How to read the Lakers board: moneyline, spread, total and the hold

Every Lakers game on the board is laid out as six tables: each side of the moneyline, each side of the spread, and the over and under on the total. A table lines up one position across every venue that prices it. Here is what the columns mean and how each figure is calculated, worked through with a single real line: DraftKings' price on tonight's NBA Cup game against Portland at Crypto.com Arena, as ESPN listed it at about 4:30 p.m. Eastern on Friday.

One game, three markets

Moneyline. You are picking the winner and nothing else. The favorite carries a minus number, which is what it takes to win $100. The underdog carries a plus number, which is what $100 wins. DraftKings had the Lakers at -154 and the Trail Blazers at +130: $154 on Los Angeles to make $100, or $100 on Portland to make $130.

Spread. The favorite gives up points and the underdog gets them. DraftKings had the Lakers -3.5, so they need to win by four or more for that side to pay; Portland pays if it wins or loses by three or fewer. Each side of the spread has its own price. Here it was -104 on the Lakers and -116 on Portland, so the book was charging more to take the points than to give them. Spreads at a sportsbook usually sit near -110 on both sides; on a prediction market, where traders are matched with each other, the two sides tend to land nearer even money.

Total. Ignore the winner and add the two scores. DraftKings set tonight's total at 231.5, with the over at -112 and the under at -108. The over needs 232 or more combined points; the under needs 231 or fewer. The Lakers' first nine games have finished at 232, 242, 255, 265, 190, 207, 256, 255 and 219 combined points, which shows how widely a single game can miss the number in either direction.

These examples show how the board reads. They are not advice, and the prices will have moved by the time you read this.

The per-$100 column

American odds and contract prices are hard to compare by eye, so the board converts every quote to one number: the profit a winning $100 position returns.

• Plus odds: the profit is the number. +130 returns $130.
• Minus odds: 100 divided by the odds, times 100. -154 returns $64.94; -104 returns $96.15; -116 returns $86.21.
• A prediction-market contract at price p (60 cents is 0.60) with a fee rate r: profit = 100 / (p × (1 + r × (1 − p))) − 100.

Say the Lakers trade at 60 cents, roughly -150 and close to the 60.6% that DraftKings' -154 implies. With no fee, $100 buys 166.67 contracts and a win returns $66.67 in profit. At Kalshi's 7% fee rate, some of the $100 pays the fee instead of buying contracts, and the profit drops to $62.13. On the other side, a 40-cent Portland contract returns $150 with no fee and $139.92 at 7%.

How Novig's fee works

Novig's fee depends on when you trade, per the fee table on its offer page:

• Pre-game straight trades pay no fee, so a 60-cent Lakers contract bought before tip-off returns the full $66.67 per $100.
• Live (in-game) trades that take a resting order pay a taker fee of 0.06 × price × (1 − price) per contract, the same rate in every league. The same 60-cent contract bought in-game that way returns $62.76.
• Makers, whose resting orders are the ones filled, pay no fee.

The board prices games before tip-off, so Novig's rows carry no fee.

Best price and the gap

Each table is sorted by the per-$100 figure, highest first, and the top row is marked Best. Novig is pinned to the first row so it is always in view, and every row below shows how many dollars it gives up on the same $100 compared with the leader. On a moneyline that comparison is exact. On a spread or total it holds only when the venues deal the same number; if one has the Lakers -3.5 and another -4, the row is flagged, because in a game that can come down to late free throws, half a point can be worth as much as the price.

The hold

This is the column worth reading first. Convert both sides of a two-way market to implied probabilities and add them. A fair market sums to 100%. Whatever is above that is the venue's cut.

DraftKings' moneyline implies 60.63% for the Lakers (-154) and 43.48% for Portland (+130), a total of 104.11%: a hold of 4.11%. The spread at -104 and -116 sums to 104.68%, a 4.68% hold, and the total at -112 and -108 to 104.75%. All three margins are in the prices before anyone takes a side.

A prediction market has no house on the other side, so its two sides usually sum to within a point or so of 100%. Lakers at 60 cents and Portland at 41 cents add to 101 cents, a hold of about 1%, and that 1% is just the gap between the best buy and the best sell on the order book.

The board prints each venue's hold beside its row, calculated from that venue's two prices when the board last refreshed. It says nothing about who will win. It tells you what the venue charges to take part.

How fresh the numbers are

The board refreshes about every ten minutes. NBA prices move most in the last hours before tip-off, when injury reports are settled; Portland has listed Ja Morant and Shaedon Sharpe as out tonight. Use the board to see which venue tends to pay more on which side, then check the live price before you act. Tonight's game page carries the comparison until tip-off, then becomes the live score and, after the final, the recap. The full schedule is on the team page.

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