Basketball Betting Guide – Strategy Articles, Current Lines & Trusted Sportsbooks
This page was written to serve as a complete basketball betting reference guide to help you win more often on the wagers you place. Below you will find informational and strategy articles on a variety of topics; anything from beginner articles like how money lines or point spreads work, to intermediate subjects covering how parlays are calculated, to more advanced topics like the true statistics of having home court advantage or the significance referees play in the outcomes of NBA games.
At the bottom of this page you will find the most up-to-date NBA betting lines and odds for the current upcoming games, as well as the latest betting trends for each game. These lines, odds, and trends come from the most trusted sportsbooks on the internet which include Bovada, BetOnline, BookMaker and TopBet.
Articles: Wagering Tips, Different Types of Bets, Strategies, and More
Whether you are a beginning or more savvy basketball bettor, the articles below are intended to provide you knowledgeable information to help you make smarter, bigger, and more profitable bets on the wagers you place. Several of the articles have useful illustrations to help you understand the information provided and to simplify the betting examples provided for the different types bets.
How to Bet Over/Under
Parlay Strategy
3 Important Pieces of Information to Know Before Wagering on Basketball
1. Bench Players
- Far too many bettors make the mistake of focusing strictly on the superstars or starting five when handicapping a game and placing wagers online. Obviously these players will have the biggest impact on the game, but the play of players off the bench is quite often the difference between winning and losing. Bettors don’t need to know everything about every player, but knowing the basics will keep you from being surprised when the star player takes a seat and a bench player jogs on to the court. Is he a defensive specialist? A 3-point shooter? How effective is he in his role?
- Watching bench players give up a big lead can be infuriating to bettors, but it should be accounted for in the handicapping process if the bettor is including the bench in their handicapping process. Great value can often be found on teams with deep benches going up against teams with a superstar or two; bettors that don’t do their homework may be surprised, but you shouldn’t be.
2. Coaching Strategies
- It is also important to consider coaching tendencies. Some coaches rely heavily on bench players and give regular breaks to starters at certain points of the game, while others ride their starters as long as they can and only use their bench when a starter gets into foul trouble. Most coaches are stubborn in their ways, and tendencies are easy to spot.
3. Home Court Advantage
- The other major factor to always keep in mind in online basketball betting is the tremendous home court advantage. NBA home teams have a higher winning percentage (about 59%) than those in the MLB, NFL, and NHL, and home court can have an even bigger effect in emotionally-driven college basketball.
- With fan proximity in basketball closer than any other sport, it is commonplace to see the road team get overwhelmed by a revved-up crowd. For this reason, point spreads are often skewed considerably against the road team. Finding teams that play particularly well on the road (or poorly at home), especially early in the season before bookmakers make the adjustments, can be very profitable.
NBA Sportsbook Guide
There are several sportsbooks on the web that are shady and untrustworthy, but we list only the best and most reputable sportsbooks in the business; Bovada, BetOnline, BookMaker, and TopBet. With four different sportsbooks listed below, we do the work for you when it comes to line comparisons and shopping for the best odds. Here you will find the most current betting lines and odds, as well as the hottest betting trends.
