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Parlays

A parlay is a single bet that links together 2 or more, up to 16, individual bets. The parlay is comprised of a series of bets on teams, over/under bets or any mixture of the two.

For the parlay to be a winning wager, every single one of its individual wagers must win. If any of the individual bets fails, then the entire parlay wager loses. However, if one of the individual bets is a "push", then the parlay only takes into account the remaining bets. For example, a three team parlay would become a two team parlay, while a two team parlay would become a straight bet; any of these reductions would also reduce the payoff.

So, why do bettors prefer wagering on a parlay instead of making several individual bets? That's because the payouts for parlays are significantly higher. But always keep in mind that since every one of the individual bets must win to succeed it's an all-or-nothing proposition. If you win two out of three bets, where you would have won those two as individual straight bets, the parlay still loses. You are given better odds because predicting the outcomes of several bets together is more difficult than predicting any individual play.

Open Parlay(s): A parlay can be left with open teams/contests or open spots, and be filled later when you are sure of your selection. There is a week's time to fill in those open spots. If the wager is not completed by this time, it is considered a loss.

Understanding How Parlays Work

A parlay is a selection of two or more wagering outcomes, in which the odds for the payouts increase with the number of teams (sides/totals) chosen by the player; the more teams you choose to parlay, the better the payout. You can combine different sports, pointspreads and moneylines in win/loss and/or totals betting.

Allow me to explain the math behind fixed odds parlay payouts. Fixed odds parlays involve football and basketball spreads and totals at standard odds (-110). Rather than having to calculate the odds of every parlay uniquely, Vegas books (and now offshore) ones have instead derived a standard set of "fixed odds" payoffs for such parlays. Let's look at a simple 2-team parlay using a real example:

The line is Dallas -3.5 and the total is 36. Parlaying a side and the total gives us four combinations.

  • Dallas -3.5 and Over 36
  • Dallas -3.5 and Under 36
  • Chicago +3.5 and Over 36
  • Chicago +3.5 and Under 36

The odds of any one of these bets being a winner are 1-in-4 so the actual odds would be 3/1. In actuality, most books pay 2.6/1 (you see it commonly written as 13/5) assuming all bets are at stand payoffs (-110).

To clearly illustrate how this works for the house let's assume four different players, Allan, Bob, Charlie and David, each bet exactly $100 on a different parlay of the four possible ones for this game, and Parlay D is the winner. The house would collect $100 from Allan, Bob and Charlie (who bet A, B, and C respectively) and would pay the $260 to David (who had the winning play on Parlay D). David would also get his risk money back. In total the house would collect $400 in handle, collect $300 and pay out $260 for a net gain of $40, which is a theoretical 10% hold (300-260=40, 40/400=10%).

For 3-team parlays it is essentially the same calculation except there are 8 possible outcomes and the payoff is 6-1. With $100 bets on each outcome, books would collect $700 from the losing bets and pay out $600 to the winner for a net profit of $100 on $800 in handle for a 12.5% theoretical hold. Below is a chart using standard Las Vegas payouts showing the actual odds, Las Vegas payout and the house edge.

# of Teams Actual Odds Las Vegas Payout House Edge
2 3/1 2.6/1 10.00%
3 7/1 6/1 12.50%
4 15/1 10/1 31.25%
5 31/1 20/1 34.38%
6 63/1 40/1 35.94%
7 127/1 75/1 40.63%
8 255/1 150/1 41.02%
9 511/1 300/1 41.21%
10 1027/1 700/1 31.54%

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that parlays bigger than 3-teams should do very well for books, but in fact they don't hold this much. It is hard to split the action on one game and it is impossible to evenly split the action in parlays involving multiple games.

We often see the same picks over and over in different parlays and so the higher juice is simply to cover the risk of having to pay out the occasional very large bet. Any bookmaker that has had a good weekend ruined by a big 1000/1 payout on a parlay knows the feeling and would argue that the juice isn't high enough! Remember that these gambling odds are just the Vegas standard and that there a wide range of different payout tables.