Are you a casual bettor, or maybe you’re a little bit more serious of a bettor? This guide will help you maximize your odds. That way when you win your bets, you will win more money.
With such a large number of platforms available, more than there has ever been, odds at different books are commonplace. So whether you are a casual bettor or a serious everyday bettor, you need to be maximizing your potential earnings and trying to keep the odds in your favor.
Say you’re hiring a contractor to build you an addition on your house. Do you get one bid and just take it? Probably not. Instead, you get multiple bids to check on the pricing between each, see who is insured, find out who has the best reputation, and compare the timeline of each company.
You get the point. Well, you should be doing the same when it comes to online betting. While the odds may not be that big of a difference, if you consistently win straight game wagers at +110 instead of +105, it will add up over time.
Best Value on Standard Betting Options
Always shop around for the best point spread, money line prices, and game totals. Just by doing this, you can increase your winnings while reducing your wagers risk.
Many books have gotten to the point where they simply move lines to entice more action on a particular game. Price shopping is getting easier all the time as well.
Best Value on Future Betting Options
Future bets have become increasingly popular recently and are a way that you can cash in big. This is also one area where odds can vary significantly from one site to another. Future bets have so many different options as well.
- Betting on a team to win their league’s championship, conference, division, etc.
- Betting on a team’s win totals for a season.
- Player props that are season long for things like yardage or touchdowns in football, to points or rebounds in basketball.
- Awards, betting on a player to win a specific award.
Frequently these odds are long and have good payouts if you have the foresight to know who might win the league or get MVP. For example, to begin the NBA season, Evan Mobley was around +1000 to win rookie of the year. Currently, he sits as the odds on favorite to win it. If you had the insight to place that bet before the season started, you could end up winning $1000 on a $100 bet.
Best Value for Player and Team Props
Here is another example of where odds can fluctuate and have pretty significant differences. One site might have a player at 90 receiving yards over/under, while a different site may have the same player at 70 receiving yards over/under.
Team health can also affect these lines a lot, especially during the covid era, where player availability seems to change by the minute. You want to bet on your favorite running back to go over 100 yards in a game. Well, you catch on social media that his QB is out. Well, hammer that over before the oddsmakers change the over/under 75 to over/under 100 because they know his touches will increase with his quarterback out.
Is Line Shopping Worth it?
YES, line shopping is absolutely worth it! Let’s do a simple breakdown for you on game spreads. You place ten $10 wagers on the first NFL Sunday of the year. On one side, you get all the lines at -105, and on the other side, you can get them at -115.
-105 scenario: You win seven of your bets which amounts to $66.64 in winnings minus $30 in lost bets for a net positive of $36.64.
-115 scenario: You win seven of your bets which amounts to $60.90 in winnings minus $30 in lost bets for a net positive of $30.90
Multiply that by the same winnings difference for 17 weeks of an NFL season, and you have won an extra $102.68.
Scale it and say those were $100 bets instead of $10 bets. You would have won an extra $985.32! So yes, it is worth it.
For one thing, there are some great tools out there that show you the best odds and do all the leg work for you. EatWatchBet has an incredible tool that shows you the best odds, so you do not even have to visit ten different sites to find the best odds. With tools like that, it is definitely worth shopping your odds.
