What Is Covering The Spread

Understanding the different types of betting options is crucial when you’re getting a start as a first-time sports bettor.

1. What's Covering The Spread
2. What Is Covering The Spread In Sports Betting
3. What Is The Opposite Of Covering The Spread
4. Nfl Teams Covering The Spread
5. Spread Betting Gambling

This is called a straight bet. A straight bet is the most common type of bet for betting on the NFL, NBA, College Football & Basketball. It uses the the point spread: When betting a straight bet you are betting on the team to “cover the spread the point spread”.Referring to our examples above you are either Betting with the spread or Betting against the spread. “Cover the spread” means that a favourite wins an event with the handicap taken into account or the underdog wins with additional points. The spread goes beyond classifying a team as the favourite or the underdog and assigns a numerical value to the perceived difference between teams.

The Point Spread: Betting the spread

For those new to sports betting, the point spread is the simplest, most straightforward approach to placing wagers.

Sports books set a predetermined margin of points on a game and a team must win – or not lose – by that set number. That’s why you’ll often hear people say the team won, but they “didn’t cover the spread” so their bet still came up short.

It’s not a matter of a team winning or losing like in a moneyline bet.

Sports books aren’t in the business of predicting who will win or lose games. Their goal is setting a pre-game point spread with the intention to generate an equal amount of betting action/volume on both sides of the ledger – as much total money being bet on the favorite as on the underdog.

The vast majority of point spread wagers are made on football and basketball because of the proliferation of points that are scored in comparison to sports like baseball and hockey, where 1-0 or 2-1 games aren’t that out of the question or out of the norm. There’s one every night.

For example, the New England Patriots are playing the New York Jets and New England is a 9½-point favorite. Bettors typically have to spend $110 or so to win $100 with sports books, known as “the house edge/advantage.” With a point spread bet, simply having a team win the game isn’t the key. The critical factor to betting a point spread is how much a team wins or loses by. If a wager is placed on New England – “laying” the 9½ points – the Patriots need to win the game by 10 or more points for that bet to pay off. If New England wins 28-20, those betting on the Jets plus 9½ points (points added to their final total) win the bet.

The same general rules apply for basketball and are quite easy to follow because of the inherent simplicity of the bet. When it comes to betting sports like baseball and hockey, the standard bets are made on the “money line” – an established number for both teams to win the game outright.

What's Covering The Spread

What makes point spread bets attractive are the fluid nature of each game – it’s a reality show that, when done right, is inexplicable. Games change on one play and momentum is a thing. But, when it comes to point spread betting, you know where you stand at every moment.

For those just starting out, the simplest form of gambling is betting the spread because it’s the easiest to explain and understand, which explains why it is the most popular form of sports wagering.

I have to admit, I’m one of those sports fans who if I don’t know what something means, I have no shame in asking. Except when it comes to things that I should technically “already know”.

That is the problem that I continuously run into the problem of when I hear the terms “cover the spread” or “I’ll take the points”. I do what a lot of girls do, shake my head and smile to give off the perception that “yeah she knows what she’s talking about”.

What Is Covering The Spread In Sports Betting

Many girls feel somewhat afraid to ask questions when it comes to sports.

Usually they are laughed at for not knowing things that seem very simple to the avid sports fan. Avid fans seem to forget that you could spend dozens of years learning about so many rules, stats and the history of each sport and still not know everything.

But that’s also what makes sports so much fun to watch and learn.

I decided instead of asking someone what “covering the spread” means, I would just take the simple route: When it doubt, Google it. And I’m pretty sure, the search engine won’t be laughing at me!

Read on to find out what a point spread, covering the spread, against the spread and over/under mean….

What Is The Opposite Of Covering The Spread

The “spread” is the difference in points scored by opposing teams in an athletic competition. The spread is also known as “the line” or “morning line”. This provides the basis for wagering : points may be “given” or “taken” to equalize a bet, or bets may be made that the difference will be larger or smaller than the estimate.

In simpler terms its when one team is the favorite over the other… so the spread is how many points the favorite has to beat the underdog by.

The spread is the difference in points between the two teams when the game is over. It’s what oddsmakers come up with to determine the winner and margin of victory of a game.

For example: the Lakers are the favorite over the Spurs by 5 points. So the Lakers must beat the Spurs by 5 points to cover the spread. This is how it will be written out in a Sportsbook

Lakers -5
Spurs +5

If one team is minus, then the other team is plus of the same number, so really you only need to see one of the numbers, to know the other.

If the line on the Lakers was -5.5 instead of -5, you would have to bet 6 (and have the Lakers win by that much) in order to collect on a bet. If you bet just the -5 then some betting sites would at least give you your money back or a credit towards future use.

Nfl Teams Covering The Spread

A bet where you try to determine which team will cover the spread; not necessarily which team will win. It’s also known as ATS.

Over/Under means the odds-makers picked the most likely total combined score of both teams. For example in an NFL game with the Jaguars vs Dallas the over/under is 37. You can either bet on either “over” or “under”. Over, is if the two scores added up at the end, total to over 37. Under is if when you add them together, they’re less than 37. If the total is 37, it’s a tie, or “push” again.

Spread Betting Gambling

If your anything like me and math is not your strongest suit, you will have to read that a couple dozen times to fully understand it. It took a while to find a clear answer on these questions but saved a lot of time from pretending to understand and trying not to look confused if someone were to explain this to me in person.