What is a 20 cent line / a 30 cent line ???

[Albator]

Hello everybody. As living in Europe most of the books i use are european bookmakers,and therefore i don't know a lot about US books and other... That 's why i need your help to understand: i often read on forum people talking about "20 cent line" or "30 cent line"... But what is it exactly? What does it mean? I would really appreciate if someone could try to explain to me in simple words and terms in English coz my english is not very good (or if someone could even explain it in french that would be even greater! :-) )

[MadTiger]

The difference between the odds. -150 and +130 in American odds. You already know it as -1.50 and +1.30, for example. That would be a 20-cent line.

Babelfish translation (I checked the grammar): La différence entre les cotes. -150 et + 130 en cotes américaines. Vous connaissez déjà comme 1,50 et +1.30, par exemple. Ce serait une ligne de 20 cents.

[LT Profits]

20-cent line: -110/-110 or -130/+110; 30-cent line -115/-115 or -140/+110; dime line -105/-105 or -130/+120; nickel line -103/-102 or -105/+100. The "cents" refers to the difference in the odds between the two teams, although all line sets have cut-off points where that differential increases.

[benandjerry]

The difference between the odds. -150 and +130 in American odds. You already know it as -1.50 and +1.30, for example. That would be a 20-cent line.

Babelfish translation (I checked the grammar): La différence entre les cotes. -150 et + 130 en cotes américaines. Vous connaissez déjà comme 1,50 et +1.30, par exemple. Ce serait une ligne de 20 cents.

If you're not familiar with XX-cent lines chances are you may not familiar with US odds either, let me expand a little further the different ways to display odds. Americans commonly use their "US odds", if you got -150 line that basically means for every 150 you wager you'll win 100, for + money odds as the +130 mentioned above for every 100 you wager you'll win 130.

Converting them to standard european decimal odds, the plus money odds are really simple. +130 the same as 2.3, +180 same as 2.8, +250 same as 3.5 and so on. Its pretty simple without doing any math, but you could just devide the US odds with 100 and add 1.

For the negative odds you may have to do a little math if you arent familiar with them already. If you have a line of -150 to win 100, you take the 100 and devide it by the 150 you have to pay for your wager and then add 1. 100/150 + 1=1.667, -120 would be 100/120 + 1=1.833 and so on.