If you’re a newbie to the world of sports betting, there’s a few things you should know before you start placing bets and spending your money. Like any hobby, it takes a little time to get used to and get good at, so don’t expect to get rich overnight. But here’s 3 tips to help you along the way and get you familiar with all things sports betting!

1. There are Different Types of Sports Betting

This may seem obvious, especially if you’ve been on any betting app or site, but there are a lot of different ways to bet. Let’s look at some of them:

• Straight Bets – these are the most popular bets, where you can bet on either the favorite or the underdog based on a point spread. If you bet on the favorite, then they must win by the number of points on the spread for you to get your money. Similarly, if you opted for the underdog, they have to win or lose by less than the point spread if you want to cash in. 
• Parlay Bets – this kind of bet uses multiple bets that come together to form your very own parlay. You can use parlay picks to choose your bets, but be warned, this betting strategy is more high risk than others.
• Head to Head Bets – most often found in sports like golf or NASCAR, this kind of bet is used when you have a head to head battle between two competitors. So if you bet on the party that wins the tournament or race, you can cash in. 
• Money Line Bets – these bets don’t use point spreads, but each individual can choose their favorite or underdog based on your own intuition or knowledge. We see these kinds of bets across most major sports.
• Total Line Bets – another bet you may have already heard of, total line bets are made on what the total of the scores will be at the end of the game or match for both parties.  

2. Betting Varies Over Different Sports

Now you’re familiar with the types of bets, let’s look at which bets you can make over different sports. Bets like head to head bets are found in sports where there’s two competitors, such as golf or racing. You can make most bets on sports such as football, basketball, soccer, basketball, horse racing and hockey. 

3. Know Who to Trust

Lastly, if you’re a beginner, you need to know who to trust when it comes to finding the best sports picks and betting knowledge. You’ll need to do two things to get really familiar with sports betting:

• Research
• Place your bets

Experience is a great teacher, but there are people out there whose jobs focus on sports betting. These are the guys to trust, because they have the time to analyze, research and publish their own picks. And of course, look for the results. The numbers don’t lie, and you’ll be able to tell a good sports handicapper from a bad one by the winnings they generate for their customers.