Using a Teaser in NBA Betting

Teasers are probably the least used sports betting option in any sport, and the National Basketball Association is no exception.

Using a Teaser in NBA Betting A lot of gamblers will pass on teasers because of the degree of difficulty involved as well as their poor value. Let’s take a look at what a teaser is, and the only time you should really consider using one in your overall NBA betting strategy.

Teasers work along the same lines as a parlay card; in fact, they are usually included on the parlay option. If you’ve done any reading on sports betting at all, this should tell you straight up why teasers aren’t very appealing for professional bettors – parlays are the worst betting option there is in sports. In parlays, a bettor has to pick every team on a card to win their games. Teasers offer an option that is slightly better, as each team does not have to win outright, but only has to beat the spread.

As an example, let’s say that you are thinking about betting on a few teams. In order to increase your chances of winning, you might pick the teaser option included on the card. The teaser is a number that applies to all of the games you picked. You might have Chicago at -6, Seattle at -4, and Toronto at +2. If you took the four point teaser option on the card, the spreads would change to -2 for the Bulls, even for the Supersonics, and +6 for the Raptors. Your underdog Raptors can lose by a lot more, while the favorites on the card have to win by less.

Of course, the teaser option isn’t free and it’s in the payoff where the value is decreased significantly. The payout on a teaser is much lower than it would have been on betting the odds straight out. In addition, you also stand to decrease value in a game where there is a tie after the spread is factored in. A push here means that your three team teaser is now only a two team teaser, and the payout may decrease by half or more (from 6-1 to 3-1 or less). If you’re handicapping the bets for the week, you’ll want to take the lowered payout into account when it comes to evening out on your other bets.

Teasers are really a low value option that are hard to keep track of, hard to win, and hard to pick. There is really only one good time to use a teaser, and that’s if the picks you’ve already made seem to agree with it. If you’ve finished handicapping and look on your card and realize that there are few picks you’ve made that have similar spreads, you can put them together in the hope of making a bit of extra money. Remember though that you’re no longer on the money line with a teaser, you have to beat the spread.

Marshall

Published on 08/15/2007