This is a simple and concise guide that will teach you all you need to know about sports betting in the USA. I will show you how to tackle this fun pastime by providing:
That’s right, tickets, x to two, the thrill of the big game. If you want to dabble in sports betting in the USA and increase your chances of winning, this guide is your perfect solution. So, let’s get into it.
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50% up to $1000 (T&C apply. 18+)50% Welcome BonusA MINIMUM deposit of $55.00 is required to qualify for the bonus. |
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50% up to $250 (T&C apply. 18+) |
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All of our featured and listed sports betting sites which are found above will offer you everything you are seeking, and each of them have a first class and very spotless reputation for giving their US based customers the very best levels of service.
All of the following Sportsbetting sites not only offer you all of the above unique qualities, but whenever you sign up and start to place your first initial bets and wagers at their sites they will also give you access to some of the most generous and biggest new customer sign up bonuses if you have never bet at that site before.
Check through each of the betting sites that cater for US sports bettors above and visit their websites for up to the minute information on just how large their respective welcome bonus offer is we just know you will be impressed by what you find at their websites in regards to their free bets and bonus offers!
Sports betting is one of the most prominent forms of gambling in the world. And it’s one of the most popular choices for a good reason!
Whether you’re a big fan of your local soccer or football team, or you’re more into the Mike Tyson school of boxing, sports betting is for you. Sports betting is an amazing way to combine your hobby of gambling and your love of literally any sport. This might sound too good to be true, but in modern days, you can literally bet on everything, even if it’s not sports.
You can get custom odds on basically anything, and if you’re right, you can get a whole lot of cash. Sports betting is the skill and practice of predicting results in sports and betting your wager on the outcome of said results you think will occur. The frequency of sports betting has been rising in the past couple of years, notably around different seasons of popular sports.
Everything is subject to sports gambling. I myself have bet on everything between Football, Soccer, Basketball, Baseball, Ice Hockey, Boxing, MMA; Hell, I’ve even bet on the “Tour De France” for god’s sake! I’ve never placed my wager on things that aren’t even sports though. I have my favourite clubs, and I am well versed in how numerous sports work. But people have bet their wagers on some pretty odd things. I remember the latest presidential election. If you bet on the current president, you could have pocketed some fantastic dough. The odds were amazing! To get yourself into sports betting, you really need to know the know-how, and the inner workings of the game you’re betting on. You don’t want to become broke as fast as you can write a few odds down on a receipt. To bet on a sport, you need a bookie.
A bookie (well, a legal one) is a person that operates in a casino. You give him the money for your bet upfront, place your bet, and if you are correct in your assumption, you’ll get paid out according to the odds. It’s a safe practice, and it’s not nearly as frightening as movies make it out to be. You can’t owe your bookie anything, and you’re not going to be chased down in a chrome-trimmed black car. If you keep your practices legal (which I really, strongly advise), you’re going to be completely fine.
There are numerous types of sports betting you can compete in and make a little cash. It is not that simple, and there is a wide array of different kinds of sports betting. It might look a little bit confusing at first sight, so be sure to pay attention. I’ll walk you through the different types of sports betting available to you in the United States.
Moneyline
The first type of wager we’re going to be talking about is Moneyline Betting. This is the most straightforward type of betting and is probably the thing you’re thinking about when sports betting comes to mind. A money line bet is a simple bet that determines the winner.
The Boston Celtics are playing the Golden State Warriors. You are certain that the Warriors are going to win. You place your money on the Warriors, the Warriors win, and you get paid out depending on the odds of the victory. You can combine numerous Moneyline bets to increase your odds. If you add bets on top of bets, the overall odds rise, and if you are right every single time, you could cash yourself a pretty penny. In conclusion, Moneyline betting is picking a winner. If the team you thought would win does, you win your bet in turn! This is what is called a Parlay, and I’ll explain what that is a little bit later.
Futures
Futures is a fantastic practice that lets you bet your money on major future events that will occur. If you’re going to bet on a particular league or anything really, you can place your bets now, and cash them in when they’re done. This is a good thing if your financial situation is a bit runny.
If you have the money now and might not have it tomorrow, and you’re dead-set on betting cause you’re absolutely sure about it, you can bet now, and win tomorrow. You can even bet on sports events that aren’t even set up yet. If you know who is going to win the Super Bowl right after the former one is announced, you can place your bet. More often than not, the casino you’re betting in will give you much more favourable odds if you bet ahead of time.
