Baseball Betting Odds & Lines

The sport of baseball has been around since the 18th century when people in Europe would hit a ball pitched to them, while the batter ran a circuit of bases after hitting the ball.

While baseball has evolved since those days, some central baseball concepts remain. In its early stages, baseball was known by many different names, but the term baseball wasn’t used until 1700, according to some people, while others dispute the term was used in 1672 to describe a game known as stoolball.

It wouldn’t be until 1846 that two teams, the New York Mutual and the Knickerbockers, would play the first “official” baseball game in the United States.

Since then, there have been college, amateur, and professional baseball teams in the United States and worldwide. Some of the most popular baseball leagues worldwide are MLB, NCAA baseball, and Japan NPB.

Major League Baseball

MLB has been around since 1876 and is the oldest professional baseball league globally. MLB is made up of two leagues, the National League and the American League, with 15 teams each.

MLB has a 162-game regular season, followed by three playoff rounds for the NL and three for the AL, with the winner from the AL and NL facing each other in the championship game, the World Series.

The NL and AL both have three divisions each and those divisions have five teams each. The team with the best record in each division will go to the playoffs, plus two additional teams with the best record that didn’t win their division.

The wild card round is a one-game elimination between the two teams that didn’t win their division; the division series will be between the top team and the winner of the one-game match while the other two remaining teams face each other in a best-out-of-five series.

The final playoff round, the league championship series, will be the best out of five series between the division series winners, with the winner of this series going to the World Series.

NCAA Baseball

NCAA Baseball was first played by Amherst College and Williams College in 1859 under “Massachusetts rules,” which had a few different rules than the baseball we know today.

Those differences were that fielders were allowed to put a runner out by hitting him with a thrown ball, there was no foul territory, and the rules did not require baserunners to stay within the baselines.

Today, NCAA baseball follows most of the standard rules across all baseball leagues.

The NCAA baseball regular season consists of 82 games, with 64 teams going to an NCAA baseball tournament at the end of the season for a chance to become the next College World Series champions.

The tournament is unique in that it features four tiers of competition, alternating between double-elimination brackets and the best-of-three series.

Throughout the entire 64-team tournament, a team can lose a total of four games and still be crowned champions.

National seeds are given to 16 teams during team selection, with the top eight teams automatically hosting a super regional if they advance past the regional round.

Conference champions receive automatic bids in these tournaments while the selection committee fills the remaining spots.

The tournament brackets are divided into these three stages: regionals, super regionals, and the College World series.

Nippon Professional Baseball

NPB is a Japanese baseball league that consists of two leagues and 12 teams between the Pacific League and the Central League.

The NPB regular season consists of 146 games, with the conclusion of each regular season seeing the best teams from each league play in the Nippon Series, also known as the Japan Championship Series.

The Nippon Series is a best-of-seven series between the Central League’s team with the best record and the Pacific League’s team with the best record. There are no playoff games to get to the Nippon Series.

Baseball is the most exciting sport to bet on, as professional teams usually have between two to four-game series against their opponents throughout the baseball season.

So with baseball games having the chance of giving a different outcome from one day to the next when there is a series involved between two teams, gamblers have to study many things besides just the baseball odds.

Gamblers looking to bet on baseball games need to look at more than just the baseball lines and baseball odds as baseball betting takes research if you want to find some teams that can help you get a winning bet.

Baseball odds work closely to an NFL game, except baseball betting is based on runs instead of points like in the NFL.

There are three main options for gamblers to bet on baseball games that we will go over.

Run Spreads

Baseball betting on run spreads is based on which team is favored or underdog for each game. The run spread gives runs to underdog teams while the favorite team will give runs to the opposing team.

These spreads are usually adjusted based on which players are starting and out for the game.

The most significant thing that gamblers should look at is the bullpen and which players are available in each bullpen, along with the batting stats of players from both teams.

Bullpen players have a history of being either the pitcher that helps hold the lead or blows their team’s lead. Looking at a relief pitcher’s ERA can help with seeing if they are more prone to blow a lead or not.

Looking at the offensive bench players and their history against opposing pitchers would be something else that can help find out if one team can have a secret edge that has gotten overlooked.

Ensuring that a team can cover the run spread is essential to a winning wager, and if a bullpen has a history of giving up too many runs late in the game, your team might not cover.

Batting rotation can also play a part in which team will have an edge. Seeing which batters have a good history against starting and relief pitching can show if a team has a weakness or strength with their starting lineup.

Baseball Moneyline Bets

The moneyline is a straight-up bet on which team will be the winner. Baseball odds for moneyline bets give the favorite negative odds, while the underdog gets plus odds.

With most MLB games being competitive, the moneyline odds can be a chance for gamblers to get better returns over making a run spread bet.

The same strategies that gamblers use on run spreads can be used here, as the gambler only needs an outright win.

Over/Under on Run Total

The last type of baseball odds to look at is how many total runs will be scored in a game.

The odds will be based on a total number of runs, with gamblers choosing to wager if the total runs will be over or under the number given.

For these types of wagers, gamblers will need to look at both the pitching and batting of both teams.

While the baseball odds are based on what oddsmakers think will be the total number of runs scored, they come to that number by looking at the average number of runs both teams score in a game.

Gamblers should look at what batters for both teams are on hot or cold streaks, along with the ERA of the starting pitchers and the bullpen pitchers.

These players will all be a part of and can factor in how many runs are scored.