Teaser bets explained: how the points, prices & Wong teaser work

By Barry Healy EditorPublished: 29 October 2026, 14:22 EDT7 min read

Last reviewed 29 Oct 2026 · Editorial policy

A quiet empty racecourse at dusk, the grass glowing faintly under a fading orange sky, with a single white rail fence stretching toward distant floodlights.

A teaser moves every point spread or total in the bettor’s favour, & this guide sets out what that costs, the break-even maths behind it, why the numbers 3 & 7 matter & how sportsbooks responded to the Wong teaser.

What a teaser is

Covers describes a teaser as “a variation of a parlay bet that allows the bettor to move the point spread or the Over/Under a designated number of points in their favor.” A parlay is one bet that combines several selections, & all of them must win. A point spread is the handicap given to the favourite, & a total (or over/under) is a line on the combined score.

Action Network calls a teaser “really just a parlay with alternate point spreads or totals, moved in your favor.” According to Wikipedia, the bettor gets better spreads but “realizes a lower return on the bets in the event of a win.”

Every leg must win. The Covers teaser guide says that if even one game loses, the whole teaser is graded as a loss, & that teasers “must include two or more bets (although some books require three or more).” Covers adds that many Las Vegas sportsbook rules require at least three games per teaser, & Wikipedia says teaser cards usually need three or more teams & use half points to avoid ties.

How the points move

Wikipedia uses Super Bowl XLV, Pittsburgh against Green Bay, to show a 6-point teaser. Pittsburgh, a +2.5 underdog, becomes +8.5. Green Bay, a -2.5 favourite, becomes a +3.5 underdog.

The total of 45.5 moves the same way: a bet on the over is taken at 39.5, & a bet on the under at 51.5. Wikipedia notes that the same selections as a parlay would win $260 on a $100 bet, while the teaser wins $100 on a $110 bet, or 10 to 11 odds.

Covers says the most common teaser is the 6-point version, & some books also offer 6.5-point & 7-point teasers. Its NFL example teases the Baltimore Ravens from -9.5 to -3.5 & the Chicago Bears from +2.5 to +8.5, so the Ravens must win by four or more & the Bears must win outright or lose by eight or fewer.

That example pays -110. In American odds, -110 means a $110 stake returns $100 profit if the bet wins.

What teasers pay

Action Network says “the most common teaser is a two-team, six-point football teaser,” priced at about -120 depending on the book. Prices vary, & the sources show a range.

In a comparison of NFL teaser prices run at 10 sportsbooks in New Jersey, Action Network’s price table lists a two-team, 6-point price of -120 for bet365 & DraftKings, -125 for Caesars & Hard Rock, -130 for BetMGM & -134 for FanDuel. The same table lists the pricing type for all six as fixed.

Covers’ sample table lists two-team teasers at -110 for 6 points, -120 for 6.5 & -135 for 7, & notes that payouts vary between sportsbooks. Action Network’s table of DraftKings teaser payouts lists a two-team, 7-point teaser at -140.

The Wizard of Vegas quotes an MGM-Mirage pay table for two-pick NFL teasers: 10 to 12 for 6 points, 10 to 13 for 6.5 & 10 to 14 for 7. A price of 10 to 12 pays 10 units of profit for every 12 staked.

The break-even maths

Because both legs must win, each leg has to win far more often than a single bet does. Action Network puts the per-leg break-even for a two-team, 6-point teaser at 72.4% at -110 & 75.2% at -130.

Its teaser explainer says “bettors must win each leg 74% of the time for a 6-point teaser to break even, assuming you’re betting it at -120.” By comparison, Action Network’s NFL teaser guide says a single bet needs 52.4% to break even at -110 & 54.6% at -120.

That guide also gives historical cover rates from its database. All NFL regular season spreads since 2003, teased six points, covered 68.7% of the time, below the 72.4% hurdle.

Filtering for teases that cross both 3 & 7 changes the result in that data: underdogs of +1.5 to +2.5 covered 75.2% (374-123) & favourites of -7.5 to -8.5 covered 76.8% (218-66), a combined 75.8%.

Why 3 & 7 matter

Key numbers are the winning margins that come up most often because of how football is scored. Action Network says margins of 3, 6 & 7 make up 30% of all NFL finishing score differentials.

According to Covers’ teaser strategy guide, the six-point stretch from three through seven has a frequency of 44%. The highest six-point stretch for totals is about 19%, typically from 40 to 45, which is why Covers says teasing totals captures far fewer results.

