Betting Money

Super Bowl betting and making money are synonymous. You need to find the right bets and be on the correct side of them, but to say there are endless ways to make money betting on the Super Bowl is an understatement.

• Betting Money Line
• Odds Calculator And Payout American Odds

It seems the top Super Bowl betting sites push the envelope every single year, too.

Just when you thought you knew of all the ways to make money from Super Bowl betting, the best sportsbooks surprise you with new props.

• Our NFL betting trends tool provides data on betting patterns so you can determine how much action is coming in on pointspread, moneyline and totals wagers. You can easily learn who the 'public' is backing on a game and go the other way. Situational NFL betting.
• As we inch closer to Super Bowl LV, more and more betting money is coming in on the underdog Tampa Bay Buccaneers at BetMGM. The Kansas City Chiefs opened up as 3.5-point favorites over Tom Brady.

It would be preposterous and absurd to think about placing bets without having a good grip on the main types of betting odds and the ability to read and interpret the various associated formats.

Old or new, though, the point is there will be plenty of ways to bet on Super Bowl 55 and win money.

If you’re not totally familiar, join me as I break down the best ways to make money betting on the 2021 Super Bowl.

Before you can make money betting on Super Bowl 55, you need to find the best spot to do so. There are a lot of different Super Bowl betting sites and apps, and they all have something to offer.

Some carry risk or aren’t easy to trust, or maybe they just don’t offer great wagers or odds. Whatever the case, you want to like where you bet on Super Bowl 2021, and you certainly want to feel comfortable with that betting site.

Stick with the best Super Bowl 55 betting apps and sites above, and I think you’ll be good to go.

So, how does using the best 2021 Super Bowl betting sites help you make money? Pricing, my friends.

The best Super Bowl LV betting websites are understandably going to offer competitive pricing. The more you frequent the top sites, the better chance of getting the best price available.

Here’s a quick example.

Most sites are posting this bet at -115, but what if you could find a reputable Super Bowl betting site listing Mahomes at plus money?

Assuming you think Mahomes is the winner, how do you not make that bet? Right there, without any real strategy, you’re making money betting on the Super Bowl.

You still obviously need Mahomes to win the MVP award, but by betting at the site offering +100, as opposed to -115, you’re automatically making more money by choosing the site offering superior odds.

This goes right along with picking the right sites to bet on the Super Bowl and is relatively self-explanatory.

You can make money betting on Super Bowl 2021 just by picking the right site, but you can make even more money if you use sites offering top-shelf bonuses and promotions.

Our Super Bowl 2021 betting guide touches on this in greater detail.

Super Bowl 55 Betting Guide for Beginners - How and Where to Bet on the Super Bowl in 2021

The Super Bowl is the biggest game in the biggest sport in America. It’s no wonder that Super Bowl betting breaks new records every year. Placing wagers on the big game is easy if you know how, especially when using gambling apps or online sportsbooks....

Most Super Bowl betting websites will offer some type of sign-up or Super Bowl-specific bonus.

Take advantage of that to enhance your bankroll in some manner, and also hunt down other bonuses and Super Bowl promos that reward you for betting on the big game.

You’re risking cash anytime you bet, and you only get back what you win. By using promos and bonuses, the earnings only get bigger.

Okay, now we can get into the actual act of placing Super Bowl 2021 bets that can win you money. The most obvious and one of the more popular options is simply betting on who will win the 2021 Super Bowl.

For this bet, you just find the best moneyline available and bet on the team you think will win.

Here’s how the pricing shakes out at the top Super Bowl 55 betting sites at the moment.

This is easily one of the easiest ways to make money betting online when it comes to Super Bowl 55.

Most Super Bowl LV betting sites have very similar pricing, so it’s quite arguable the difference in pricing doesn’t matter that much. If you really value one site over the other and the difference is +143 to +145, I don’t think you’re going to bet on a site you like less.

As for figuring out the right bet, that’s totally up to you. However, Michael Wynn and I did break down compelling arguments for both sides going into the 2021 Super Bowl.

Not sure who will win Super Bowl 55? Don’t love the pricing? Maybe you just don’t want to put a bunch of money on the line for such an absolute wager.

