One of the easiest ways to make money when it comes to betting on college football is by betting on props. Proposition bets are bets on an individual game that aren’t your traditional types of bets. Traditional bets revolve around things like the amount of points scored (the total or over/under), whether a team wins by a certain amount of points or not (spread betting), and whether or not a team wins the game (moneyline betting).Coellege Football prop betting includes everything from the mundane to the downright silly.
How to find College Football Prop Bets
While you don’t typically see as many prop bets available for college football games as you do professional football games, most sportsbooks will still offer some props on college football games. The general rule of thumb is that the bigger a game is, the more prop bets you will see offered. Whether it’s because the game is between two rivals, between two of the top teams in the country, or simply a nationally televised game, sportsbooks want to capture your attention when it matters and will do so by listing prop bets.
In college football, there are a lot more prop betting options between Power Five teams than Group of Five teams. There are two main reasons for that. The first reason is that Power Five teams attract far more publicity than their Group of Five counterparts. You see that in every aspect of college football. Power Five schools have more lucrative contracts, see their games broadcast on bigger channels to broader audiences, and are constantly getting media attention. Meanwhile, Group of Five schools struggle to find the spotlight. We generally only hear about those schools when they are having fantastic seasons or pull off a big upset.
The second reason is somewhat related to the first. All the extra media attention, scrutiny and devotion makes bettors want more when it comes to those teams. Fans and bettors are invested in those teams more than others, and they want more options to bet on their games. Additionally, it’s much easier for sportsbooks to set prop bet odds in those games because there is more information available for those teams.
Types of College Football Prop Bets
Generally speaking, there are two main types of prop bets: game bets and player bets. When it comes to game bets, there are dozens of small things to bet over the course of a quarter or a game. You can bet on minor things, like whether the coinflip will be heads or tails and whether the total number of points scored will be odd or even. Of course, those bets are a toss up and most bettors prefer to wager on something that can actually be analyzed.
For instance, you will often see prop bets involving kicking and field goals. There may be options such as the length of the longest successful field goal in a game, the total number of field goals attempted in a game, and whether or not there will be an unsuccessful field goal attempt. These are items that a shrewd handicapper can pick up on. Diehard fans of a team might be more likely to know whether or not their coach is more aggressive or conservative in certain situations, giving them an edge on the sportsbook.
The more popular prop bets revolve around betting on a player’s performance. Bettors can wager on how many touchdowns or interceptions a quarterback will throw, how many passes they will complete, and how many yards they throw for in a game. For running backs, you can bet on the amount of carries a player gets, the number of yards a player rushes for, whether or not they score a touchdown, and how they do in the receiving game. Receivers typically see prop bets such as how many receptions they will have in a game, how many receiving yards they pick up, and whether or not they will score a touchdown.
These bets are more attractive than other prop bets. Much in the same way we are drawn toward fantasy football because we want to prove that some players are better than their peers at that position, betting on player prop bets gives fans the extra incentive of cheering for or against a player.
College Football Prop Betting Strategies
You aren’t going to get rich off of prop bets, but you can make some nice cash on them. Sportsbooks aren’t willing to take much of a risk when it comes to prop bets, typically making the max wager $100 and not allowing you to re-bet the line if it moves. That’s because sharp bettors can have a field day with these types of bets.
When sportsbooks set the lines for prop bets, they usually aren’t putting a terrible amount of thought into the odds. Generally speaking, sportsbooks will simply use a historical average for prop bets or a player’s average for prop bets involving players. They may tweak the line a little bit one way or the other depending on factors like the popularity of a team, but for the most part the lines are based on averages.
That gives the bettor an opportunity to make a profit whether they use qualitative data or quantitative data. For instance, if a quarterback has played in eight games and thrown for over 500 yards in two games and under 300 yards in six games, the average will be heavily skewed. A simple average in this case will create a lot of value on the under.
Fans who scour the internet in search of news can use that knowledge to win on prop bets too. If a bettor knows that a team is particularly thin at a position or weak in a specific area, they can use that to their advantage.
One last thing to keep in mind: Many fans who bet on prop bets are doing so to cheer on their team or a specific player. They are more likely than not to bet the over, creating good value on the under, especially for the most popular players.
More College Football Betting Guides:
College Football Regular Season Betting Guide and NCAA Football Odds
2018 College Football Betting: Conference Odds, Picks and Strategies
2018 College Football Playoff: Betting Odds, Strategy, Predictions and Picks