Understanding Teaser Betting

As a less risky alternative to parlay betting, teaser bets are flexible and can be a good choice for bettors who want to try something other than straight betting, but who are not yet willing to take great risks.

Overview

Teaser betting is nothing more than a variant of parlay betting that comes with a lower degree of risk as well as reduced odds. It works like this: you bet not on the win/lose outcome of a game but on the game point or point spread totals (or both). The totals/spreads are teased (adjusted) to minimize the risk. Because it relies on the final score of games, teaser betting doesn’t work with all sports; in fact, it’s usually only offered for basketball and football.

A teaser bet is not necessarily complex, but it may appear so for someone who hasn’t tried it before. In order to fully understand you should know the rules of the betting type from which it derives, namely parley betting. In short, in a parlay bet you chose a team just as you do in straight betting; the trick is that all your choices are connected, and so in order to win all your teams must win – if any team loses, then you lose too, regardless of the other results on your ticket.

Rules

• The payout odds in teaser betting are greatly influenced by the number of wagers you select, as well as the teaser points you use.
• Similarly to other types of betting, teaser also allows for pushes: if the team you choose ends the match in a tie, it’s a no action – the result is not counted. If you wager on only two teams and one of them ends its match in a draw, then your ticket becomes a no action and you won’t win anything.
• Just like in parlay, in teaser betting your bet reverts to a lower bracket whenever one of your selected teams ends its match in a tie (unless you wager on only two teams). For example, if you play a five team teaser and one encounter is a draw then your ticket is consider a four team tease and you will be payed accordingly.

Example

Let’s suppose that the L.A. Lakers will soon play the Sacramento Kings and you want to make a teaser bet on this game. You will have to chose between wagering on either the point spread or the point total.

• Step One

◦     This is how things stand if you wager on the point spread:

▪     You select the L.A. Lakers to win at +15 points, meaning that your team must win or lose by less than 15 points.

◦     And if you wager on the point total…

▪     You bet that the combined points of the two basketball teams is more than 200 points, meaning that you’ll win only if there will be more than 200 points scored in the game.

• Step Two – The Teaser

◦     Now the teaser comes in: the bookmaker features a 6, 7, or 8 point teaser for the L.A. Lakers vs. Sacramento Kings bet. You choose 7 points, meaning that:

▪     If you play point spread you add 7 points to the +15 margin you’ve selected in step one 15 + 7 = 22 point spread: you win if your team wins or if it loses by less than 22 points.

▪     If you play point total you add 7 points to the 200 combined points score you’ve selected in step one 200 + 7 = 207 point total: you win if the combined score at the end of the game is 207 or more.