After all, if you’re wrong, you win nothing.

You can make a similar Super Bowl 55 bet without as much risk, and that’s betting on the point spread. The current Super Bowl 55 point spread is at 3 or 3.5, depending on where you like to bet.

For a point of reference, here’s how the spread looks at BetUs.

Obviously, you want the spread thicker to bet on Tampa Bay and thinner to bet on the Chiefs.

That could help you decide where to bet on Super Bowl 55, but as I mentioned, I personally wouldn’t let it dictate things too much.

Check out these tips for betting on football point spreads if you’re new to the wager. To put it simply, though, you’re just betting on if a team can keep a game within a set amount of points or if the favorite can win by a set amount of points.

So, why bet on the Super Bowl 55 point spread rather than just predict the winner? Because you might love the Buccaneers but aren’t totally sold, they actually win.

Or you may like Kansas City, but betting on the Chiefs to cover offers more betting value than getting them as the winner. A pretty clear example is that BetUs spread above has KC at -115, while their moneyline there is -165.

If the Chiefs can win by four, that may be enough of a difference in price to get you on that bet.

However, you opt to exploit the Super Bowl 55 point spread is up to you. You can attach it to moneyline bets, or just pick one or the other.

Personally, I like to shop alternative lines. The Buccaneers at +7.5 files in as one of the safest Super Bowl 55 bets for me.

Bet on the Super Bowl 55 Game Total

Another extremely popular way to make money betting on Super Bowl 2021 is to bet how many points will be scored in the game.

This refers to the amount of points going “over” the game total or going “under.” For Super Bowl 55, most sportsbooks have this total hanging right around 56 or 56.5.

You obviously have a 50/50 shot at picking the right side, which gives you a reasonable chance at a winning Super Bowl bet.

There is a certain amount of research that can help you profit from this wager, too. Here are a few things I’d definitely consider before placing a bet on the Super Bowl 55 over/under.

• Over/Under Record in respective team’s games
• Past meeting game totals
• Offensive upside
• Defensive ability
• Team scoring average
• Plays per game

I am sure even more can go into it, but this is typically what I look at the most when trying to project game totals.

If you have one or two elite defenses, teams that play slow, and/or teams that don’t typically put up a ton of points, the Under is going to look quite attractive.

For Super Bowl 55, though, both of these offenses are stacked. Tampa Bay and Kansas City both resided in the top-5 for points per game on the year, Kansas City owns the league’s #1 passing offense, and the previous meeting resulted in a cool 51 points.

I’ll let you decide how that sways things in trying to make money betting on the Super Bowl 55 game total, but it’s clearly a great bet to consider.

Whether you attack the more popular Super Bowl bets or not, you can always break off into the alluring world of Super Bowl prop bets.

The most basic way to bet on Super Bowl props is to just target props dealing with the game itself.

They are virtually endless, but they can deal with some of the following.

• Scoring by quarter
• First half/Second half scoring
• Total yardage
• 4th downs converted
• Penalties committed
• Time of score
• Exact score

This is just scratching the surface, as basically any part of the game you’d want to bet on can be bet on when it comes to the Super Bowl.

I won’t do a deep dive into all the game props that can make you money during Super Bowl 2021, but that’s definitely a great way to profit from the big game.

This is just as extensive as betting on Super Bowl 55 game props, but it deals with individual players only.

All of the top stars from either side are on the table here, and you can bet on any number of player stats, milestones, or over/unders.

There’s all kinds of wild Super Bowl player props that can change based on the year and the players involved, too.

Here’s an example of player props you can target at most Super Bowl 55 betting websites.

• Patrick Mahomes Passing Yardage
• Tom Brady Touchdown Passes
• First Player to Score a TD
• Tyreek Hill Receiving Yardage
• Travis Kelce vs. Mike Evans: First Touchdown

Betting on Super Bowl player props adds a little extra excitement to Super Bowl Sunday, and it’s a somewhat more appealing bet style.

Why? Because how the game actually plays out doesn’t necessarily have any bearing on whether or not your player prop can hit.

