On the eve of Super Bowl XX, Caesars Sportsbook bookmaker Art Manteris wanted to capitalize on the interest surrounding the famed 1985 Chicago Bears, who would be playing the New England Patriots in New Orleans for the Lombardi Trophy.
Bears coach Mike Ditka had been using defensive tackle William “The Refrigerator” Perry in the backfield on certain short-yardage plays all season, so Manteris thought offering a proposition bet on the rookie to score a touchdown would be a good way to generate handle and potential profit. Longtime Las Vegas bookmaker and current DraftKings sportsbook director Johnny Avello recalls that Ditka had been downplaying the idea of Perry getting the ball in the Super Bowl.
Caesars set Perry’s odds to score a touchdown at +2000 and immediately saw a flood of action — so much that the book had to shorten the number to +200 by the time the game kicked off. When Perry found the end zone in the fourth quarter of Chicago’s 46-10 win, it was a huge loss for the sportsbook and others that had latched on to the craze. It also started a new tradition for America’s biggest football game.
“We never had this real extensive menu back then, but we would put up quite a few props. Always have the first half, maybe passing yards and things of that nature,” Avello told ESPN. “But that prop kind of set everything off, because then the media really took attention of props.”
Nearly 40 years after Perry plunged into the end zone and made betting history, the Super Bowl returns to New Orleans, and prop betting has grown into a behemoth. Each week, sportsbooks offer dozens of markets per game, with that number stretching into the hundreds once the big game rolls around.
As a result, there are bound to be some strange props that hit every year.
“With the elevation of this big game and how teams treat it, anything can happen,” Caesars head of football Joey Feazel told ESPN. “These wild kinds of bets that are higher odds have a better chance than they would in a regular game.”
Opening kickoff for a touchdown
If the Refrigerator Perry situation taught sportsbooks anything, it’s that bettors will latch on to storylines from the regular season when placing their Super Bowl wagers.
In 2007, it was another Bears rookie who garnered similar attention ahead of Super Bowl XLI. Devin Hester had become known for his kick returning ability throughout his first season in the league, which led bookmakers to offer props on him to return a kickoff for a touchdown any time at +2000 odds and on the opening kick at +7500, according to Avello’s recollection.
It didn’t take long for the props to cash, as Hester became the only player in Super Bowl history to return the opening kickoff for six points.
Kickoff return touchdowns, in general, are rare in Super Bowls (there have been only 10 in history) and have only gotten rarer in recent seasons (there hasn’t been one since 2014, the longest drought since the big game’s first such TD came in 1983). Last year, Caesars offered a kickoff or punt to be returned for a touchdown at any time with +900 odds. This year, ESPN BET is offering a prop on the opening kickoff going for a score at 200-1.
The Super Bowl has never had a punt returned for a touchdown.
First score to be a safety
The Super Bowl has started with a 2-0 score only three times.
The first came during Super Bowl IX in 1975, when Pittsburgh Steelers defensive lineman Dwight White sacked Minnesota Vikings quarterback Fran Tarkenton in the end zone for the only points of the first half. Then, nearly 40 years later, Tom Brady was called for an intentional grounding penalty in his own end zone on the Patriots’ first drive of Super Bowl XLVI against the New York Giants in 2012. Two years later in Super Bowl XLVIII, the first snap from scrimmage went over Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning’s head and running back Knowshon Moreno was downed in the end zone by Seattle Seahawks defensive end Cliff Avril.
“I think we lost $150,000 on the first play of the game,” Avello said. “We didn’t even start the game yet; we didn’t even get into any offensive plays. And so that prop, ‘Safety first scoring play of the game,’ was 100-1. You won’t find that 100-1 any longer.”
Modern sportsbooks split this prop among the teams playing, with ESPN BET listing each team at +7500 for last year’s Super Bowl.
Non-QB to throw for a touchdown
When a team reaches the Super Bowl, offensive coordinators usually are not hesitant to dip into their bag of trick plays. Recently, that has meant relying on players beyond the quarterback to throw passes.
“It just happens more often on the bigger stage for the Super Bowl than it would for your probabilities of it happening in the regular season,” Feazel said. “So that kind of adds a little difference in how pricing goes into these markets.”
FanDuel listed “Any non-QB to throw a passing touchdown” at +3500 last season ahead of Super Bowl LVIII, and San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Jauan Jennings delivered with a 21-yard TD pass to running back Christian McCaffrey in the second quarter. He was the sixth non-QB to throw a TD pass in Super Bowl history, and the second in the past three seasons.
Super Bowl LII saw the birth of the “Philly Special,” as Philadelphia Eagles tight end Trey Burton threw a touchdown pass to quarterback Nick Foles. While it’s not known what kind of odds the Philly Special might have garnered, ESPN BET offered “Any QB to record a reception” at +2500 and “Any QB to score a receiving TD” at +6000 last year.
