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| | Author: MasterBets
| The Baseball Run Line
Those of you who are regular followers of MasterBets' amazing sports picks will have noticed that we never recommend run line bets in baseball. Why is this? And, more importantly for you betting inegnues, what is a run line bet in baseball anyway?
Baseball features three types of bets:
The first is a straight moneyline bet on which team will win the game.
The second is the Over / Under or total runs bet, which is based on the combined scores of both teams.
The third is the run line bet. Baseball run lines are really a combination of a moneyline and a 1.5 run point spread or handicap added to the wager. For a run line wager to win, a favorite that you bet on must win the game by at least two runs, or if you bet the underdog, they must lose the game by less than two runs.
By adding the 1.5 run pointspread to the wager, the amount of money you have to lay on favorites is reduced. For example, a game with a standard moneyline favorite of (-260) would generally have a corresponding runline of (-1.5 runs / -140). The payouts for runline underdogs are likewise reduced because of the +1.5 run added advantage. Runlines are most useful for games with very high moneyline favorites, but before you make a runline play, you should be aware of some facts about one-run games.
26.8% of all Major League Baseball games are decided by one run. This is a historical fact. That number should surprise you. You need to realize that if you are taking a runline favorite and laying -1.5 runs, you have just significantly reduced your chances of winning that wager, compared to a straight play, by almost 30%. Therefore, the reduction in the amount of money that you have to lay for a runline favorite, in many cases may not justify this added risk, knowing that nearly 3 of 10 games will be decided by one run and will lose. When you take the 1.5 runs you are usually losing at least 45% of your profit, so clearly there is little value in this proposition.
Furthermore, a team's ability has little affect in determining their success in winning one-run games. The consensus opinion of baseball scholars is that the final outcomes of one-run games are really based more on luck than any other identifiable factor. The one factor that you should take into account is home-field advantage. The home team tends to win extra-innings games over 70% of the time, and the vast majority of those results are one-run games. But you are already sacrificing such a huge chunk of your profit margin by taking the run line bet in the first place, that following home teams would never be a profitable long-term strategy.
The run line play is a crapshoot, and the odds are against you from the start. There are rare circumstances where it can be bet, but generally you should avoid this play.
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| Last Updated
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 | | |
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