Game flow can play into how you bet on NFL player props in the Super Bowl, but your props can convert no matter what happens in the game.

There is still a bit of a science to picking the best Super Bowl 55 player props, but that process and the actual picks are ultimately fairly subjective.

Okay, so this is literally still just another player prop for the Super Bowl, but it’s also kind of its own thing entirely.

Unlike most Super Bowl player props, however, this one kind of depends on how the game goes.

Only once in history has the Super Bowl MVP come from the losing side, while the award is notoriously dominated by the quarterback position.

Seriously, take a look at Super Bowl MVP awards won by position.

That is damning evidence. Also, the next closest position is a tie between running back and wide receiver, both of which got a whopping seven.

Suffice to say, barring something wacky, you’re betting on a quarterback to win this thing.

For the 2021 Super Bowl specifically, that brings you to Tom Brady or Patrick Mahomes, but there’s also a bet out there (-350) to just bank on a quarterback claiming it.

Whatever way you go, the point is you’re betting on the Super Bowl 55 Most Valuable Player.

Their team almost certainly needs to win, they probably need gaudy stats in the game, and they had to be a key reason for their team’s success.

In a Super Bowl like this year’s – where the game has a high total and two loaded offenses – betting on anything, but one of the quarterbacks doesn’t make a ton of sense.

Lastly, if you don’t love how you can make money betting on Super Bowl 55 on sports betting sites, then just take the whole process into your own hands.

Hosting a party, or just watching the big game with your family? Use our free printable Super Bowl 55 prop bet sheets and fill out your answers before the game starts.

You still get all of the fun of betting on the Super Bowl, but you can decide precisely how it’s done, what you bet on, and what’s at risk.

Hopefully, this breakdown helps you win some money from your 2021 Super Bowl betting.

From betting on who will win to betting on a variety of Super Bowl props, you now know the best ways to make money from betting on Super Bowl 55.

Ideally, some of my advice sprinkled in through this post also helps you decide how to bet this year.

I’m just one voice, though, and the “how” is only part of mastering Super Bowl gambling. For a little more insight, check out some helpful post for Super Bowl 55 betting.

• Best Bets for Super Bowl 55 – Advice for how to find the best bets for Super Bowl 55, including some of the top bets to target in 2021.
• Crazy Super Bowl 55 Props to Bet On – Tickle your brain and make some money betting on the 2021 Super Bowl with these weird SB props.

Most people who want to place bets on sports are fans to begin with. It isn’t unheard of for a gambler to place some sports bets, especially during big games like the Super Bowl or the NCAA basketball Final Four, but for the most part, sports bettors are sports fans looking to use their knowledge of a game or of a game’s players to earn a little extra cash. Being a fan of a particular sport, a team, a college or professional squad—these are all precursors to placing sports bet. Sports betting is also a way for a fan to get in on the action of the game, with something more than self-respect at stake.

All gambling is mathematics, even games of chance. If you understand the math behind the game, you understand the game and can give yourself an advantage. For many games, like penny slots or poorly placed roulette bets, are so bad that smart bettors earn their advantage by avoiding them altogether. In sports betting, the math is more complicated. Depending on your favorite sport, you may need to think about things like bye weeks, underdogs, quarterback ratings, and injuries with the same fervor other connoisseurs reserve for fancy winces.

So how difficult is sports betting math? The math behind placing a winning bet is fairly complicated, but the way to stay ahead of the bookmaker is rather straightforward. If you collect on 52.4% of your bets, you’ll break even. We’ll have more details on that number later, including why it takes more than 50% wins to break even, but first some general knowledge about sports gambling and the numbers behind it.

Sports Betting Basics

The easiest way to demonstrate the math behind a sports bet is to make up an example. Let’s say you and your buddy walk into a casino, each with $200 burning a hole in your pocket. There’s a big game on tonight, the Cowboys and the Redskins, so you wander into the sportsbook to check up on the latest news about the game. While you’re sitting there, you see the wagering board, with some funny numbers on it. It looks like this:

• 428 Cowboys +175
• 429 Redskins -4 -200 38

Some of this is easy enough to read. The Redskins -4 means the Redskins are favored to win and must do so by at least 5 points for a bet on the ‘Skins to pay out. The next number (-200) is the moneyline, in this case the Redskins are a 2/1 favorite. The last number (38) is the total, the over/under of the expected number of points scored in the game.