Player to record an octopus
A relatively new phenomenon in football, an octopus describes a set of plays where one player scores a touchdown and the ensuing 2-point conversion. Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts became the first player to accomplish this feat in the big game at Super Bowl LVII two years ago, when the prop cashed at DraftKings with +1400 odds.
“That one’s generally not as popular,” Feazel said. “Some people will just see ‘octopus,’ and we put the disclaimers of what it is, but they still don’t know what it is, and so people tend to shy away from that one.”
With the growing prevalence of 2-point conversions, the bet could become more popular, especially with Hurts back in the big game. Last year, ESPN BET offered the market at +1600 odds.
Super Bowl to go to overtime
Only two Super Bowls have needed overtime in NFL history. The New England Patriots and Atlanta Falcons were the first teams to play an extra period when Brady led the Patriots to a 34-28 comeback victory in Super Bowl LI (2017). The other OT decided last year’s Super Bowl LVIII, when the Kansas City Chiefs clinched a thrilling victory over the San Francisco 49ers.
“The overtime market is always one of the most popular, and usually it’s within the top 20 most-bet markets,” Feazel said. “As the line trends down as you’re getting more bets, you’re always going to have the sharp bettors lay the big ‘No.’ They’re always going for a boring Super Bowl, and that is one of the ‘No’s’ that they usually bet into.”
BetMGM reported 90% of bets on “Yes” for Super Bowl LVIII at +800 odds and expects “similar betting for overtime this year.” DraftKings said it took a $1,000 wager at +1000 odds for the market last year, which netted $10,000.
The longest Super Bowl MVP odds
One of the most popular betting markets each year is for Super Bowl MVP, which can provide value for bettors who are willing to put up their money well ahead of time.
“We’re opening those up when the playoffs are beginning,” Feazel said. “We’re taking action throughout the playoffs, so — if you’re wanting to hone in on [Patrick] Mahomes, you’re wanting to hone in on a bigger quarterback — you can bet them early if they do end up making the game.”
Taking a quarterback for the honor has often paid off, considering 33 of the 59 winners have come from the position. However, non-QBs can provide greater value.
Seahawks linebacker Malcolm Smith was such a long shot to win MVP in 2014 that he wasn’t even listed on any odds board on record. Patriots wide receiver Deion Branch (+1500) had the longest recorded odds to win MVP since 2003 when he took home the award after Super Bowl XXXIX in 2005.
Though a tight end has never won the award, Travis Kelce has been a very popular selection in the market in recent seasons, given his recent exposure to mainstream pop culture. Kelce was the biggest Super Bowl MVP liability at BetMGM and ESPN BET last year, and several sportsbooks leaned into the mania with Taylor Swift-themed props.
Big money on novelty props
One of the most popular Super Bowl prop markets year after year is the coin toss. Though it is permitted in only some jurisdictions, BetMGM and Caesars reported it as one of the five most-bet Super Bowl props last year, while DraftKings placed it in the top three.
“What is appealing is the anticipation. It’s over quick. They’re walking out, they flip the coin, the decision’s made,” Feazel said. “You don’t need football knowledge; it’s heads or tails. It’s a true coin flip.”
For last year’s Super Bowl, one Michigan bettor put down $100,000 for the coin to land on tails; it landed on heads.
The Super Bowl coin toss has landed on tails 30 times and heads 28 times. Heads holds the longest winning streak at five, and has been the winning side for three of the past four Super Bowls.
Some sportsbooks and/or jurisdictions will offer action based on occurrences outside of the normal run of play, though they’re becoming increasingly infrequent, and bookmakers largely are not fans of them.
“I don’t particularly like those types of props,” Avello said. “We didn’t write a whole lot on them, not as much as we would for some of the props that were played out on the field, but they were just good conversation pieces to talk about.”
Nevertheless, three states — Illinois, New Jersey and West Virginia — allow betting on the color of the Gatorade that will be poured on the winning coach, one of the most popular off-the-field props. Chiefs coach Andy Reid got a purple Gatorade bath after each of Kansas City’s past two Super Bowl victories.
Other popular markets for informal or offshore markets include the length of the pregame national anthem, wagers related to the halftime show, and who the MVP will mention first in their speech, but none of those is permitted in any American mobile betting jurisdiction.
Super Bowl bad beats
With so many props on the board, there are bound to be bad beats.
Last year, Brock Purdy barely got over his 12.5 rushing yards prop with 13 on the evening … that is, until he kneeled on the final play of regulation to send the game to overtime and end up with 12.
Similarly, Mahomes’ rushing yards prop was a popular bet for Super Bowl LIV (opening at 27.5 and getting as high as 36.5). With the game in hand, Mahomes kneeled three straight times on the Chiefs’ final possession, bringing his final total down from 44 yards to 29.
“That was close to a six-figure swing [in favor of the house],” Jeff Davis, director of trading for Caesars Sportsbook, told ESPN at the time.