout to the top 2,000 point scorers.
If you enter a league game with two five dollar entries, and the payout to the top winner is $10,000 you have two chances to win.
Research is Key in Daily Fantasy
There are also a number of sites created specifically for winning a contest in daily fantasy leagues and it is highly recommended that you try to create as many strategies as possible to select successful lineups.
Sites such as Rotogrinders can offer daily fantasy analysis that you can use to get an edge against your competition.
Daily fantasy sports does have a major drawback. Inexperienced players can sometimes lose money to players who have better access to paid research tools and more money to place multiple lineups in leagues.
Besides that drawback, playing daily fantasy can be fun and help you stay engaged through the long seasons for sports such as baseball, basketball, and hockey.
How to Bet on Sports Like a Pro
Throughout this article, we have discussed some of the best ways you can learn how to bet on sports to make money. If you want to bet on sports that have instant gratification you can opt for betting against the spreads or money lines of contests.
Another option is daily fantasy sports that can lead to big payouts if you have a winning lineup. The more traditional options for fantasy sports is joining a season-long league.
This will require more attention for the long-term success of your league but can end up with payouts comparable to the other options.
What are some ways you plan on betting on sports after reading this article? Leave us a comment below and don’t forget to check out our sports and outdoors section.