Hedging a sports bet is the act of making a secondary wager that would offset any losses you might face on your initial bet – it’s guaranteed profit regardless of the outcome of a bet. Hedging is a beneficial strategy that can lead to bonus profits if you time your wager properly.
Here’s an example of what a hedge might look like: At the start of the season, you bet $100 on the Kansas City Chiefs to win the Super Bowl at +400 odds for a payout of $500 total. Let’s say they made it all the way and they’ll be playing the Philadelphia Eagles with the following odds:
You already stand to make $400 in profit if the Chiefs win, so to hedge this bet, you’d wager a certain amount on the Eagles to offset a potential upset. We’re going to pause this example for a moment to explain the hedging calculator, and how you’d evaluate these odds.
What is a hedging calculator
Hedging calculators are like any other type of calculator – they take the data given and save you the effort of doing manual calculations, showing exactly how much money is needed to offset your original wager.
Because sportsbooks will never have the same line for every market, it means there’s usually a chance to take advantage of arbitrage. Arbitrage simply means finding different buying/selling prices to earn a small profit from those differences, like we’re doing with our hedges.
How do you use a hedge bet calculator
Using a Hedge Calculator couldn’t be simpler. Plug in your initial bet and its odds, followed by the odds of the secondary bet – the calculator will spit out the golden number you need to bet on that second option.
Two great use cases for using a hedge calculator are futures and line shopping. If you bet on a team to win the championship (like our Super Bowl example), you can input their competitor’s odds and find a hedge amount to secure a safe win. If you see a discrepancy between favorites and underdogs on different sportsbooks, bet on them both by finding the $ amount needed to guarantee a profit.
Why is a hedge calculator important for sports bettors
Betting on sports can be a ton of fun, but at the end of the day we’re all in the business of making money. If you weren’t hedging bets already, hedge calculators give you a massive advantage by introducing you to the world of bonus profits with no added work.
They’re dead-easy to use, give you a safety net for large wagers and most importantly; betting hedges is fundamental for the avid bettor, so why not have a bit of help?
How to calculate using an online hedge calculator
Let’s go back to our previous example of hedging our Chiefs Super Bowl bet to show the calculator’s use in real time. We’ve got a potential $400 profit on a $100 bet – that’s pretty sweet, but we want guaranteed returns!
On the Hedge Calculator, you’ll insert your initial odds and bet amount, which were +400 and $100 for the Chiefs. All we need to finish our calculation are the Eagles’ odds, which were given as +130. Plugging that into the tool, we’ll get a hedge amount of $217.39, which would return $500 on +130 odds.
As you can see, either way you slice it, you’ll be taking home $182.61 in profit – I know, that’s a lot less than your potential $400 profit, but it’s also completely bonus! That’s the payoff for guaranteeing a win. Hedging comes with a lot of patience and effort but can be very lucrative if played right.