What Does Minus Mean In Betting
“Wait, why does this NFL team have a -235 next to its name? What’s with New England Patriots (-15) vs. Miami Dolphins (+15)? Help! HEEEELPPPP!”
If the odds are minus (–), then that amount of money must be wagered to win $100. –150 means you must bet $150 to win $100.) If the odds are plus (+), that amount of money would be earned on. These numbers all mean the same thing - just expressed differently. In short - if you see a 'minus' symbol before a set of odds, this means that the team (or person in an individual sport) is a favourite to win. If you see a 'plus' symbol before a set of odds, this means that the team (or person) is an underdog to win.
If that sounds like you, we’re here to assist you. If you’ve stared at a board at a sportsbook or just seen spreads and moneylines on the Internet and been utterly confused, don’t worry. It’s not just you. Those numbers can be confounding.
But hopefully, once you’re done reading this, you’ll completely understand how they work. As you prepare to dive into the world of sports betting, here’s a breakdown of how the lines work, starting with …
Spreads
What Does Plus And Minus Mean In Betting Odds
It would be really easy to bet on a game if you could put money on a heavy favorite to win.
That’s where point spreads come in. Let’s look at an example:
Philadelphia Eagles (-4.5)
New York Giants (+4.5)
In this case, you can bet on either two outcomes: you can put money on the Eagles to win the game by 4.5 points OR MORE, which makes them the favorites. Or you can bet that the Giants will either win or lose by LESS THAN 4.5 points. They’re the underdogs.
Now, sometimes the spread “moves” during the days leading up to the game. Perhaps the Eagles’ spread ends up being -3.5 (in which they must win by 3.5 points or more to give you a victory in your bet). Your bet all depends on whichever spread you bet on, whether it was when the Eagles were favored by 4.5 or 3.5 points.
If you ever see “PK” or “pick” next to a team, it means there’s no spread and you can bet on who will win, no matter what the score is.
Moneylines
Let’s take that same example above but use moneylines:
Philadelphia Eagles (-200)
New York Giants (+150)
The team with a minus symbol is the favorite, and the number is how much money you would need to bet to win $100. In this case, you would have to bet $200 on the Eagles in order to win an additional $100.
The Giants are the underdogs. If they’re +150, that means you could bet $100 to win $150.
Note that you can bet any amount you want, but those numbers are always calculated and posted the same way, either in how much money you would need to wager to win $100 or how much money you could win by wagering $100.
Odds
If you’re betting on something like the team who will win the Super Bowl in the future, you might see it look like this:
New England Patriots — 3/1
Baltimore Ravens — 5/1
Kansas City Chiefs — 8/1
If you were betting on the Patriots and their 3/1 odds, you would win $3 for every $1 you spend. So if you bet $50 on the Pats and they ended up winning the Super Bowl, you’d win $150 (plus your original wager) back.
Good luck!
Today, bookmakers offer many types of odds and types of bets, each of which has its designation. In this article, we will answer a popular question, what do plus (+) and minus (-) signs mean in sports betting?
What does +100 or -100 mean in sports betting?
A plus or minus sign and a three-digit number denote the odds in US bookmakers (you can find the rating of the best of them on Meta.reviews).
The value of the odds with a plus sign is the amount of potential net profit that can be obtained from a $100 bet. For example, odds at +125 mean that a $100 bet will generate a net profit of $125. The total profit, in this case, will be $225 ($100 bet + $125 net profit).
The value of the odds with a minus sign is the amount you need to bet to get $100 in net profit. For example, odds at -120 mean that a $120 bet will generate a net profit of $100. In this case, the full payment will be $220 ($120 bets + $100 net profit).
What does +1.5 or -1.5 mean in sports betting?
What Does The Plus And Minus Mean In Betting
A plus or minus sign and a fractional or whole single or two-digit (for bets on the total in basketball) number usually denotes a handicap bet.
Handicap is a bet on the victory of a particular team with some adjustment. The handicap is added to the final result, and if the final result is in favor of the selected team, the bet wins.
For example, let’s take the soccer match Manchester City – Sunderland. If the player bets H1(-1.5), he will win if Manchester City win the match with a difference of 2 or more goals (2:0, 3:1, 3:0 and so on). The bettor will lose if Manchester City win by just 1 goal or fail to win at all (1-0, 0-0, 1-2, etc.).
Now consider the Real Madrid – Atletico Madrid match. The bet is H2 (+1.5). The bettor will win if Atletico Madrid win or draw or lose by just 1 goal. The bet loses if Real Madrid win with a difference of 2 or more goals.
The peculiarity of handicap betting is that bookmakers define any sporting competition as a 50/50 contest of equal chances, adding one (usually the underdogs) a point advantage at the expense of the clear favorites of the match. It can be said that in this way bettors’ chances are somewhat equalized, which makes them focus more on luck than on the skill and experience of the sports team.
Types of handicaps
- A handicap can be an integer: (-1), (+1) and so on. With such a bet the player can get a return if, for example, he bet on -1 for the first team, and it wins with a difference of only one goal.
- A handicap can be fractional: (-1.5), (-2.5), (+1.5), (+2.5) and so on. In this case, a return is possible only if the match is canceled.
- Positive handicaps are usually given to a clear underdog. In case a player bet on the victory of an underdog with a handicap (+2.5), and the match ended with a minimal victory of the favorite, it can be said that the bet won.
- Negative handicap, respectively, is set to the favorite. So, if a capper made a bet with a negative handicap (-1.5), and the match ended with a landslide victory of the favorite, the bet wins.
- The essence of the zero handicap is that the player will win if the team on which he bet wins, and get a refund if the match ends in a draw.
What Does Plus Minus Mean In Betting
Story by Julia Gahan