Currently, there are many different betting strategies and ways of sports betting, but betting on US sports is one of the most complex and yet most exciting disciplines in the world of betting.

Sport Betting on US Sports

As you may know, there are four main US sports:

Basketball,

American football (or just football),

Baseball,

Hockey

All of those sports have their professional leagues and college leagues as well. You can bet on all of those competitions, and throughout the entire year there is one active sport to be on, so sports bettors don’t have dry periods.

Online betting platform for US clients (NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL, Soccer, Tennis, Rugby and so much more)

College leagues are active from September till mid-January, NBA league is active from October till April, NFL league is active from September until February, hockey NHL league is active from October, until April and baseball MLB league is active from April until September.

Betting on all those sports is different, but some sports have similarities when it comes to betting strategies.

Betting on NFL and NBA

In American football, there are several dominant betting markets. Most of the action is on spread betting and total market betting, but in this sport, many bettors prefer to bet parlays as well.

Spread Betting is the most similar to Asian Handicap betting in soccer, or spread betting in basketball, so if you ever played on those markets, you will have no problem with spread betting in Amercian football.

In short, in the games where teams are not evenly matched, sportsbooks set the point spread so that every team in the game has an almost 50% chance of winning the game with that spread. That way sportsbooks try to ensure that bettors will equally play on both sides of the spread.

In the point spread betting we have two types of teams:

FAVORITES – team that is expected to win. Favorite always has a minus (-) point spread, and that means that favorite team needs to win by a certain amount of points in order to cover the spread.

UNDERDOG – team that is not expected to win. Underdog holds a plus (+) point spread, and that means that even if that team loses by an amount smaller than the point spread or wins the game, your bet will be won.

The total market is the market where you predict a number of points that will be scored in the entire game. In the Totals betting market we also have two types of bets:

OVER – when you predict that number of points (runs, goals, rebounds, etc.) will be higher than bookie set.

UNDER – when you predict that number of points (runs, goals, rebounds, etc.) will be lower than bookie set.

This market is common for every US sport, as you may bet on Over or Under in football, basketball, baseball, and hockey.

The Parlay Betting is a type of the bet where you combine several individual selections into one bet. Combining those bets give you a lower chance for a win, but if you manage to pick all the bets correctly, you will get a more significant amount of money.

See our post “How to win money betting on NFL” here

Betting on NHL and MLB

In hockey and baseball, the situation is slightly different than in basketball and football. In those sports, results are lower, so the spread betting isn’t such a popular market. Sports bettors tend to play money line markets in hockey and baseball.

In Money Line betting there are two sides (favorite and underdog):

FAVORITE is the team or a player that is expected to win the game or the match. Odds on favorite are always lower than 2.00. Those odds on favorites can go as low as 1.01.

UNDERDOG (DOG) is the team or a player that is expected to lose the game or the match. Bookies rate them as underdogs and give odds higher than 2.00 on their win.

Is it profitable to bet on US sports?

From our experience (BettingZebra), this market is one of the hardest markets to beat. There are several different reasons why beating the bookies in US sports is so hard.

Teams tend to play many games during the season (NBA teams 80+ and playoffs, MLB teams 160+ and NHL teams play 80+ games) and sometimes it is hard to determine motivation and fatigue factor at certain teams and to find value at those games.

Also, there is a thing called circadian advantage, when teams change time zones when they travel from east to west and vice versa.

Despite all of those things that can be pretty tricky for novice bettors, if you manage to find the right strategy, there is no doubt you will be profitable in the long run betting on four major US sports.