Quick ?? about wager web

[sokrzesik]

i just started to use wager web because i got some free money there and when i went to place a wger they have this:

Wagered Amount Risk Amount To Win Amount

you can select from 1 of the 3 and then put in your amount but i as wondering what the difference is between these. thanks

[bigboydan]

you can either bet the amount you want to risk with or without the vig factored into your wager basicly.

[TLD]

Short answer:

The “Risk Amount” is what you are risking. The “Win Amount” is what you stand to win. The “Wager Amount” is the smaller of the risk or win amounts for a given wager. You need to fill in any one of the three boxes.


More elaborate explanation and examples:

Every wager has an amount you’re risking and an amount you stand to win. For a traditional –110 odds wager for instance, you might be risking $55 to win $50.

Some sportsbook software, like the one you’re asking about, enables you to specify either the risk or win amount (and then it calculates the other.) This can be especially helpful if, say, you like to keep your risk constant or your potential win constant.

For example, let’s say you’re betting baseball, and you prefer to risk $100 on each bet, regardless of the odds. So if you have a +130 play, you want to risk $100 (to win $130), and if you have a –175 play, you want to risk $100 (to win $57.14). Just put $100 in the “Risk Amount” box and you don’t have to bother doing the calculations to determine that you’re trying to win $57.14 or whatever.

The other option offered by the software—“Wager Amount”—means you want a wager where that amount is the smaller of your risk or win amount. So it’s the amount you are risking if the odds are plus, or the amount you stand to win if the odds are minus. For example, if you put $100 in that box, then for odds of +105 you’d be making a wager of $100 to win $105, for odds of +325 you’d be making a wager of $100 to win $325, for odds of –200 you’d be making a wager of $200 to win $100, for odds of –475 you’d be making a wager of $475 to win $100, and so on.

In effect it defaults to the “round number.” Bookies know that when a bettor says “Give me $100 on the Yankees” and the odds are –170, the bettor almost never means he wants to bet $100 to win $57.14. He means he wants to bet $170 to win $100. And similarly if the next caller says he wants $100 on the Red Sox, and they are +160, he doesn’t mean he wants to risk $62.50 to win $100. He means he wants to risk $100 to win $160.

So “Wager Amount” means you want to bet in round numbers the way almost everyone who’s used to American-style odds prefers to bet. If you instead want the flexibility to bet more unconventionally (like risking $100 to win $57.14), the “Risk Amount” or “Win Amount” boxes enable you to do that.

In any case, whichever of the three boxes you use, the next page will be a confirmation screen, and it’ll specify exactly what you’re risking and what you stand to win. Just check that to make sure you’re getting the wager you want before committing to it.