Starting out in sports betting is like heading to a new country and trying to figure out how to order food. You see people talking in a way you don’t quite understand, but it’s the words that are being said that aren’t really adding up for you. But thankfully, once you know the main sports betting vocabulary, all the rest comes easy.
Getting Familiar With The Main Vocabulary Terms
The main sports betting vocabulary can really be boiled down to a few terms. Stake is the amount wagered on a bet. Action is whatever betting activity is occurring at the time. These terms are thrown around a lot in betting, so it’s best to get to know them right at the beginning of your learning process.
The betting terms start to get more interesting from here. The favorite is the party that is predicted to win while the underdog is the person or party that is most likely to lose. Odds are used to describe what is expected to happen and the value of what each outcome is “worth”. Odds are taken from regional preferences by sites like Nerobet, which brings us to the next important term.
How Odds Are Represented
Odds are represented in three different but interchangeable styles. American odds represent odds using positive and negative numbers. Decimal odds represent the payout of the total value of the stake included. Fractional odds pay tribute to an old-fashioned model of odds representation like horse races (3/1).
Getting used to odds can be done through any of the above forms. No matter which style you choose, each bet will be the same.
-150 odds mean that you have to bet $150 to get $100 in winnings. The same figures as +150 mean that if you bet $100, you will win $150 in return. It sounds like it’s reversed, but it’s easy to understand after experiencing it only a couple of times.
The negative value shows that it’s working off the favorite while the positive value describes the underdog.
Common Types of Bets
A single or straight bet is the most common type of bet in which the bettor only has one party or outcome to rely on in an event. Most newbies start out with these types of bets, but many seasoned betters still rely on them as they are the simplest.
Parlays are groups of events that must all play out as predicted by the bettor in order for the bet to get paid. Every individual component of a parlay must win for the parlay to win. They are a great way to gain value when combined in a single bet but are also extremely high stakes as they rely on multiple components.
A point spread system pays out based on the winning margins of a specific event or team that balances the odds of an underdog and a favorite party. Bettors need to choose whether a favorite will win by a certain number of points (covering the spread) or whether an underdog can come close to beating the spread. A value like -7.5 means that the party being placed on must win by at least 8 points for any bet placed on them to win.
Money Management Terms
Betting involves some specific terms around how money is used during betting.
The term bankroll refers to the total amount of money that has been set aside for betting as a whole. Responsible betters manage their bankroll carefully and only use it for betting activities.
“Units” is how betters refer to the size of their bets and how much will be placed on individual bets. Instead of randomly throwing amounts into bets, many use 1-5 units to measure it, instead of referring to an amount of money.
“Juice” is commission taken by the bookmaker from placed bets.
Standard juice refers to -110 odds which means $110 must be placed per $100 won to guarantee profits for betting sites no matter which party wins.
Terms Used To Make More Effective Bets
To make better bets, there are also terms that can help with that goal.
“Live betting”, also called “in-play betting”, refers to bets that are placed after an event has already started with changing odds that reflect what is happening at that moment. The opportunities that showed themselves during the event may be hard to see before it even starts.
Hedging is to place a bet on the opposite outcome of a main bet in order to still make a profit. This term is especially useful once most of your parlay has already played out, but one party still needs help.
Bad beats are placed on bets that seem impossible to lose but end up losing in the dying moments of an event. This term will be familiar to all betters and is often the term used that references that last second touchdown that ruined your spread value.
Terminology Related to Line Reading
Line reading terminology encompasses reference to odds placed in an event. The opening line is the first representation of odds in any given event while the closing line is the odds that are placed just before an event plays out. Bettors can watch movement between the two.
Line movement refers to the changes between opening lines and closing lines and sharp betters recognize line movement and know that large movements often happen when there is professional “money” behind a certain outcome.
A push is used in line reading to describe an event (or outcome) that ends in an exact finish according to point spreads or totals.
In this case all bettors are refunded due to there being no winner. Pushes are avoided by most modern point spreads as they usually only have half point values.
Conclusion
Learning betting terminology doesn’t have to be memorized in a style of a dictionary. The terms mentioned above are the ones you will encounter most often when just starting out on your betting journey. Place some bets and watch some events, and these terms will come second nature soon enough. One more thing though, don’t let terminology intimidate you. Everyone was a newbie once.