Night in and night out customers look at games on the betting board and think to themselves, if only this spread was a few points in the other direction, and subsequently ask themselves how is Las Vegas so good at their jobs?
Sportsbook operators have an answer for that, giving customers the option to 'tease' together two or more games to create lines that are more favorable.
Of course, there is an inherent risk of having multiple games in the same wager, but they wouldn't call it a teaser if it wasn't enticing. Here we walk through an explanation of teaser betting and provide three teaser strategy options for you to use as a teaser betting strategy.
What Is A Teaser?
Customers have the option to take two or more games on a single betting ticket and manipulate the point spread or total over under in their favor for a price. There are several types of basic teaser options, including two-team teasers, three-team teasers, four-team teasers, and exotic teasers.
Teaser Example
This type of teaser involves two teams and allows customers to adjust the point spread or total line by 6, 6.5, or 7 points.
Basketball point spreads and totals can usually be altered by 4, 4.5 or 5 points.
Game 1: Dallas Cowboys vs. New York Giants with a point spread of -6 for the Cowboys
Game 2: Kansas City Chiefs vs. Baltimore Ravens with a point spread of -3 for the Chiefs
The customer selects the Cowboys and Ravens for their two-team teaser. The new point spreads are:
Game 1: Dallas Cowboys vs. New York Giants with a point spread of 0 for the Cowboys
Game 2: Kansas City Chiefs vs. Baltimore Ravens with a point spread of +9 for the Ravens
With the teaser, the Cowboys would go from -6 to even, pick 'em, or a zero-point spread, while the Ravens would go from +3 to +9 points.
Teaser Odds Table
Teasers generally have a universal price guide assuming all spreads have -110 odds attached to each game. The teaser table below shows the different points and odds associated dependent on how many teams are in the teaser:
Number of teams | 6 points | 6.5 points | 7 points | 10 points |
2 | -110 | -120 | -130 | +100 |
3 | +160 | +150 | +140 | +120 |
4 | +260 | +240 | +200 | +160 |
5 | +400 | +350 | +300 | +200 |
6 | +600 | +500 | +400 | +300 |
Teaser Betting Strategy #1 : Key Numbers
There have been a lot of sports final scores in recorded history and believe it or not, there are trends that emerge with so many data points including key numbers. Key numbers are numbers in which the final scores of contests end on.
For example, key numbers in football are 3, 7 and 0 because those are the numbers that teams' score usually ends it.
Some of these final score examples would be 23-17, 20-7, 27-23, etc. Because the most final scores in football end on these numbers, it is a strategy to use teasers to push a team's spread past these numbers to pay for a greater chance of winning a wager.
Key Number Teaser Example
If the team a customer selects in a football game has a point spread of +4, a 7-point teaser would push that team's spread to +11. This is incredibly value since it pushes the spread past a touchdown and even more so, past the number 10.
By using teasers to move the line past key numbers, bettors can increase their chances of winning and minimize their risk of losing by a half-point or a point. This is especially important in games that are expected to be close or have a high-scoring outcome.
Teaser Betting Strategy #2 : Using Different Start Times
A customer places a three-team, five-point teaser in basketball.
Original Spread | Spread With Teaser | Time Of Game | |
Duke vs. North Carolina | Duke +3 | Duke +8 | 12:00 PM |
Clemson vs. Notre Dame | Notre Dame +5 | Notre Dame +10 | 1:00 PM |
Virginia vs. Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh +7 | Pittsburgh +12 | 4:00 PM |
Taking games at different times and spread out throughout the day has multiple benefits.
First, there will be more hedge options if the result is known for previous legs of the teaser. If Duke covers their 8-point spread and Notre Dame is in the second half of their game down 4 points with 10 minutes left, a customer can feel comfortable not trying to hedge their original teaser bet or try to bet out of the original stake and let the teaser play out.
Once both results are known and there is about an hour until the third leg of the teaser between Virginia and Pittsburgh, a customer can figure out what they'll win if the original teaser plays out and hits, what number the customer should try to wager on to try to create a possible middle, and will have plenty options to live bet to not lose out on any money or possibly guarantee themselves a profit.
When the games are all at the same time, customers may get too hasty and place a mistake wager that backfire on them later in the day.
Teaser Hedging Strategy: Tease Down Big Favorites
When hedging is a possibility within a teaser, it is better to have a 10-point football favorite teased down to zero points compared to having a 10-point underdog teased up to +20.
On one hand, if a spread is in the double digits, the chance of a blowout is more likely than a game with a close spread. Hoping for a worse team to keep up with a juggernaut is worse than hoping for the juggernaut just to simply defeat the lesser team.
In addition to this, having hedge opportunities on a team with a higher + odds money line will cost less. If a team is +10 and a customer wants to hedge on their money line because he or she has a 10-point favorite at zero points, the underdogs money line will be more cost effective and also will have way more opportunities to make up for it throughout the game as the underdog will have + odds for the majority of the game, if not the entire game.
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