Points Bets:

When betting on NFL point spreads, making a bet on the underdog is a valid option you should think about for almost every football game. In any game -- whether it's a sport or a gambling game -- people love to bet on the favorite. And statistically, the favorite is more likely to win. You know, "favored" to win. Hence the name! If not for Point Spreads Betting in football, few people would ever bet on the underdog. Because bookies want plenty of action on both sides, they offer an incentive that can make an Underdog bet far more attractive.

And that's Point Spreads -- which is a bet on a certain team to BEAT THE POINT SPREAD, not merely win. Your team may lose the game but still beat the spread and win you your bet.

In the Lines information of an online sportsbook, for an upcoming game between two teams, you'll see something like this:

Pittsburgh Steelers +2.5 -110

Chicago Bears -2.5 -110

This is bookie shorthand for, "The Steelers are predicted to lose, by 2.5 points; The Bears are predicted to win, by 2.5 points."

We'll get to discussing the -110 later; the other number is the one to look at.

This + or - 2.5 indicates the bookies' evaluation of what the point spread will be, and the team with the negative number beside it is the favorite, the team considered more likely to win. This number is how many points you add onto the team's final score at the end of the game in order to compare the predicted spread to the actual one. The team with the higher sum wins the spread bet. So -- if you had decided to bet on the underdog Pittsburgh, then at the end of the game you'd ADD 2.5 points to the Steelers score. And then, since Chicago's value is negative (as the favorite), you SUBTRACT 2.5 from the Bears' final score.

Let's say the final score was 21/20, with a Bears victory. The Bears' score minus the spread number is: 21 - 2.5 = 18.5.

Making the final score of the game, for the purpose of the wager, Steelers 20 - Bears 18.5,

So the Steelers won the spread ...And you won by betting on Pittsburgh, the underdog.

Other ways to win the point spread bet:

1. If you bet on the favorite, and the favorite wins, by a margin greater than the point spread. (Favorite covers the spread)

2. If you bet on the underdog, and the underdog wins.

3. If you bet on the underdog, and the favorite wins but by a margin less than the point spread. (Underdog covers the spread)

A Push is when the teams' scores differ by exactly the predicted spread, and no one wins his bet. All monies are returned.

This is an excellent reason to bet on the underdog. A great team can win, but a poorer one can still manage to get a few points and destroy that spread.

Another reason why you might want to bet on the underdog is the more recent behavior on the part of the modern head coach: He doesn't force his team to keep pushing the score up even if it can. It may be they're trying to act sportsmanlike rather than rubbing the other team's nose in their loss, or it may be a more calculated decision. Running up the score might be revealing too much of what a team can do. When they play another opponent, why not save some of that skill and spring it on them unawares? Upsetting another team's expectations can't hurt.

These may be why we really don't see huge point spreads too often. And that means it's going to be a more manageable spread for an underdog.

And finally, don't forget the motivation to work harder that an underdog team brings to the field. Think of a crowd watching its (losing) home team suddenly get a little ahead. Watch the effect a little excitement can bring. You never know.

* Okay, now about that -110? That means in order to win 100 dollars, you'd have to wager 110 dollars. Or bet a ratio equal to that, like 11 dollars to win 10. It is always expressed in bookmaking in terms of 100 dollars, as a convention.

And that leads into our next topic, buying points at a sportsbook.

"Buying Points"

Surely you've heard this phrase, or "buying half-points," and you may not be familiar with it. It is connected with the point spread bet.

Football games tend to have final score differences, also called margins, of certain numbers. This is because of the points won for certain things, like a last-minute field goal, or a sudden TD in the last moments of the game. So when different handicappers and sports reporters tally up the point margins that occurred in all pro football games in recent years, or all years, they find the most common margins that occur, overall.

These are the most common margins:

3, 7, 6, 10, 4

Three is by far the most common margin. It turns up in approximately 15% of games.

If you see a predicted point spread on a sportsbook's lines that is not one of these margin numbers but is very close, like within a half-point or a full point, you might want to increase your chances of getting a spread that your team can cover.

When You Might Want to Buy Points

--When betting on the underdog, you might buy a half point to turn a +3 favorite into a +3.5, a spread just a bit harder for the favorite to beat. It means a field goal at the end will not be sufficient.

--Or when betting on a +6.5 favorite, you can pay to move the line a half-point to 7, which is one of the common margins.

What you don't want, in either case, is to be offered 13-to-10 for it; 12-to-10 is considered fair. That means you'd have to pay $13 dollars in order to win 10. The extra juice you'd be paying could eat up your profit.

There is a great deal more on whether it's advisable to buy points, but for the new bettor it is usually inadvisable. A more seasoned sports gambler might try; but he should consider the price he's paying for that half-point, and do his homework on the spread that's offered on the game, and the spread he's considering moving it to. Percentage tables are available online recording the frequency of different margins.

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