How to Bet On Golf – Betting the Masters

Betting on professional golf may be one of the smaller handles at most of the top offshore sportsbooks taking online action for this sport, but even causal sports bettors will take an active interest in betting on the sports four Majors.

The 2018 Majors’ season is slated to get underway this Thursday with the opening round of the Masters from August National in Augusta, Georgia. Being the first Major on the slate helps to attract some added betting action giving its timing in early spring. The course itself is a main attraction for golf fans and bettors alike given its pristine playing conditions and iconic images such as Amen Corner consisting of the 11^th, 12^th and 13^th holes.

Betting on the Masters opens up a number of interesting options given the odds posted for both tournament futures and props. Tiger Woods has won the Masters four times over the course of his career. He is playing some of his best golf in recent years which has led a few books to release an entire page of props just for his performance this week at Augusta.

The most common way to bet the Masters is to pick an outright winner. This is extremely hard to do in any PGA event, let alone the most prestigious title up for grabs all season long. You can go chalk on favorites such as Rory McIlroy (+1000), Jordan Spieth (+1100) and Dustin Johnson (+1200) for an incredible return on winning ticket. However, the fact that odds are so long and so tight for three of the top golfers in the field is a clear sign of just how tight the competition for this year’s Masters is shaping up to be.

As we get closer to the start of Thursday’s opening round, you will begin to find futures odds posted for a Top 5 and Top 10 finish. The return on these bets will be much smaller than picking the outright winner, but much easier to hit. Going with Woods to stun the field at +1200 with his first victory in a Major since 2008 sounds good on paper, but betting on him to finish in the Top 10 is a much smarter play.

Some of the best value in the betting odds for the Masters is for head-to-head matchups between some of the top competitors in the field. You can bet on these matchups on a round-by-round basis or for the four rounds of the tournament as a whole. If you think that Ricky Fowler is in for a big week at Augusta at +2000 betting odds to finally win his first career Major, then the best betting strategy would be to bet him head-to-head against some of the favorites at favorable odds. Fowler can finish second to last in this year’s Masters and still pay off as long as the player he was paired against in that bet finishes last.

Whether you place all of your sports bets at one online betting account or across a wide spectrum of online sportsbooks, props are probably the best and most exciting way to bet on the Masters. Just like any other major sports betting event, the top books will release of full set of props surrounding the action on the course over the four rounds. Betting on speculative props such as ‘will there be a hole-in-one’ is an educated guess at best. Betting on the highest finishing player based on origin of country requires some deeper thought.

One thing to keep in mind, is the high level of talent in the Masters’ field. The best of the best in the world are taking aim at this title. This tends to overvalue high-profile players, such as McIlroy, Mickelson and Woods while undervaluing some of the hottest golfers in the field such as Jon Rahm, Hideki Matsuyama and Tommy Fleetwood.