All the sportsbooks offer baseball odds throughout the year, so betting on baseball is as easy as going to your favorite online betting site and putting a few bucks down on whatever you deem to be a good play. Before doing so, make sure you understand all the lines encountered when it comes to baseball.
Baseball odds include the common moneyline and totals bets. In case you need to know more about these two, check our detailed article here.
Runline
The runline is baseball’s version of the spread. Instead of points, here you have the runs that are designated as a handicap between two teams. Most of the time the handicap is 1.5 runs with the underdog at +1.5 and the favorite at -1.5.
Below is an example, where the Orioles are considered to be the favorites. You could $100 stake on the Red Sox losing by no more than 1 run and your payout would be $276 if correct. Alternatively, you could wage $146 that the Orioles will win by more than 1 run and you would receive $246 if correct.
The odds displayed next to the runs spread are called the juice or vig. In our example, the juice or vig for the Orioles is +146.
Other bets in baseball include first five innings odds, prop bets, parlays and futures. We’ll discuss every one of them in more detail below.
First Five Innings Odds
As its name suggests, this option allows you to stake on the moneylines, runlines or totals (over/under) but graded on the results up to the end of the 5th inning. The goal is to allow bettors to wage on the starting pitchers and avoid late-game collapses by the bullpens.
Prices for the first five innings lines are offered in the same fashion as full game lines but could be marked as active or limited. An active bet remains active even if the starting pitcher was changed last minute whereas a limited bet would be canceled and staked money returned to the bettor.
Some sportsbooks refer to it interchangeably as either “first five inning” line or “first half” line. Here is an example with lines for a game between the Cardinals and the Pirates.
This type of line has become more and more popular with bettors over time as it seems to be a shift of focus on the starting pitchers.
Parlays
Like for any other sport out there, sportsbooks offer parlays which basically means that you can combine two or more bets together on one wager. The more bets are added together the greater the potential win, but the higher the risk as well because if one bet in the parlay fails, the entire wager fails. In other words for a baseball parlay to pay out, all of the bets involved must win.
Sportsbooks will generally allow bettors to parlay multiple moneylines or totals together or any combination of those two options. More recently, sportsbooks started opening the parlays to a multitude of other bets, like the prop bets which will be discussed next.
Prop Bets
Prop bets in baseball are vast and extensive mostly because baseball offers a great multitude of stats relative to other games. Baseball bettors can choose between various lines on things like hits, steals, strikeouts and others for every single player in each team. For example, regarding pitchers you could see lines on how many strikeouts might accumulate during their time on the mound.
The amounts of baseball prop bets are endless. Other options could include whether there will be a run or not scored in a certain inning. Prop bets are very popular with bettors and they can be extremely fun to play during live betting. Sportsbooks try to compete on the variety of prop bets offered. Below is a sample if prop bets offered by one sportsbook for baseball.
Futures
Betting baseball futures is more popular in the preseason and they are fairly straightforward because they involve staking on the odds of a team winning a certain division or league or even the World Series.
Baseball futures can be set around play honors such as MVP awards.
Even if the futures bets open in the preseason, they continue during the year, with the odds adjusting based on results, injuries and betting actions until the result is decided or the the market is closed by the sportsbook.
Because there is a longer time involved, up to an entire year, the risk of getting it wrong is very high. This explains the high numbers you should normally see listed for these lines relative to others discussed above.
Here is an example of futures lines for the world series.
Conclusion
Baseball games offer a lot of opportunities for sportsbooks to open lines due to its nature and the high number of innings and many possible outcomes. Sportsbooks are generally okay with adding multiple prop lines for the baseball live games because they can adjust the odds quickly between various actions as the game develops.
Overall, betting on baseball events is a lot of fun and very attractive even for fans of other sports due to its vast list of lines and the fact that the baseball season in North America runs over the summer when other sports are not.