Buying Points

Most books will move a spread or total in your favour for a fee, usually ten cents per half-point. Whether that is a good deal depends entirely on which half-point you are buying, and books charge a flat rate for something whose value varies enormously.

The Comparison You Have To Make

Buying a half-point typically takes a bet from -110 to -120. That raises your break-even from 52.4% to 54.5%, a 2.1 percentage point increase.

So the question is simple: does this specific half-point add more than 2.1 points of win probability? If yes, buy. If no, do not. Everything else is detail.

The answer depends on the sport and on where the number sits, which is exactly what a flat ten-cent charge ignores.

What Half-Points Are Actually Worth

The pattern follows the key numbers exactly. Buying on and off 3 is a good deal; buying on and off 7 is roughly fair to slightly good; buying anywhere else is paying well over the odds. See key numbers.

Basketball, Baseball And Hockey

Basketball: margins are smoothly distributed, so no half-point is worth much more than any other. A half-point in the NBA is worth roughly 1.3 to 1.8 points of win probability almost anywhere on the board, which makes buying it a losing proposition at ten cents. Buying points in basketball is close to a pure vig increase.

Baseball and hockey: the spread is fixed at 1.5, so there is nothing to buy in the ordinary sense. Alternate run lines and puck lines exist and function differently, with the whole price recalculated rather than a fee added. See run lines.

Totals: football totals have mild clustering around 41, 44 and 47, so half-points across those are worth slightly more than elsewhere — though considerably less than the side's clustering on 3.

The Alternative Nobody Uses Enough

Buying points is a way of getting a better number at one book. Line shopping is a way of getting a better number for free.

Before paying ten cents to move from -3.5 to -3, check whether another book already posts -3 at standard price. Often one does, and the entire question dissolves. A bettor with four accounts buys points far less often than a bettor with one, because the market has usually already provided the number somewhere. See line shopping.

Selling points — taking a worse number for a better price — is the mirror operation and is occasionally correct in basketball, where half-points are cheap in probability terms and books pay a flat rate for them.

Frequently Asked Questions