The Date : November 9, 2013
The Venue: American Airlines Arena, Miami Florida
The Teams: Miami Heat hosting the Boston Celtics
On one side of the court was the Miami Heat fresh off winning back to back Championships, and boasting superstar trio Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosh. On the other side of the court was the unfancied Boston Celtics who entered the season expecting to have very little chance of making the playoffs.
Miami started the match at an average price of $1.07, with Boston starting at an average of $9.85.
At the end of the first quarter the Miami Heat led the Boston Celtics 31-25. The Second quarter saw Miami suffer from defensive lapses as Boston rallied to take the Half Time Lead 60-59. The third quarter was a more defensive affair as Miami again edged ahead 82-80
The 4th quarter is where it really got interesting from both a betting and an overall match perspective. Or more precisely it was the final 5 seconds of play that saw the unthinkable happen. Boston trailed by 110-106 when Gerald Wallace scored off a layup with 1.6seconds left on the clock to get Boston within 2. Prior to that shot you could have laid Miami at extremely minimal risk. Wallace then fouled Dwayne Wade who missed the first free throw. With next to no time on the clock, Wade knew that if he made the second time would stop giving Boston a genuine chance to tie the game up, so he deliberately bounced the second off the backboard. The ball only had to hit the rim to start the clock, but his mistake was that it didn’t, and thus Boston got the ball back with 1.6 seconds. As if to rub salt in to the wound, Wallace inbounded the ball from in front of the Heat bench to find Jeff Green in the corner who arched the ball over the outstretched hands of Lebron and into the net for 3 points giving Boston an unlikely 111-110 victory
Money to be made
At half-time “Back and Lay” punters had already been able to green up their sheets and would have been able to watch the theatrics play out knowing they would bank a profit either way. Starting at $1.07, Miami’s price had tumbled down to around $1.03 at the end of the first quarter. Here’s a good opportunity to lay Miami for minimal risk, you would have risked $30 for the chance to make $1000. At Half Time though, with Boston hitting the lead, Miami’s price had drifted to around $1.25, and a $200 bet on Miami at half time would have returned you $250. So here you have a total outlay of $230 and either going to profit $20 with a $250 return if Miami win. Or profit $770 on a $1000 return should Boston go on to win the match. So pre-match, only a speculator or recreational punter would have put their cash on Boston, live-betting has allowed the serious punter to profit as a result of the score fluctuations without taking much of a risk.
For sportsbook readers you would have noted that whilst your bookie would offer you live betting on NBA matches, they offer no facility to be able to ‘Lay” a selection. To do that, you need to place your bets via a Betting exchange. There are a few good Betting Exchanges around such as World Bet Exchange (WBX.com) and Betfair.
WBX.com is perhaps the best of the exchanges for NBA bettors. The commission rate is lower than Betfair which is key, and they also offer a loyalty discount for high volume punters which has the potential to reduce commission rates to as low as 1.2%. With multiple games every day of the week over the best part of 8 months this can be a real cost saving to those who love their NBA.
Additionally, winners are also most certainly welcome at WBX.com and it does not have a reputation for closing accounts of those who win to match unlike a lot of sportsbooks, and does not have any premium charges on winners like other exchanges, notably Betfair.