
Author:
Brian Hammons
Last Updated:
05/15/2022
If you are a fan of golf but have yet to venture into the world of online golf betting, there are a couple of things that you need to learn about, namely, how to understand the golf betting odds.
Our guide on finding the best golf odds today will help you to understand how sportsbooks calculate these odds, how you can go about working out the expected value and what you should do to make the most of live betting markets. Keep reading to polish your golf betting prowess and improve your overall betting game.
Those of you that have been around the golf betting block a few times will know by now that not every sportsbook is identical in every way. The most important difference between some of these platforms is that they will offer you varying sports betting odds on golfing events like PGA tour tournaments or on the majors. The slightest difference in odds can mean a significant change to what your eventual payouts might look like. Finding value odds is the game and we can show you how to play it.
If you are new to online golf betting, you may not know why comparing odds is so important. A small difference between 2 sets of odds might seem insignificant but that couldn’t be further from the truth. In our guide on the best golf odds, we teach you a number of things that include why comparing odds is so important to what different kinds of odds there are.
Consider the sport of golf and think for a moment how many variables contribute to how a tournament could play out. A player might be carrying a small injury or has just come back from a major operation, the weather might be extreme over a tournament weekend, a certain player may play particularly well on a specific course, the world rankings of players comes into play, all of this impacts how odds are determined by sportsbooks. The bookmakers in the US will consider just about every variable possible to come up with odds that accurately reflect the players and their chances of winning.
A question that many new golf betting fans might have, is why would these bookmakers then not offer the exact same odds? There is clearly some complex mathematics involved to draw these golf betting odds up, so how could they differ at all then? To put it in simple terms, when you determine the golf betting odds, you reach what you would call the “real odds”. However, these sportsbooks will always offer you golf betting odds that are below these real odds. This is because the bookies need to balance their books as well as they can. If they offered the real odds and lost enough big bets to their player base, they would go broke in no time. This is just the reality of the situation.
So, the odds will differ slightly on certain events and this is because the competition between sportsbooks is fierce. They will attempt to undercut the odds to the absolute minimum that they can to try and draw in more players to bet on their site. This is normal and why we largely see disparities between sportsbooks and their golf betting odds.
It’s difficult to say for sure what the most popular golf betting odds are. It will really come down to what you are most comfortable with. There are 3 different odds types that we will discuss below but the point is, these odds types are used in various regions around the world. Let’s take a look at how these golf betting odds differ from one another.
Expected value is an interesting concept and one that most of your casual betting fans won’t really take into consideration. If you want to know how so many of the best bettors around the US continue to consistently do well, it’s because they use expected value. Firstly, it’s important to note that finding value bets and using expected value to your advantage should be done as early in the week as possible. This is because the bookies will catch up and the odds will shift closer to the match itself. You can expect the same to happen to soccer odds for today as well.
Okay, now onto calculating expected value itself. For moneyline odds, what you need to do is use a simple sum. You can only work out the expected value once you have the line odds from the bookie. So, what you need to do is this, 100 ÷ (line + 100) = percentage (i.e. expected value). Let’s do a quick example to make things easier. Let’s say the line is +110, your sum would then be 100 ÷ (110 + 100) = 47.62%. Once you start getting the hang of it, it’s actually very easy but it’s important to know that the market is always changing so it makes it difficult to get what would be the exact +EV.
There is honor in loyalty and this is something you should keep with you in your day-to-day life but when it comes to finding the best golf odds today or the best golf odds tomorrow, it will not serve you well. You might be betting with a sportsbook that you feel comfortable with and that is fine, but if you are truly looking to find value golf bets, you need to be a little more fluid than that.
It’s always a good idea to have a little look at some of the other sportsbooks in the US that compete with the platform that you use. This way, you can gauge what the best golf odds today are by simply comparing them with other sites. From there, you can work out some of the expected value and even just see with the nakedd eye what operator is giving you the best golf betting odds for a certain player or event. Do yourself a favor and shop around on these sites to find the best odds so that you can place more value bets.
There are plenty of things to consider when you use an online sportsbook. While on average, golf betting odds are fairly crucial, you can find different means for increasing your value. For example, a bookmaker you like may offer better odds as a whole to another but that other bookmaker may have plenty of promotions, bonuses and rewards for you to claim that could boost your golf betting odds in their own right. It’s not always so cut and dry. Take a look at some of these other factors when you run through these sites to see if you can cash in on some extra value. Remember, you can use more than one site at a time so nothing is tying you down.
Here at the Grueling Truth, we have a fantastic golf odds comparison tool for you to use where you can find the best pre-match odds out there. However, we should note that using an odds comparison for live betting odds is much, much trickier. What we recommend is for you to stay in the loop as the match goes along. If it is a soccer match, it’s best to wait until halftime as the bookies will stabilize, in tennis, wait for the players to sit down between changeovers. Anything where the match steadies and the bookies get a chance to stabilize is your impunity to analyze the live betting odds and find value.
We have now come to the end of our guide and we hope you have found a few key things to take away with you. Remember to check back on this piece if you forget anything or if you just need a refresher. If you are looking to improve your knowledge of betting odds in general we can help you there with our guides on the best F1 betting odds and the best horse betting odds as well.