Betting on futures in any sport can sometimes be the most exciting wager you might place all year. If you’ve ever said, “I think Team X will win the Super Bowl” or “Team X is winning it all this year!”, you have exercised the decision-making process of futures betting.
A futures bet is as simple as it sounds: betting on an outcome of an event that will occur in the future. How far in the future? Well, it really doesn’t matter if you place the wager a year before the event, or months, weeks, or days, it just matters that you pick the correct outcome.
Sure, the odds will definitely be changing after every major victory by that team, and you will see the odds fluctuate for your selection all season, but you locked in your odds months ago, and you will continue to sit back and wait for the main event (or stress about it, we don’t judge).
You might hear those rare stories where someone placed a $100 bet on a huge underdog with +40,000 odds to win the Stanley Cup, and when they do, pocketed a huge amount of cash – comparable to a lotto win if you will. This is a great example of how a risky futures bet could be life-changing.
Don’t get greedy, picking underdog after underdog – we’re here to advise you how to bet on futures and how to potentially make a profit betting on your favorite sport.
NFL Futures Betting
Betting on NFL Futures can be extremely popular, as predicting the winner of the Super Bowl months in advance can be a huge achievement as well as a big payout. There are also a few NFL futures you can choose from or bet all of them – depending on your futures betting strategies.
The most common NFL Futures bet is to win the Super Bowl. Odds are released almost immediately after the previous year’s Super Bowl wraps up – with the current champions usually at the top of the odds board. While it’s rare that any team has repeat winning seasons, they are currently the best team in the league as they just won it all and will likely rank in that top spot until the draft and trades start occurring.
Usually, once the season begins you have a good idea of the true odds of winning the Super Bowl. You will have teams who did well in the preseason and picked up some good players via trade, and they will inch up the odds board.
Super Bowl 56 Odds
You can also bet on conference futures like the AFC and NFC Champions, and choose the two teams you believe will make it to the Super Bowl. You can even bet on divisional winners, like the top team in the AFC North, AFC South, AFC East, AFC West, as well as NFC North, NFC South, NFC East, NFC West. These are a little easier if you know there’s a team that is strong in a weaker division.
You will also see us release specials like totals on how many games a team might win in a season. You will see lines that have “over/under 9 wins” and you will have to determine if you think that team will end the season with more or less than 9 wins.
NBA Futures Betting
Much like the NFL, betting on NBA futures can be even more challenging, with so many games in the regular season, and playoff series, you are looking at a risky amount of opportunities for your chosen team to crumble. However, the NBA is notorious for allowing ‘super teams’ to flourish, loading teams up with star players and those teams just dominating all season long.
Dynasty teams can make futures betting a little more predictable, like the Golden State Warriors dynasty run from 2015-2019 – they were always heavily favored in futures betting until their loss to the Toronto Raptors in the NBA Finals.
There are plenty of options for betting on NBA Futures, much like the NFL, so you can choose which option you think is best based on the teams entering the current season. Depending on who dominated the draft and who made some big trades in the offseason, you should have a hint of an idea who will win the NBA Finals outright.
2021 Odds to Win the NBA Finals
You can also place futures wagers on the Eastern and Western Conference championships, divisional futures on the Southwest, Northwest, SouthEast, Atlantic, and Central divisions.
These futures are much easier to predict, especially when you have heavily favored teams in a division. Mind you, you won’t win a lot in NBA futures betting when choosing these favored teams, but if you’re certain they will win it’s important to go with the stats.
MLB Futures Betting
MLB futures sometimes can be overlooked as their season ends just as all the winter sports start to come alive, so once the World Series finishes up and those MLB futures are released, many have so many other sports on their plates to bet on, it can be a little while until MLB futures betting really takes off. Usually, during the preseason, MLB futures start to get more action, after the NFL has wrapped up and the NBA and NHL are starting to get ready for playoffs.
MLB Futures betting includes odds to win the 2021 World Series, which is definitely the most popular MLB futures option, followed by the National and American League pennant winners and the divisional odds for each. If you feel strongly about the Los Angeles Dodgers to go all the way, you could bet on them to win the National League West, National League Pennant, and the World Series and pocket some decent winnings if they pull it off.
NHL Futures Betting
Some may say that the Stanley Cup is the most difficult award to win, so that doesn’t bode well for NHL futures bettors. However, there are always some great futures available each and every year that you can take advantage of, and if you get lucky, you could be sitting on some huge winnings this coming June.
Much like all the other professional sports listed above, the odds to win the 2021 Stanley Cup are the biggest NHL futures betting market available, and you can win some big money if you’re correct. You could be like the St. Louis Blues fan in 2019, who bet $400 on the Blues to win the Stanley Cup at +25000 odds which net him $100,000 when they won the Stanley Cup.
You can also bet on each of the divisions, North, East, Central, and West, which are much larger divisions than the other professional sports which usually boast between 4 and 6 teams. Other fun NHL futures you can bet on include who will win the Hart Memorial Trophy as the season MVP, and the Conn Smythe Trophy during the Playoffs.
Now that you have an idea of how futures betting works, you can put it into action. Head over to the sportsbook to check out all the current futures options for your favorite sport and start predicting some big winners.
Do plenty of research and see which teams will be hot in the upcoming season.
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