Futures bet
What does "futures bet" mean in sports betting?
A futures bet is a wager on an outcome settled later, like a league champion, an award winner or a team's season win total.
You place it now and it settles weeks or months later, so your money is tied up the whole time. Prices move through the season as injuries, trades and results change the picture.
Add up the implied probabilities of every option in a futures market to see how much margin the book built in. With many teams in one market, that total can climb well above 100%. Championship futures are also one of the most common spots for hedging once a team gets close.
Example
A team at +1000 to win the title implies 9.09%. A $25 bet returns $275 if they win ($250 profit). In a four-team market priced +150, +200, +300 and +400, the implied probabilities are 40%, 33.33%, 25% and 20%, for a total of 118.33%. That works out to a hold of about 15.49%.
Related terms
Implied probability
Implied probability is the win chance a price suggests. It turns odds into a percentage so you can compare them with your own estimate.
American odds
American odds show how much you risk to win $100 (minus numbers) or how much you win on a $100 bet (plus numbers).
Hedge
A hedge is a bet on the other side of an earlier wager to shrink how much you can lose, at the cost of how much you can win.
Hold
The sportsbook's built-in margin on a market: the share of all money bet it expects to keep if action is balanced across every side.
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