Pleaser Betting Strategy
I've written advanced articles on NFL teaser betting and college football teasers, so it only makes sense I also cover their opposite, the pleaser bet. For those not familiar, when dealing with two betting lines of +6.5 and -7.5 a 2-team 6-point teaser gives you +12.5 and -1.5 at odds -110. When doing a 2-team 6-point pleaser (the opposite), you get +0.5 and-13.5 at odds +600. The difference is you're giving the bookmaker 6-points, instead of him giving you six points. In exchange you receive a much larger payout.
Pleaser Betting Sites
In years past the most popular betting website offering teasers was Bet Jamaica, which their owner Spiro closed prior to the 2011 NFL football season. To fill the void, these were recently introduced by popular US friendly betting site www.betonline.com who offers 6-point pleasers for NFL football with the following payouts:
- 2 Teams 6 to 1
- 3 Teams 17 to 1
- 4 Teams 45 to 1
- 5 Teams 120 to 1
- 6 Teams 300 to 1
Another website offering these is www.5dimes.com which is a popular reduced juice sportsbook. This means at 5dimes everything is about getting better odds but as a trade off there are no bonus offers. At 5Dimes pleaser bets can be made on other sports and leagues, and you can mix and match these. For example, where you give 6-points on NFL football point spreads and totals you can do the same at 7-points on college football and CFL, and the same again at 8-points on high school football and UFL. For basketball 5.5-points on NBA point spreads, 6-points on college basketball point spreads, and 7-points on all basketball totals are offered at the same odds as 6-points for NFL football selections.
Pleaser Betting Odds
A 2-team 6-point pleaser pays 6 to 1 on winning bets. This means winning once per seven attempts is required to average break even, or in other words winning 14.29% of the time. In order to determine the odds given for each team individually, change the break even percentage to its decimal format 0.1429 and calculate its square root. This solves to 0.3780 which tells us if each selection individually wins 37.80% of the time, we'll go 2-0 on our selections 14.29% of the time. To put into a moneyline format, go to our odds converter, plug 37.8% into the implied probability field and you'll see a 2-team 6-point pleaser bet at -110 is a 2-team parlay where each team is priced +165.
In my article on teasers I showed popular US friendly betting site Bovada.lv offers the best teaser odds in the industry. Their 3-team 6-point teasers at +180 are the same as a parlay where each team is priced -244. Now in fairness Bovada doesn't even offer pleasers, but just comparing best in the industry teasers, with best in the industry pleasers something concerning sticks out. When we take 6-points from the bookmaker he charges us -244 (teasers) but when we give him six points, essentially offering him a teaser, he gives us +165. That's a huge gap, and the reason many online betting sites don't offer pleaser bets; the word is out they're not a very good deal.
Now, it's important I note, while pleasers are meant as a -EV bets for recreational players seeking large payouts, +EV pleaser bets do exist on rare occasions. This is something you wouldn't discover reading betting strategy in books, forums and blog posts, as the industry consensus that all pleasers are -EV sucker bets is heavily sold. Now some sharps when called out tend to say, "Yes, okay, but" and go on with excuses about how difficult these are to find, but again they're wrong. If you're shopping for value you're already looking at the board and would spot these in 10 extra seconds. With this said let me get into pleaser betting strategy.
Pleaser Betting Strategy
In my article on teaser betting I showed for reason that 3 and 7 are the most common margins of victory in NFL, teasers that go from a loss to a win on these points spreads are the best of all teasers. For reason pleasers are opposite of a teasers, it is easy to decipher 3 and 7 are the absolute worst point spreads in pleaser betting. Pleaser betting strategy involves finding the lowest value points to cross.
So what are the best point-spreads to please across? Anything that doesn't cross 3 & 7 in way shape or form is a given. From here you should be conscious that 10, 14, 17 and 21 are also frequent margins of victory and NFL games only score so many points, so large favorites -15 or greater should also not be added to a please. Of course I've just eliminated pretty much every point spread that will be offered this season so let me loosen the rules some. It is okay to cross 10, 14, 17 once in a pleaser, but never cross more than one of these numbers in the same pleaser.
+EV Pleaser Subsets
Using simple logic I can determine in NFL football the following point spreads are the beast to please.
- -7.5 Favorites
- -10.5 Favorites
- -14.5 Favorites
- +13.5 Underdogs
- +16.5 Underdogs
- +20.5 or higher Underdog
Considering point spreads are 50% propositions and in pleasers we need each team to win 37.8% to break even, it's calculates out… giving the bookmaker 6-points must reduce our cover rate by less than the difference (12.2%) for the pleaser selection to be +EV. Based on the subsets I gave you above let's look at the historical results. Over the past 5 seasons (2007/08 to 2011/2012) my provided pleaser subsets had the following results:
No Please: 35-34 (50.72%)
Pleased 6: 27-42 (39.13%)
Decrease: 11.59%
It is important I note this is not data mining. That sample size is far too small to have much value, but I actually used push charts and simulations to first determine my logical theory was correct. The historical data just gives me extra comfort knowing these subsets have run profitable over a small recent sample.
+EV Pleaser Opportunities are Rare
Discouragingly so, you won't find too many +EV pleaser bets per season. Because you need 2-teams available in the same week these opportunities are rare. Taking a look at the past 5-seasons this how often +EV pleasers bets were available:
2007: 6 times (2 had 3 teams)
2008: 1 time and it was a 3-team pleaser
2009: 6 times all of them 2-team pleasers
2010: 3 times all of them 2-team players
2011: 3 times (1 was a 3-teamer)
The good news… www.betonline.com does allow up to 2 open legs for 4-team, 5-team and 6-team pleasers. A strategy here for someone looking for massive payouts might be in those rare times there are three +EV pleaser selections in the same week, to make it a 5-teamer leaving 2-legs open. Should you win, you could then be patient looking for highest +EV pleaser selections to make in future weeks. To learn other advanced strategies for football betting, refer to my article on football betting strategy.
Advice for Recreation Punters
Pleaser betting is a fun way to have a chance at a large payout for a small stake. There is nothing at all wrong with making $20.00 6-team pleaser bets at BetOnline hoping to run like Moses and cash a $6,000 payday. It's just important to note this is for fun, don't get carried away betting more than you can afford to lose. Of course, if you're looking for a chance at big payouts while also making +EV bets this sometimes possible elsewhere. One suggestion I have is to choose a sign up bonus from our page on sports betting bonuses, and instead of making pleaser bets use your bonus to make moneyline parlay wagers. Additionally, you could also refer to my article on football betting systems.