Betting big: Tracking Super Bowl LVII wagers

February 4, 2023 ndowd

The countdown to Super Bowl LVII between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Kansas City Chiefs has begun, and the betting at sportsbooks on a game that’s expected to have billions of dollars riding on it is heating up.

We’ll follow it all right here, the biggest bets, the wackiest wagers and the prolific prop bets.

Good luck!

Consensus Super Bowl LVII line:

Eagles (-1.5)
Total: 50

Prop bets hit the board at sportsbooks

Here are some notes from the early action at Caesars Sportsbooks, courtesy of Caesars editorial writer Max Meyer:

• In early coin-flip betting, tails has garnered the majority of the action, including a $5,025 bet on tails placed by a Michigan bettors at -101 odds. Nearly 77% of the money that’s been bet on the Super Bowl coin flip as of Thursday was on tails.

• An Arizona bettor placed a $50,000 bet on Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes to be named MVP of the Super Bowl. The bet was placed earlier in the playoffs when Mahomes was listed at +350 and could win a net $175,000. Mahomes’ odds have improved to +130, behind only Eagles QB Jalen Hurts at +125.

• A bettor in Ontario placed a pair of $500 bets on team’s kicker — Philadelphia’s Jake Elliott (200-1) and Kansas City’s Harrison Butker (200-1) — to be named Super Bowl MVP. A kicker has never won the award.

• Caesars Sportsbook offered a yes/no prop on whether a quarterback will have a reception in the game. More money has been bet on the QB reception prop than any other prop offered by Caesars, the bulk of it on the “No.”

The “Yes” opened at +475, and the “No” at -650.Money poured in on the “No,” including a $13,000 bet by a bettor in New York at -650 for a potential win of $2,000. The “No” had attracted seven bets of at least $1,000, causing the price to grow to -1,200.

Line movement

The opening point spread and total varied somewhat wildly when it was posted by sportsbooks shortly after the Chiefs used a last-second field goal to nip the Cincinnati Bengals in the AFC Championship Game. Caesars Sportsbook and the SuperBook were among the operators that opened the line at pick ’em. Other books, including DraftKings and FanDuel, opened the Eagles as small favorites, while still other shops, like PointsBet and Circa, installed the Chiefs as 2.5-point favorites.

Within hours, the Eagles emerged as the consensus favorites, and the line grew to as high as Philadelphia -2.5. It ticked back down to Eagles -1.5 the following days.

The over/under total, which opened at a consensus 49.5, had ticked up to 50 as the calendar turned to midnight.

By the Numbers

$3.02 billion: The amount wagered on the Super Bowl with Nevada sportsbooks since the state’s gaming control began tracking betting on the NFL championship in 1991. A record $179.8 million was bet on last year’s Super Bowl with Nevada sportsbooks.

$233.2 million: The net win on the Super Bowl for Nevada sportsbooks since 1991.

2: The number of Super Bowls that Nevada sportsbooks have suffered a net loss. The books lost a record $2.6 million when the underdog New York Giants beat the New England Patriots 17-14 in Super Bowl XII. The bookies also got dinged for approximately $397,000 in 1995 when the heavily favored San Francisco 49ers won and covered in a 49-26 win over the San Diego Chargers in 1995.