With 82 games each season, frequent roster changes and a high amount of scoring involved, basketball is a challenging, yet lucrative, season for sports bettors. Bettors need to stay informed and disciplined throughout the entire season. But this fast paced action also what makes basketball betting so fun – there’s always a chance to join in on the action.
Before you place your first bet, there are a couple of NBA gambling tips and strategies to keep in mind.
Learn how to read the lines. The point spread is the number located next to each team. A “–“ symbol indicates the favored team, and the “+” indicates the underdog. When you bet against the spread, you are betting on how much a team will win or lose by, and not necessarily who will win or lose the game.
Consider home court advantage. Out of the top four betting sports – NFL, NHL, MLB and NBA – the home court advantage in basketball is the highest at 61%. A study by Amstat revealed that the home team has the advantage over visiting teams for several reasons – travel, environmental factors, familiarity, support from fans, distribution of rest and lodging. Across the entire game of basketball, there is always a greater winning percentage of games played at home court.
Pay attention to scheduling. In an 82 game season, it’s inevitable that players, especially players with high minutes totals, will tire out. Watch out for teams playing back-to-backs, and with an unusually high number of games in a week.
Do your research. Amateurs who don’t do their homework and rely on “gut”, or advice from friends and family will not be profitable over the long run. One way to do your own research to calculate which bets are favorable is to use Power Ratings. A Power Rating is a number assigned to a team that rates its quality.
When you compare the Power Ratings of two teams playing against each other, you can get a sense of who will win and by how much. You can find Power Rankings in Gold Sheet, Power Sweet, Sports Reporter and USA Today.
Power ratings are powerful because they give you the mathematical perspective – in that way, they are unbiased and simply compile past performance statistics. They do not, however, take into consideration the qualitative factors that we know have a significant impact on NBA games. These include, but aren’t limited to, coaching changes, player changes, specific rivalries & matchups.
All in all, basketball betting is highly engaging and will provide you with a ton of action this season. Sportsbook is the premier online betting network and we take wagers on all NBA events throughout the season. Access money back specials, signup bonuses and member privileges when you sign up at Sportsbook to bet on the NBA.