I am curious to see if there is a way to calculate ML odds into an expected chance that you have to win the bet. For example, in a standard ATS bet, you have a 50% chance to win or lose the bet. Is there a way to calculate high ML odds and their expected chance to win? Let's say Barcelona's ML odds are -980 this weekend in soccer...is there a formula to see what their chance of winning (or losing) would be based on the numbers? I hope I'm asking the question clearly. Thank you in advanced for any help.
I have setup an excel sheet to make the calculation easier on some of my other sheets, the calculation is below - for the purposes of my sheet B2 is the cell that I enter the US Style odds, so if you setup a similar sheet change all instances of B2 to whatever your input cell(s) is:
In the cell that you want the probability % in enter the following calculation:
=IF(B2>0,(100/(B2+100)),(-(B2)/((-(B2))+100)))
I am no excel wiz, so I am sure that this calculation can be streamlined by those who are wiz's, but this works fine for me and accounts for whether you end the price in using the - or + sign depending on if they are fav or underdog.
Using the above calculation, your example of Barcelona -980 comes out at a Probability of 90.74% chance of winning.
It's very easy. In your above example of -980 odds, all you have to do is add 100 to your number and then divide 980 by that number.
For example, 980+100 = 1080 so you would divide 980/1080 = 90.74%. So you would need Barcelona to have at least about a 91% chance of winning the game in order to make a bet on them profitable. Another more common example would be a line like Eagles -3.5 -120. In that case, the Eagles would have to have at least a 120/220 or 12/22 or 54.55% chance to cover the 3.5 in order to break even or make a profit.
Also, these numbers are not a team's chances of winning or covering. They are numbers based merely on a combination of the opinions of experts and the general public, and the number that a sportsbook thinks it can make the most money off of while assuming least possible risk. So, while the chances of winning an ATS bet averages out to 50% in the long run, the chances of winning any individual ATS bet vary greatly.