Betting Super Bowl 44
There will be approximately $10 to $12 billion wagered on this year's Super Bowl and if you're reading this article, the odds are good that at least a few of those dollars will belong to you.Betting on the Super Bowl has practically become a national pastime, as people who don't gamble on any other sporting event often find themselves with a vested interest in the outcome of the game.
There are many different ways to wager on the Super Bowl, ranging from the always-popular office pools to friendly wagers with friends, family, or co-workers, to betting through a sports book. We'll look at many of the different ways, as well as give some tips and suggestions to improve your chances.
Office Pools
The most popular type of Super Bowl office pool is the box pool, also known as a square pool. It's a 100-square grid, where bettors fill in their names and then draw numbers for the corresponding squares.The cost of these pools can range from 25-cents per square to hundreds of dollars per square. There's really no minimum or maximum cost, it's simply whatever the pool organizer believes is a cost to get the pool filled.
The best part about the 100-square pool is that it offers bettors the opportunity to win a lot of money for very little risk.
If you're having a Super Bowl party or attending one, you'll probably see square pools floating about, and if not, you can make one pretty quickly. See Creating a Super Bowl Box Pool for instructions.
Box pools can also work for smaller gatherings by simply using a low cost per square, so that people are more inclined to purchase more than one square.
The other popular type of Super Bowl party pool for small gatherings is to simply use 10 pieces of paper and label them 0-9 and then draw for numbers. The combined score of the two teams determines the pool winner. If the score is 24-17 the person with the "1" would be the winner, while a 28-17 score would see the person with the "5" taking home the money.
Point Spreads, Totals and Money Lines
The most common bet on the Super Bowl will be point spread bets. With the point spread one team is favored by a certain number of points and must win that game by at least that many points for its bettors to win. If Team A is favored by six points, which will be written as Team A -6, Team A must win by seven or more points for the people who bet on Team A to win their bets. If Team A were to win by four points, those who bet on Team A would lose their wagers.Totals will receive a lot of wagers, as well. Totals, often called over/unders, involves the combined score of both teams. The oddsmakers will post a number for totals wagers. If the number was 50, bettors could wager that more combined points than 50 (over) will be scored or fewer combined points (under) than 50.
Newcomers to sports gambling may want to read Understanding Point Spreads and Understanding Totals for more detailed explanations.
Money line betting involves strictly picking the winner of the game with no points involved. But because one team is typically expected to win, people who wager on that team will have to risk more than they stand to win to back the predicted winner.
For more on using the money line, which is also used for proposition bets, see Understanding Money Lines.
Proposition Bets
Perhaps nothing captures the spirit of Super Bowl betting quite like proposition bets. Sports gamblers will be able to wager on everything from how long it takes to sing the National Anthem to the number of attempted field goals.The world of proposition betting can be a crazy one, which we'll detail a bit more closely in The Wacky World of Proposition Betting.
As the game gets closer, we'll have updated point spreads, totals, proposition bets and plenty more, so stay tuned for some fun.
