Betting on baseball is becoming ever so popular, no surprise really as baseball betting really does afford good betting opportunities and is arguably easier than wagering on football games and other field sports.
There are two primary reasons why betting on baseball is something that all bettors ought to consider, most definitely, if you are a serious bettor with ambitions of making money long term.
Firstly, baseball is relatively simple to handicap as it falls into the low score genre of sports handicapping thus spread bettors and higher risk punters must look elsewhere for their fix. Secondly, betting on baseball and odds compilation pivots around the pitcher. In baseball odds-setting, the scheduled pitcher is king, everything revolves around this guy. This is a tip in itself, get to know the pitchers, research them, read about them and learn their strengths and weaknesses.
When betting on baseball there are 3 opportunities, Totals, Run-lines and Money-lines. Let’s take them one-by-one.
Money Lines: Betting on baseball Money lines is easy, there are only 2 options and if you pick the winner of the game you collect. The Money line is represented by 2 numerics, one plus and one minus:
Baseball team one + 120
Baseball team two – 130
What this means is that team one is the outsider with a Money line of + 120, essentially this will give you $120 for every $100 dollars wagered (total returned for $100 wagered = $220). On the other hand team two is the favorite (favorite is always minus) with a Money line of – 130, essentially this means you have to wager $130 to get $100 back (total returned for $130 wagered = $230)
As a final explanation of the odds, if you placed $100 on the favorite at odds of – 130, you would get back $177. This is deduced by the following: 100/130 + 1 – 1.7692, rounded up to 1.77).
The observant reader would have noted in the odds offered there is an inbuilt 3% profit for the bookmaker, (0.77 + 0.20 = 0.97) this is sometimes referred to as the juice, and granted an equal book the bookmaker is guaranteed to make 3% profit on all bets.
Totals or Under/Overs: Betting on baseball totals, also known as unders and overs is relatively straightforward. There are only 2 possibilities, under the predicted bookmakers total or over it. For instance if the bookmaker sets the totals at 9.50 , and 9 runs are scored, all punters who wagered unders are winners and similarly all bettors who wagered overs (hoping for 10 or more runs) are losers.
Betting unders and over’s can be lucrative, but do get to know the idiosyncrasies of different ballparks and pitchers as these are the 2 most important factors in this type of bet.
And finally, from a betting perspective, Run-lines.
Run Lines: Betting on baseball run-lines is also a simple affair, 2 options means you win or you lose. Here’s how it works. The bookmaker will give the favorite a bit more work to do by handicapping the team with minus 1.5 runs and similarly give the underdog a start by giving them 1.5 runs before a ball has been pitched. The run lines will come in brackets before the price offered, for example:
Baseball team one (+ 1.5) – 130
Baseball Team two ( – 1.50 + 120
The striking obvious is the favorite actually pays more than the underdog. Of course this is because they are playing with a theoretical handicap of minus 1.50 runs. Betting on baseball run lines is arguably the most difficult to get right, and most times it’s better to stick with the unders or overs bet. The only exception is when the bookmaker makes a perceived odds error and offers what appears a value pick based on the odds offered (by value pick I mean odds offered which are in your opinion greater than the actual chance of it happening. For instance, just like being offered odds of + 110 for the toss of a coin.)