Moneyline

A moneyline bet is the most direct wager in sports betting. Setting aside point spreads and totals, you are simply selecting which team or player wins the contest. If your selection wins, the bet pays; if it loses, the stake is gone. Margin of victory is irrelevant — the final score matters only insofar as it identifies the winner.

Moneyline odds are quoted differently for favorites and underdogs. In American format, a favorite carries a negative number (such as -150), specifying how much you must stake to win $100. An underdog carries a positive number (such as +130), specifying the profit a $100 stake returns. Decimal and fractional formats preserve the same relationship: lower odds mark favorites and higher odds mark underdogs.

Example

Suppose the New York Yankees are listed at -160 and the Boston Red Sox at +140 in a baseball game. Stake a $160 moneyline bet on the Yankees and, if they win, you receive $100 in profit plus your $160 stake back. Stake $100 on the Red Sox at +140 instead, and if they pull the upset you collect $140 in profit plus your original $100 stake.

The payout gap between the two sides encodes the bookmaker’s read on each team’s win probability, along with the embedded commission (the vig or juice).

Key Points

• Simplicity: Moneyline bets require only that you pick the winner. No spreads, no totals — just the outright result.
• Payouts scale with probability: Favorites pay less relative to the stake because they are more likely to win. Underdogs pay more because they are less likely to win.
• Common across all major sports: Moneyline betting is offered in baseball, hockey, soccer, basketball, football, tennis, and virtually every sport with a definitive winner.
• No ties in most markets: Many moneyline markets exclude the draw. In sports where ties occur (such as soccer), a three-way moneyline adds the draw as a separate outcome.
• Foundation for parlays: Moneyline selections are routinely combined into parlays, where every leg must win for the ticket to pay.