NFL Division Winner Betting Guide
The NFL is the most popular betting sport in the US, and there are plenty of interesting markets you can bet on to increase the excitement of watching football. While betting on game winners or against the spread is pretty popular, another way to enjoy NFL betting is by predicting which teams will win the divisions.
The NFL has eight divisions, the North, South, East, and West in the NFC and AFC. Winning a division is a surefire way to reach the NFL playoffs, regardless of final record, so these spots are hotly contested.
If you want to learn more about the excitement of placing NFL division winner bets, read our complete guide below.
What is an NFL Division Winner Bet?
An NFL division winner wager is a bet type known as a future, which allows you to bet on an outcome far in the future, weeks or months before the wager settles. So, you can place NFL division winner futures well before the season starts, with some betting sites offering the lines before the NFL Draft and even in the weeks following the Super Bowl.
The earlier you place your future bets, the more generous the odds will be as you have less information the further away from the season you are. For example, if you place your NFL division winner bet before the NFL Draft, you’ll get much higher odds as you don’t know what players a team will draft, what free agency additions it will make, or if anyone will get injured during training camp.
When Can I Place NFL Division Winner Bets?
While many bettors choose to bet on NFL division winners before the season starts, the markets will be available as the season progresses, with odds changing from week to week based on performances and injuries. If you place your bets midseason, you’ll better understand what is happening. However, you’ll get better odds if you wager before the season kicks off, so consider this with your NFL division winner betting.
NFL Division Winner Parlays
You can add multiple betting lines into one wager with a parlay bet. Each selection you add, called a leg, must be successful for your parlay bet to win. If even one leg is wrong, you lose the whole wager. As there is added risk with a parlay bet compared to betting on each market individually, you get better odds and have to risk less to make more profit.
Some US sportsbooks allow you to combine multiple future bets into parlays, so you can create parlays featuring NFL division winner futures.
How to Read NFL Future Odds
Most US sportsbooks will present NFL futures in American odds, which makes it easy to determine which teams are the favorites to win and how much you can expect in profit if you are correct. With American odds, you’ll have two things to consider: a three-digit number and a symbol. The symbol will tell you how to read the three-digit number.
With a minus (-) symbol, the three-digit number indicates how much you must bet to make a $100 profit. For example, if you’re betting on odds of -120, you need to wager $120 to make a profit of $100, giving you a total of $220. The higher the three-digit number, the more likely the outcome will occur. Unless there is a heavy favorite, you don’t typically see many minus (-) future bets until later in the season.
What is more common is a plus (+) symbol, which means the numbers show how much you can profit if you bet $100. For instance, if you bet $100 on odds of +500 and win, you’ll get $500 in profit and your $100 stake back, giving you a payout of $600.
The higher a plus (+) symbol number is, the less likely that outcome will happen. As there are only four potential outcomes with division winner future betting, you don’t usually get too high odds. However, there may be significant underdogs for these betting lines, especially later in the season when teams have played a few games.