More on Placing Sports Bets

Look at that over/under number, in this case 38. If you or your buddy thinks this is going to be a particularly high or low scoring game, based on your knowledge of the team’s offenses and defenses, or information about a hurt player or bad playing conditions, you can place a wager on the total of points scored.

So how is a guy supposed to know how to literally lay down a sports bet? You need to know three things:

#1 – the type of bet you want to make
#2 – the number of the corresponding team you have chosen and
#3 – the amount you wish to wager

Knowing all that beforehand gives the ticket writer the details he needs to write the ticket without having to bend over backwards to process your bet.

Tipping and Sports Betting

We haven’t even gotten to the meat of the sports math yet, and we’re already talking about tipping the staff behind the window? Yep. Here’s why.

If you place two $100 bets, and you win, you’ll collect $440. You should consider leaving a tip around five percent of your winnings. Yes, that’s a $22 tip, but you just made a huge win, and surely you can spring for a twenty-spot for the guy who helped you win it. If you tip around the five percent mark regularly, when you win, you’re way more likely to get free drinks, which is about all you’re going to get comp-wise at the sportsbook.

So, back to the basic math of sports betting. You and your buddy, after much deliberation, decide to each place a $100 bet on your favorite team. What now?

To bet on the Redskins using the point spread, your bet is called “laying the points.” For your bet to pay off, the ‘Skins have to win by five or more to cover the spread. Remember, if the ‘Skins win by exactly four, the game is a push, and both sides recoup their bet. Another alternative is called “taking the points” with the Cowboys. That means the Cowboys have to lose by three or less for your bet to win, or if the Cowboys win outright. So you and your buddy go up to place your $100 bet, and you find out that the standard straight bet at any bookie pays 11/10. That means you have to bet $110 if you want to win $100. You and your buddy pay the bookie $110 and sit down with drinks to watch your bets come in.

These are deceptively simple bets. Deceptively because they make it look like the outcome of the football game is like the outcome of picking marbles out of a bag. Put one black marble and two white marbles in a bag, pull one out at random, and there’s your football game. After all, the odds are the same: 2/1 for white.

But we, as sports fans, know that the mathematics of a sporting event is much more complex. Sports bettors deeply involved in their hobby will subscribe to weather bulletins from major cities that take part in their sport, making huge wagering decisions based on a few mph of wind in one direction or another. Then there’s the unknown—does a player get hurt in the first quarter? Does weather become a factor? Is a particular player “in the zone?”

Betting Money Line

How Do Bookies Make a Profit?

Odds Calculator And Payout American Odds

Just as we finish ruminating on the concept of the difficult math at play in the background of major sporting events, we’re going to turn right back towards the simpler side of sports betting. Bookies make a profit because of vigorish. What’s vigorish?

Look at the above example again. You and your buddy each paid $10 to the bookie to place your bet. That’s what the standard 11/10 odds in sports betting are all about. You bet the Cowboys and your buddy bet the Redskins, a total of $220 bet. The sportsbook has to pay back $210 to the winner, leaving a nice $10 profit no matter what happens on the football field. That $10 built-in profit is called the vigorish, and it’s the final monkey wrench in the gears of sports betting.

Obviously, sportsbooks are going to take more than two bets on any game, but this example is for simplicity’s sake. Looking at the total number of bets on different games over the course of a week and adjusting the moneyline and other numbers is another way the bookie makes a profit. Adjusting the odds a tiny percentage point in either direction will affect the balance of beats and make the book more likely to turn a profit no matter what.

Essentially, a bookie is a person who holds on to money from bettors then pays them if they win and keeps their money if they don’t. That’s what the job is boiled down to its essence.