Zero works the other way. Covers says only 17 of 8,279 games since 1995 (0.21%) ended in a tie, so moving a line from -1 to +1 gains one point while paying for two.

The Wong teaser

Covers says that “in his book Sharp Sports Betting, Stanford Wong outlined a teaser strategy” that became known as the Wong teaser. The method was a two-team, six-point teaser using only “favorites of -7.5 to -8.5 and underdogs from +1.5 to +2.5.”

Teasing those ranges six points carries each leg across both 3 & 7. Action Network credits the idea to Wong, describing it as “a nearly 25-year-old concept popularized by blackjack author Stanford Wong,” with examples such as teasing a team from +2.5 to +8.5 or from -7.5 to -1.5.

Covers says Wong teasers “provided high profits for over a decade.”

How sportsbooks responded

Covers says Wong “arguably changed the way books offer their lines and how they price and grade wagers.” It lists three changes: “Prices of two-team teasers have become shorter,” “Many books now grade any teaser with a push leg in it as a loss,” & books “deliberately try to stay out of the -7.5 to -8.5 and +1.5 to +2.5 ranges.”

Covers also points to lopsided juice, meaning the bookmaker’s margin built into a price, on non-key numbers. Its example shows a line of +9.0 at -125 & -9.0 at +105 rather than an even +7.5 & -7.5 at -110, which Covers says “is due to teaser protection implemented by the sportsbook.”

Action Network says a -110 price on two-team, 6-point teasers is “no longer available in the United States from the 10+ books we’ve looked at.” It found that BetRivers/Kambi, ESPN BET & Fanatics price teasers dynamically using alternate spreads.

Under that approach the price depends on the lines chosen. In Action Network’s example from ESPN BET, a teaser crossing 3 & 7 on both legs was priced at -142, while one that did not was -115.

Pushes: house rules differ

A push is a result that lands exactly on the spread or total, so the stake on that line is returned. How a push affects a teaser depends on the sportsbook.

Covers’ teaser guide says a pushed leg is removed, & “a two-team teaser with a push would be graded as a push overall, and the original wager would be returned.” Covers’ strategy guide says rules vary: “Some books count pushes as losses. Some count pushes as pushes. Some offer you different odds for either.”

Action Network describes another approach, in which a push “will simply drop that leg out, and adjust the payout.” Its example turns a $24 bet to win $20 at -120 into a one-team teaser at around -265, winning $9.06.

Action Network also says Caesars in Las Vegas refunds the entire bet if one leg pushes & the other wins, but that Caesars elsewhere in the country does not.

The cost for most bettors

The Wizard of Vegas says teasers give “6 to 7 free points on each pick” but that wins are significantly reduced in return. The house edge is the average share of each stake the sportsbook expects to keep.

Based on every NFL game & side from the 1983 to 2008 seasons at MGM-Mirage payouts, it puts the house edge on two-pick side teasers at 14.13% for 6 points, 13.60% for 6.5 & 12.61% for 7. For two-pick teasers on totals at 6 points, the figure is 17.01%.

Those figures cover every side rather than the filtered ranges in Action Network’s data. Action Network itself says “betting teasers is in general a -EV decision,” meaning negative expected value.

Questions

What is a 6-point teaser?

It is a teaser that moves each spread or total six points in the bettor’s favour, & Covers says it is the most common size. In Wikipedia’s Super Bowl XLV example, Pittsburgh +2.5 became +8.5.

What does a two-team, 6-point NFL teaser pay?

Action Network found prices from -120 at bet365 & DraftKings to -134 at FanDuel at sportsbooks tested in New Jersey. The MGM-Mirage table quoted by the Wizard of Vegas paid 10 to 12.

What happens if a teaser leg pushes?

It depends on the book. Covers says a two-team teaser with a push is graded a push & refunded, Action Network describes the leg dropping out with a lower payout, & Covers notes many books grade a teaser with a push leg as a loss.

What is a Wong teaser?

Covers says Stanford Wong outlined it in Sharp Sports Betting as a two-team, six-point teaser using only favourites of -7.5 to -8.5 & underdogs of +1.5 to +2.5. Teasing those lines six points crosses both 3 & 7.

Why is teasing through zero considered poor value?

Covers says only 17 of 8,279 NFL games since 1995 (0.21%) ended tied. Moving a line from -1 to +1 therefore gains one meaningful point while paying for two.

Sources

Sources checked 29 October 2026. Information only. 18+.

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