Props
Props prove all that you can literally bet on anything you choose to bet on. It’s also known as accessory betting, for its sheer versatility. A props wager is a bet made on whatever little detail you pick, which really does not need to have any relationship based on the game you’re betting on. You can bet on anything from the turnout of the coin toss, to the number of dives a soccer player takes.
Props are a type of wager that is catered to casual gamblers that are looking at the fun side of gambling. Not everything needs to be super serious, and props are a great way of proving that. It’s made for fun small bets that can get you a small profit, just for the heck of it.
Point Spread
Now, this is a serious type of bet and wager. This is where the pen and paper come in. You need to know how to crunch the numbers properly. The point spread is a spread of numbers that are set by the bookie and the oddsmakers. You need to pick which team will cover the spread best. This requires some know-how and skill. But betting is a game of luck, so everything is possible in the long run. You can never be certain, but you can do things to improve your guess. Let me paint a picture.
The Celtics are playing the Warriors again, and the number spread is going to look like this: Warriors -2.0 Celts +2.0 The spread is two points. That is the margin that the warriors need to cover if they are going to help you win the wager. If the Celts are going to win, they need to win by two points ahead of the Warriors.
Totals
Totals are an exciting type of bet you can make to win the wager. When it comes to totals bets, you need to know if the number will go over or under the number crunched and set by the bookie or oddsmaker. Let me paint you another picture.
LA Galaxy is playing against Chicago Fire, and by some miracle, the end result is 3 – 2. The oddsmaker has made a fatal mistake and made the total score odds a 3. You have guessed the score is not only over 3, but you’ve got the correct answer, the score you’ve set is five! If you’ve guessed that the total score is over or under the set amount, you’re entitled to some financial benefit. If you’ve guessed the overall score, and the bookie had guessed it too, you’ve hit a push. This leaves you in a pat position, but it does have a happy ending. When you’ve hit a push, you are going to get all of your money refunded so that you can place your bet on something more definitive.
Parlays
A parlay wager might sound fancy, but it is a simple task. A parlay bet is combining all of your wages into one ticket. Let us say you want to combine all of the games in a particular league. You can do this with parlay bets! If you’ve got a list of the games that are going to be played in a particular league (it does not even have to be the same league or sport for that matter), you can combine all of the bets mentioned above. Combining as many bets from as many different games you like is completely fine. As your bets stack up, the odds that all of them are going to be right drop, but the ticket amount rises. If you are ultimately correct in your assessment, you are going to be entitled to quite a hefty sum of money.
Live Betting
Live betting is another excellent feature, and many online and real-life casinos can offer it to you. Live betting is not betting per se, as you can bet whatever you like. It is just the timing that the casino lets you bet on. Numerous games and sports allow live betting, not betting in advance.
Say you’ve found yourself in a casino, sipping your favourite drink and a particularly interesting match happens to catch your attention. If the game is right, the casino will let you place your wager at any point in the game. This is known as live betting and is a type of wager that a lot of sports bettors prefer. There is something that makes this type of betting much more immersive than betting all of your money up-front. It’s like you’re there!
Before you and I get into the ins and outs of the legality of sports betting, you need to understand that there are two different types of sports betting you can get yourself into as a citizen of the United States of America, both working on their own separate arch of the law.
We’re going to get into some very lawful lingo in this segment of the article. You don’t have to worry about a thing. If you don’t understand a term, I’ll link it so you can read all about it. So, betting on sports in the US was illegal for quite some time.
This refers to placing your bets at casinos, race tracks, dog tracks, websites, anything. It was illegal everywhere except at the home of Las Vegas, the state of Nevada. The supreme court ruled that the prohibition and ban on sports betting were unconstitutional and, in turn, un-American, which is completely right. There is nothing Americans love more than freedom, and freedom should let us gamble if we want to! This did not make sports betting legal though. It just gave each state the authority to legalise sports betting and gambling on their own respective territory, within their borders.
The laws can only prohibit what you can access and what you can do on American territory. But, what do they say when it comes to online betting at offshore casinos? That’s right. You’ve hit the golden gray area of gambling, sort of.
This is the most popular type of sports betting every American partakes in. There are a lot of different sports you can bet on, and there is nothing easier than betting on European sports through a European service.