When a bookie sets odds for games, he will build what bookies call an “over round” into his set of odds. Another slang term used for this formula is “the juice.” For the sake of simplicity, let’s look at a boxing match where both contenders are equally talented, of equal stature, etc. Since they both have an equal chance of winning, a casual bet may be even money. You put $20 on one guy; your friend puts $20 on the other. Whichever fighter wins awards the bettor with the total of $40.

Bookies don’t offer even money like friends in a casual betting situation. In the above example, with two evenly matched boxers, a smart bookie will offer 5/6 odds for each. That way, a $10 winning bet would only return $8.30 plus your stake. What does this do for the bookmaker? He can float an equal amount of money on both fighters, winning no matter which fighter actually wins. If they take $1,000 worth of bets on one boxer and $1,000 on the other, the bookie would take in $1,000 but only have to pay out $830, for a guaranteed $170 profit regardless of the outcome.

Bookies look at the weight of their books all the time and adjust odds and other factors to make sure their books balance. Though it isn’t possible to completely balance a book, bookies that go too far out on one side run the risk of losing money, and losing money in gambling is the fastest way to find yourself in another industry. All of these factors are why bookies generally root for the underdog—too many favorites winning in a sport with a short season (such as the NFL) can cause a bookmaker to lose money, while a bunch of upsets (like you generally see in college football) is a guaranteed profit for the bookmaker.

The short answer here is that bookies making money has nothing at all to do with your betting. It is almost unheard of for a single customer to be allowed to place enough bets to sink a single book all on his own. High rollers in sports betting get special privileges in terms of their maximum bet size, but these privileges often change with the bettor’s luck—maximums get raised after the bettor sees big losses and decreased (sharply) when the bettor starts to get lucky.

In short, a sportsbook’s profits aren’t necessarily impacted directly by the way an individual bet is called. Unlike casino games or slot machines, where it’s you against the house, sports bettors fuel the bookmaker’s business and only rarely is an individual bettor betting against the bookie.

Sports Betting Odds

Remember at the beginning when we talked about the magic number necessary to guarantee a break-even week in sports betting? If you read enough about sports betting, you’ll hear this number repeated often: 52.4%. If a bettor can win 52.4% of his bets, he’ll break even. Where does that number come from?

When betting the spread, you get odds of -110. Sometimes, sportsbooks will offer a -105 line as a promotion or to welcome new business. But for the most part, if you’re betting the spread, you’re getting -110.

We draw that 52.4% break even number right out of the odds. -110 is equivalent to 11/10. That means if you bet 21 games, you’d have to win eleven of them and lose ten of them to break completely even. Even at -105, you’d still have to win an astounding 51.2% of the time just to break even.

If you don’t trust the basic math behind this break-even principle, look at another real-world example. Let’s say you get really into sports betting after your Cowboys cream the Redskins and you go home with a nice fat wallet. You then bet on the next 10 Cowboys games, winning six times and losing four times.

That 60% betting record (with the odds of -110 that is traditional for against the spread bets in football) will leave you with a profit of $160. Think about it—your $600 profit from your 6 winning bets minus the $440 you lost on losing bets leaves $160. It took you $1,100 to win $160, meaning you have to bet $6.87 to win $1 on average. So you see the small differences between a 52.4% winning rate and a 60% winning rate—inside those 7.3 percentage points lies hundreds of dollars in profit.

Now imagine instead that you lost one of those six winning bets, leaving you with a 50% betting record. You spent a total of $1,100, won $500, and lost $550. That means overall your 50% record drained your wallet by $50. That’s where the vigorish will get you. Not even winning half the time is good enough to break even in sports betting.

Professional Sports Bettors

Believe it or not, some people really do bet on sports for a living. Maybe they work part time at a sportsbook or in some other marginal job in the casino industry, but there is a group of gamblers who bet on sports for their life’s work. With all the math swirling around in our heads after the last bit of the article, it’s hard to imagine anyone wanting to do this for a living.

If you know that a 52.4% record will mean you break even, the simplest way to turn sports betting into a career is to bet enough so that a 53% winning record will bring in the kind of money you want to make.

Another example. After your successful Cowboys experiment, you decide to invest $10,000 in sports gambling over the first four months of the following football season. That $10,000 is set aside to win or lose in sportsbooks.

