So Green Bay is favored by 2.5 points to win Super Bowl 45 over the Pittsburgh Steelers. So what does this 2.5 mean?
When you make a bet on a game, Las Vegas sports books, places where you can make legal wagers on games, will handicap the game so both teams will be equal. In this instance, the oddsmakers think that Green Bay is the better team, but to make the game more equal in the bettors books, they are giving Pittsburgh 2.5 points to start the game, while Green Bay is stuck at zero.
If the final score of the Super Bowl is Green Bay 27, Pittsburgh 24, Green Bay will have covered the spread having won the handicapped game 27 to 26.5, meaning all who bet on Green Bay wins their bets. If Green Bay only wins the Super Bowl by 2 points, or even loses the game, then those who put money on Pittsburgh would win.
Today, the line is Green Bay by 2.5 points, but if many more people bet on Green Bay and less on Pittsburgh, the oddmakers could redo the line to make Green Bay a 3 or 4 point favorite to draw in more bets on Pittsburgh. Their whole goal is to get equal money betting on each side of the game.
The only place to bet legally on the Super Bowl is at a Nevada sports book.
Wow, they've figured out all kinds of ways to make money in Vegas, haven't they.
ReplyDeletethey've got even more quirky bets called "prop bets".....like betting on heads or tails on the coin flip, the length of the national anthem, and even cross sport bets like, "who will score more points, the winner of the Super Bowl or basketballer Kobe Bryant."
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