Betting at places that are offshore is often considered illegal. It is prohibited and not advised, so it has to be illegal, right? That’s really not true. There is nothing that can prohibit you from playing any sort of gambling offshore unless your state’s regulation makes it strictly illegal to use an offshore website. There is nothing against that in the general law most places abide by, so you’re fine.
Check before you bet though, as there are places that prohibit exclusively online wagering on offshore websites. If you’re thinking of gambling offshore, don’t forget to check the local law. The federal law is the law that operates on all levels of state and territory. This is the law above all laws that the states themselves have to abide by. The federal laws prohibit offshore betting websites from advertising their gambling services to citizens of the USA. The final ban that federal law prohibits is that offshore gambling websites cannot get certain types of financial transactions from Americans. But this is pretty loose, and it is pretty easy to get around. The law itself does not make it illegal for Americans to use gambling websites, just certain parts of them. This law was put in place to strike down on massive out-pouring of finances offshore. So if you are a recreational gambler looking to earn some extra cash through your hobby, you really don’t need to worry about this.
If you are, on the other hand, a big fish, this might prohibit you from doing certain things. Check out the full Wikipedia article on the “Wire Act,” the law and act itself. This is an interesting gray area in the law, funnily enough, akin to some European prostitution laws. It is illegal for you to solicit a prostitute, but there is nothing that prohibits the prostitute from offering her services to you directly. It’s the other way around in this case, but you catch my drift. The biggest problem that this law actually enforces and impacts is your ability to deposit and withdraw money from offshore gambling services. If you are smart about it, you can get around this too. I’m not suggesting anything, but crypto seems to be rising in popularity at the moment. Odd. Never has anyone been indicted for soliciting an online gambling service or running an offshore gambling account, so you’re going to be just fine.
Alright! Now that we have covered the legality of this topic, we can get into the topic itself a little more thoroughly. You need to understand sports betting is ultimately a game of luck and chance, but there is nothing that a little skill can’t improve.
Even if it’s basically all down to luck, you can improve your game of chance with a strategy. There are tactics and inner know-hows that can help you win the wager.
I’ll walk you through some personal favourites.
What You Should Do
DO know your sport.
Before you bet on anything, do your homework! Try to find out as much about your sport of choice as you possibly can, and make the best of it by implying what you know and making your own odds. No casino wants you to make money, as much as they advertise they do. Be smart about your decisions.
DO manage your funds
Manage your funds, and never go above your limit. You should know how much money you have and how much you are willing to spend at any given time. You should never go all out. Making a separate account for your hobby is not a bad idea, and it might give you an edge when it comes to funding management.
DO make a strategy.
When you’ve picked your poison, you should know what you are dealing with. If you’ve found out everything there is to know about the thing you are wagering on, make a strategy of how you are going to wager on it. You are never going to have a one-off bet, and you should keep that in mind. Go to the casino with a preset plan of what you are going to do.
What You Should NEVER Do
DON’T fall for the bait.
Something every single casino loves doing is baiting their attendants to gamble and wager all of their funds. They are going to try to reel you in with their amazing bonuses and their amazing odds. When something is too good to be true, it’s often just that. Untrue.
DON’T fall for fixed games.
This is the most rookie mistake you can make. You’re going to go to the casino, you’re going to want to place some bets on some games, and you’re going to hear that that small club in a minor league has a fixed victory! This is more often than not, untrue. Don’t fall for the “ Fixed “ matches.
DON’T get carried away.
You’re on a streak, and you’re literally on fire! That’s amazing, but remember not to get carried away. The only way a streak can end is by losing. So be sure to get around that by quitting while you’re ahead.
As you can see, sports betting in the US is both a popular hobby and a potential source of a bit of extra cash on the side. Everyone can enjoy it, from the casual players to more experienced betting men like myself, who stay in the loop and go for the safer bets.
I’ve always felt that people could get more out of it if they knew a few things about the rules of sports betting in the US and a few simple things to consider before making any bets. Do you go with more daring odds just for the fun of it and the thrill of maybe hitting that one big payout? Maybe you like to play it safe and place multiple bets on more favourable odds? What’s your system? I’d really like to hear some of your thoughts, so don’t be shy – leave a comment, and let’s start a conversation.
Is it legal to place a sports bet in the USA?