You plan on betting on 160 games during your investment period. You dream of a 55% winning record because your win-loss with a 55% winning record would give you an 88-72 record. That’s an expected profit of +8.8 units. How did we get to that number? To calculate your units, subtract the total of your losses (multiplied by 1.1 to include the vig) from your wins and you’ll get your unit profit.

Placing $460 bets on each of these games, a number pulled from some quick and dirty math about how much you could afford to bet in a single week’s NFL play without blowing your bankroll, would result in a $4,048 profit if you maintain that 55% winning record. Turning $10,000 into $14,048 in just four months is an investment return of 40.48%. I dare you to ask your bank for that kind of return on your savings account.

But that’s all assuming you can pick the winner 55% of the time. Do your research, look into the records of professional sports gamblers. 55%, while not impossible, would place you among the elite sports bettors in the country, if not the world.

Professional sports bettors have to worry about variance more than any other type of gambler. Working against the forces of variance means managing your bankroll over the course of the season to avoid the negative possibilities that could totally empty your wagering account. Professional sports bettors have the time and resources necessary to calculate these variances, and there are even a few pieces of software out there that can help you figure out your ideal bet in the face of negative variance. But the bottom line is that professional sports bettors would dream of having a 55% winning record, simply because it guarantees you’re beating the house.

Pro bettors make their money on bets that sportsbooks offer that give them even the slightest betting advantage. The key to becoming a profitable sports bettor is being able to find advantages, opportunities where the line a book is offering is vulnerable.

This is why many long-term sports bettors are math freaks. Good sports bettors understand statistics, particularly what are called inferential statistics, though any higher math will help when it comes time to place a bet.

Here is what a professional baseball bettor might do in his head. After looking over statistics from MLB (kept religiously by all sorts of bloggers, data archives, and magazines) between the years 2000-2010, he notices a particular statistic pop out. For example: when the home team starts a left-handed pitcher the day after a loss, that team wins 59% of the time. Good sports bettors can do this sort of math in their head or very quickly on paper. From that bit of information comes a new betting theory—look for game situations that mirror the above example and bet on them. That means he’ll only bet games where the home team starts a left-handed pitcher the day after a loss. Does he just jump in and start betting based on this back of the napkin math? No way. More statistical analysis is required—he may find that this was a fluke for that particular decade and isn’t a trustworthy statistics, or he may find an even more advantageous bet based on his original theory.

Pro sports bettors also keep near-obsessive records of their bets. Obviously, no edge in sports betting lasts longer than a single game. Taking proper records will also help you test theories, like the above one about left-handed pitchers and losses. Without taking good records, no sports bettor’s bankroll will last very long.

What Is a Good Record for Sports Bettors

So, at the end of the day, what could you call a “good” record for a sports bettor? Most casual gamblers looking into sports betting see a pro advertising his 1100-900 record and shake their head a little. How could such an abysmal record be something to be proud of? That’s a 55% winning percentage, and it indicates to those in the know that this bettor is actually turning a profit placing bets on sports.

A good record for a sports bettor is any record equal to or larger than 52.4%, because that number or anything higher means you’re not losing money. A 53% winning record, while not impressive on paper, means you’re actually beating the sportsbook and putting money back in your pocket. Ask your friends that play the slots or play online poker how often they end up putting money back in their pocket.

A -110 wager, standard for spread bets in the NFL, gives the house a built-in advantage of 10%. It means that even if you do win, and you line up to collect your $100, some sucker behind you just spent $10 to hand the casino $100.

A good record for sports bettors is any record that ensures they at least break-even. If you bet 16 games this NFL season and you won 9 and lost 7, you probably made money. And taking money away from a casino is always something to be proud of.

Other Advanced Sports Betting Strategy Articles:
» Future Betting Strategy
» NFL Bye Week Betting Strategy
» Parlay Betting Strategy

Sports Betting Break Even Video:

In the video above I go over the break even % for sports betting, and we take a look at the difference between hitting 52% and 53%. I also quickly show the amounts of profits you can expect if you can hit 55% consistently.