If you're curious about prop betting and ready to dive in, this comprehensive guide is your stepping stone to understanding its mechanics, variety, and tailored strategies to refine your betting approach.
Proposition or “prop” bets are wagers placed on specific occurrences or non-occurrences during a sporting event, often not directly tied to the final outcome. These can involve aspects like player performance, team statistics, or even quirky, off-beat events. Prop betting spans across sports, making popular fixtures in the NFL, NBA, MLB, and even events like the Super Bowl more engaging.
The Many Faces of Prop Betting:
Prop bets fall broadly into a variety of categories – player props, team props, game props and fun, nongame prop bets.
Player Prop Bets: These bets focus on the individual performances of players within a game, rather than the result of the game. Some popular examples are the number of touchdowns a quarterback throws for or the number of three-pointers a player makes.
Team Prop Bets: These bets are centered around the cumulative performance of the team, focusing on the team's stats rather than their outcomes. Some popular examples are the number of yards a team will rush for or the number of runs a team will score.
Game Prop Bets: These bets are rooted in game-wide statistics, combining the performances of both teams. Some popular examples include the total number of goals scored in a match or the number of home runs hit.
Fun Prop Bets: These bets are more entertainment-focused, revolving around unpredictable or random events like the length of the national anthem at the Super Bowl, the color of the Gatorade dumped on the winning coach, or of course, whether the opening coin toss is a heads or tails.
Sportsbooks will typically offer props in one of two ways: 1) they will give you an “over” or “under” option similar to what is seen in total points betting, or 2) they will give you a “yes” or “no” option for whether or not something will occur. On some occasions, you will be selecting from a list of options, such as when betting on the first scorer of a basketball game. Now, let’s deliver a few examples from an upcoming NBA game between the Los Angeles Clippers and the Sacramento Kings.
This bet is for De’Aaron Fox’s point total in this game. If you believe Fox will score 28 or more points, you'd bet the “over”. If you anticipate he'll score 27 or less, you'd take the “under”.
This is an example of a Yes/No type of bet. For instance, if you believe De’Aaron Fox will record a Double-Double, you would select yes.
Finally, we have an example of selecting from a catalog of options. Whichever player you believe will score the first basket of the game would be the one you select.
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Strategies to Triumph in Prop Betting:
Combining powerful data analytics with a simple user interface to make all your betting research easier, Hall of Fame Bets is the premier sports betting analytics research platform. Using our platform, you can seamlessly filter through data for teams and players alike to provide insight into past performances to find value in matchups and make smarter bets. When it comes to prop bets, Hall of Fame Bets allows for an easy process of examining a player’s success at different lines and with different factors at play. For instance, let’s look at De’Aaron Fox scoring 30+ points:
As you can see, he hits this line at a disappointingly low 45%… but if you are to filter by games against teams that focus on defending the three-point shot more, you can see this does not paint the whole picture!
This line shoots up to 75% when filtering by that factor, which makes sense as Fox is a player who thrives attacking the basket. Another way to research could be by exploring some of his different scoring lines. Let’s look at what happens when we drop the points total to over 27.5.
We can now see that he has hit this line with considerably higher consistency at 73% of his games this season, which is something that could be of use when placing your bets. From here, we could filter more to see more information on this line.
As we can see here, Fox has hit this line in every home game so far this season! Exploring different filters and lines is one of the sure-fire ways that Hall of Fame Bets can expand your prop betting experience as we have seen here.
Prop betting opens up a world of betting possibilities, adding an exciting twist to your sports wagering endeavors. With a solid understanding of prop bets and strategic play, you can immerse yourself in a more diversified, fun, and potentially rewarding betting experience.
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All odds in this article are from DraftKings Sportsbook.
