Betting The Runlines In Baseball Articles | Gambling

By: Richard Bleuze

Perhaps the best way to bet on baseball is to bet on underdogs. Yet, one has to vary picks between underdogs and favorites to make balanced selections—but, how can one bet a favorite with an underdog price: the answer is betting the favorite on the runline. Betting on the runline is like betting on a team with a spread. The runline standard is to lay 1.5 runs (in other words team A –1.5, where a runline bet on team A states that the bettor is betting that team A will win by 2 or more runs).

Although there are inherent dangers associated with betting the runline on home team favorites (such as having only 8 full innings to score and win by more than 2 runs), betting the runline is a fairly good idea. If one thinks that a favorite will win a game, it is better to bet them on the runline, rather than playing them on the moneyline. One will risk less money to win more (in general). The author suggest playing the favorites on the moneyline up until –130. Anything higher than this line, the author suggests to bet the favorite on the runline.

Thus, it makes sense to bet a home team that is favored using the runline.   Home teams win several more 1-run games than visiting teams. The reason for this is simply that games end anytime the home team has a lead entering the bottom of the ninth inning.

Please keep the following in mind - If the game is tied at the end of 9 innings, there’s only a 7% chance the home team will win by more than 1 run. On the other hand, a visiting team that scores 1 run will usually attempt to continue scoring to build up a cushion. This one difference makes a huge difference in pricing – all told, home teams win 1-run games about 17% of the time, while the visitors manage to win by 1-run just 11% of the time.

Another important factor when pricing a runline is the game total. The lower the total, the more likely a game will end as a 1-run game for the favorite. While a game total in no way guarantees that many runs will be scored, it’s a pretty good indicator of how much offense there will be in a game.