Betting NBA Futures

When it comes to NBA betting one area that is forgotten a lot of times is future betting. What is an NBA future bet? Is it a good investment? What should we look for when making an NBA future bet? Let's examine the answers to those questions.

An NBA future bet is a wager placed on a team to win the NBA Championship. It can also be a bet that is placed on a team to win their individual divisions, although that is less common in the NBA than it is in other sports like football or baseball. NBA future bets are just not heavily bet, and therefore, not something many professional bettors look at. The main reason that most people don't make NBA future bets is that they hold very little value. The NBA season stretches from November all the way until June. That is a long period of time to have money tied up, and for the most part NBA futures don't present bettors with any bargains. The NBA is a league where usually only the top few teams have a shot at the title, unlike the NFL where things are more competitive. Baseball and NBA future bets can only offer value if you can find a team offering at least double-digit odds. You sure don't want to tie up money for six months and only be getting 3-1 or 4-1 on your money.

Let's say we want to consider making an NBA future bet. What are we going to look for? First off, unless you are getting 10-1 or better an NBA future bet is probably not a good idea. There are no guarantees in any sport, and to tie up money for half the year we really want to get double-digit odds. For example, we don't want to be getting 2-1 odds on San Antonio and tying up our money all year. If we are going to be risking money on a future bet we want to look at teams that are talented, but not at the top of the class. There is no value in teams like the Spurs or Pistons. There is also no value in public teams like the Lakers. There is also limited value in teams like Philadelphia with Iverson, Cleveland with James or Miami with Shaq. The odds are always lower on a team with a superstar player. What we want is a team perhaps like Phoenix or Memphis that has a good team philosophy but few stars. Phoenix probably doesn't even fit into that category anymore now that Marion is an all-star. The problem with taking a team like Memphis is what realistic chance do they really have at winning it all? Can they get past a team like Miami, or defeat a team like San Antonio or Detroit. The answer is they probably can't. That is what makes NBA futures betting a tough proposition for fans.

As I said earlier, NBA futures betting is not at the top of the future board list of sports. The league is top heavy with strong teams and that offers the sports bettor looking for value very little options when it comes to finding value. When you bet a sports future bet you want first and foremost value. If you can't get decent odds, then it is probably not worth the bet.