NBA Championship Futures Odds
By Loot, NBA Basketball Handicapper, Lootmeister.com
In NBA basketball betting, the most popular form of futures betting is to simply bet on who will win the NBA Championship. It’s a bet you will find is a bold stance, but can have tremendous upside when done right. It’s a bet that gives you a ton of bang for your wagering buck and allows to profit tremendously off your longterm vision of the game.
In essence, you just bet on a team or group of teams you feel win win the whole thing. It doesn’t leave much margin for error, being that it’s all-or-nothing. The upside to that equation is when able to hone in on a team that not everyone is talking bout. When able to do that, you can profit handsomely off your handiwork. Whether taking favorites or long-shots, there are benefits-galore for the bettor.
Normally when betting on the NBA, we plunk our money down on a game, hope for the best, and in a few hours it’s over. That’s all good and well and there will be a ton of great betting opportunities in the regular season and playoffs betting on singular games. But when betting on a team to win the NBA championship, you have a financial interest on a team that can last all or at least most of the season. Until that team is eliminated, you are in the game. Being that you can make these bets in the preseason, you can have a bet that lasts the better part of a year.
Not that we should make bets driven by things like entertainment-value, but that’s a built-in perk of betting teams to win the title. They give you the most mileage of virtually any other bet in the world of gambling. Every little part of the season is part of the equation. It gives you a reason to follow a team’s standing all year, to root for them, and hope they get to the Finals. In other words, an NBA futures wager can take you on a long and wild ride, giving you the most bang for your wagering dollar.
It also allows you to capitalize off your longterm vision of a game, especially if you’re an enterprising bettor who isn’t afraid to make bold and unpopular stands. When betting a single game during an 82-game season, any number of things can come along to spoil our picks. It’s not that easy to drop in on a team’s season and really have a solid handle on a tiny sliver of the big picture. When betting on a team over the course of a season, the bad breaks even out, while the cream eventually rises to the top.
The odds are pretty easy to understand. The numbers game in NBA wagering can be a little tricky to the untrained eye. But when betting on a team to win the title, it’s easy with the fractional form of odds expression. Here’s an example:
Odds to Win the NBA Championship
Miami Heat: 9/4
Indiana Pacers: 7/2
Oklahoma City Thunder: 4/1
The above is a list of the top three favorites to win the NBA Championship. The first number you see is how much you get if you bet the second number. The Thunder, for example, are 4/1, meaning you win 4 for every 1 you bet. The Heat are 9/4. The book likes to use whole numbers, otherwise it would just say 2.25-to-1, which is the same thing as 9/4. The Pacers at 7/2 is the same as three-and-a-half to one. If you bet $100 on the Pacers and they won the NBA Championship, you would win $350. The same bet on the Heat would pay $225, while you’d make $400 on the Thunder.
Whether betting favorites or underdogs, this bet has a lot of upside. For example, betting on the Heat at 9/4 may not seem terribly tantalizing, but let’s assume they get to the Finals. At some point, betting on them to win will mean you have to bet more than you stand to gain. Taking the leap of faith early means you will have them at an underdog price while everyone is betting them later as favorites. It can be a good feeling if they actually end up making it that far.
For those looking to bet underdogs, there is some massive potential. Sure, it seems like the teams who win the NBA Title are usually among the top favorites to do so, but not always. In the last decade, teams like the Pistons and Mavericks won the NBA title when not many people were thinking they would in the preseason. Early futures bets on those teams would have fetched a hefty return.
For those who’ve never made these types of bets before, they’re certainly worth a whirl. They allow to profit off of any original insight you have generated that may contradict the common school of thought. In addition, when making these bets, you can at least know that you’re getting the maximum bang for your buck.
Lastly, it's important that you're placing your NBA futures bets at an online sportsbook that has proven themselves as being able to stay in business for the long haul, so that you're loot doesn't disappear as these bets often tie up your cash for months. Two places you never have to worry about are BetOnline and Bovada as they've both in business for over a decade!
