Welcome to the Pinnacle Sports Betting Help section.
This section is intended for players new to sports betting and for bettors who would like to improve their understanding of how commission and pricing work. In addition, we will explain the different ways that you are able to view the lines and odds at Pinnacle Sports in either a moneyline or a decimal format. Please make your selection from the links below.
Before selecting the sports book that is right for you, it is worth considering how a bookmaker makes their money. They do this by the amount of vigorish or commission charged on every bet they accept. What all professional players know is what a huge impact it has on whether you win or lose at the end of the season.
At traditional bookmakers, if you wanted to win $100 on an event like a coin-toss or on most sports, you must risk more than $100. If a player wants to win $100, he risks $110 with a traditional bookie. That extra $10 is the bookmaker's commission for taking the bet.
By way of explanation, consider betting on a coin toss at standard -110 pricing. If the bookmaker accepted one bet of $110 to win $100 on heads and another bet of $110 to win $100 on tails. Regardless of the outcome, one player will receive $210 ($110 risked plus $100 in winnings) and one will lose their $110 bet. The bookmaker accepted bets totalling $220 but only returned $210 in winnings. Therefore on ‘balanced action’ they make $10 for every $220 in balanced wagers that they accepted.
This is known as -110 pricing and because of the ‘vigorish’ or ‘juice’ charged, a player has to win close to 53% of their bets just to break even. If you are a good handicapper and win 54% of your bets, you would show a profit of $340 after making a hundred, $100 bets.
Pinnacle bookmakers, doesn't charge the standard -110 price for placing bets. On NFL sides and MLB moneylines for example, we use -104 style pricing instead which offers players up to 60% better value than traditional bookmakers. This means that at Pinnacle Sports, a player risks just $104 to win $100.
Not only do you save money when you make a wager at Pinnacle Sports but this ‘reduced juice’ means a player would only need to win just 51% of his plays to break even. Our hypothetical 54% handicapper would be up $616 after 100 plays – nearly twice as much as if they had used a traditional bookmaker!
The easiest way to understand a moneyline is to think of it as an indication of the amount you need to bet to win $100 (or 100 of whatever currency you are betting in) or the amount you will win if you bet $100.
Money lines are expressed with a negative number, e.g. -110, or a positive number, such as +120. A negative money line number indicates what you must wager to win $100, and a positive money line number indicates what you will win if you risk $100.
If you bet $110 on a team with a money line of -110 and they win, you will win $100 (plus return of your original $110 bet). If you bet $100 on a team with a money line of +120, and they win, you will win $120 (plus return of the original $100 bet). Unlike point spread bets, the teams do not have to win by any particular number of points.
You do not have to bet an amount equal to the moneyline number. You can bet more or less and the payoff simply becomes a proportion of this amount. For example, if you bet $11 on a money line of -110 and your bet wins, you will win $10. If you bet $50 on a moneyline of +120 and your selection is correct, you will win $60.
Moneylines are sometimes combined with point spreads. For example;
There are two wagering options: New England +3 points or Pittsburgh -3 points. If you wanted to bet on New England +3 points, you would have to risk $120 to win $100. If New England won, or lost by 1 or 2 points, you would win $100 and have your $120 risk amount returned. If New England lost by exactly 3 points, your wager is a push and your money is refunded. If New England lost by more than 3, you would lose $120.
Decimal pricing, similar to moneylines, is a way to express how much a bet will pay if it wins. The main difference is that the initial risk amount is already included in the quote so the payoff you receive will include the amount bet.
To calculate a decimal quote all you need to do is simply multiply your stake amount by the decimal quote. For instance, if you bet $100 with a decimal quote of 2.5, your winning return will be 2.5 x $100 = $250 ($150 win plus your $100 stake back). For example:
If you risked $100 on Barcelona, a Barca win would be 1.77 X $100 = $177 ($77 win plus your original $100 stake amount). If Barcelona lost, or the match ended in a draw, you would lose your bet of $100.
If you placed a $100 bet on Real Madrid and they won, your winning return will be 3.75 x $100 = $375 ($275 in winnings plus your $100 stake back). If Real Madrid lost or the game ended in a draw, you would lose your bet.
Remember, decimal quotes are extremely easy to calculate by simply using a calculator to multiply the amount you wish to bet by the decimal quote offered.