Longleaf Picks
Betting Guide
How to read a pick card, what every tag means, and how to put them to work. Five minutes here will make every card easier to use.
Reading a pick card
Every card is one game. Our models look for the part of the game the betting line gets wrong, and pick the side they expect to beat the spread (to “cover”). We don’t try to pick who wins outright: a team can win and still fail to cover.
- The pick and its line
- The team we’re backing and its current spread, for example Delaware +3.5. The line is the average of major sportsbooks when we published. Your book may differ slightly, and a better number is always worth looking for.
- Cover chance
- Our estimated probability that the pick covers. At standard −110 odds you need to win 52.4% of your bets just to break even, and the bar marks that point. Real edges against the spread are small, usually a few points above 50%.
- EV per $100
- The expected profit of a $100 bet at −110, given the cover chance. It can be negative when our decision model mildly prefers the other side; the tags tell you when that’s the case.
- Fair line
- The spread at which we’d call the game a coin flip.
- Edge
- How many points better the posted line is than our fair line, for the pick. Bigger is better.
- More details
- Tap More details on any card for:
- Line movement: where the line opened, where it is now, and where our line-movement model expects it to close. “Early line” means the official opening line wasn’t posted yet, so we show the earliest line we captured.
- Win chance: our chance of each team winning outright, next to the prediction market’s price, for comparison only.
- Why this pick: the main reasons behind the pick, and each tag on the card explained with this game’s numbers.
Our ensemble
Three kinds of models look at every game. The tags tell you how much they agree.
Spread ensemble
Makes the pick. It compares both teams on hundreds of stats and estimates how far the betting line is off.
Decision model
A second opinion. It also weighs game context (weather, travel, coaching trends...) and each program’s evolution throughout a season, and decides whether the game is worth a bet, and on which side.
Line-movement model
Predicts how the betting market will move the line between the open and kickoff.
The betting tags
A card shows up to three tags, at most one from each group below, in this order. A card with no tags simply has nothing notable to flag.
1Model agreement
Do our models back the pick?
2The line’s move
Has the betting market done what our line-movement model expected? Early in the week, before the line has moved, this tag is about timing. Once it has moved, it tells you how the market reacted.
3Closing line value (CLV)
CLV is how the number you bet compares with where the line ends up. Beating the closing line consistently is the best-known sign of a sharp bettor. These tags show the CLV so far: how far the line has moved since the open, from the pick’s side.
The records under each tag come from our walk-forward simulation: our full process replayed week by week since 2022 (2022 through 2026 week 6), retrained every week using only what was known at the time, the same way it runs live. Records are flat bets at −110 with pushes excluded. Break-even is 52.4%; every pick together went 51.8% on 2,993 bets. Past results don’t guarantee future ones, and some samples are small.
How the tags work together
Tags mean the most in combination. Here is every pairing that shows up on our cards often enough to judge (at least 150 bets since 2022), from best to worst. “Bet at” is the line the record was graded at: Open when the tag says to bet early, otherwise the closing line. Pairings that won less than half the time are marked Do not bet.
| Tags on the card | Bet at | Bets | Win rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| UnanimousMarket Followed | Close | 358 | 58.7%210–148 |
| Unanimous+CLV | Close | 364 | 55.8%203–161 |
| Majority−CLV | Close | 161 | 55.3%89–72 |
| MajorityMarket Followed | Close | 166 | 54.8%91–75 |
| UnanimousBet now | Open | 219 | 53.9%118–101 |
| UnanimousMarket Rejected | Close | 213 | 53.1%113–100 |
| Unanimous−CLV | Close | 168 | 53.0%89–79 |
Walk-forward simulation, 2022 through 2026 week 6, flat bets at −110, pushes excluded. Break-even is 52.4%; rates between 50% and 52.4% are shown in grey because they lose money at −110. Some pairings can’t happen: Unanimous already means the line is expected to move toward the pick, so it never appears with Wait for the line. Past results don’t guarantee future ones.
Putting the tags to work
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Start with model agreement
In our historical testing, picks where all three models agree have done better than the rest, and Majority picks have been close to break-even. That’s a tendency over hundreds of games, not a promise about any one game.
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Use the line tags for timing
Bet now means the number may get worse, so don’t wait. Wait for the line means check back later in the week. Once a card shows Market Followed, the expected move has already happened.
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Look for agreement between groups
The picks we like most combine a strong first tag with a market that’s moving our way, such as Unanimous with Market Followed or +CLV. See how the tags work together for every pairing’s record, and use the filter buttons on the picks page to find them quickly.
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Always shop for the best number
Half a point matters, especially around common final margins like 3 and 7. If your book offers a better line than the card shows, take it.
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Bet small, flat stakes
Even good spread picks lose around 45% of the time, and a few weeks of results can swing either way by chance. Use the same small stake on every bet and judge results over a season, not a weekend.
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Let your bets ride
We never recommend hedging or cashing out. Cash-out offers are priced well below a bet’s fair value, and a pick the line moved against still wins a large share of the time.
Glossary
- Spread
- The points a favorite must win by. −7 means favored by 7; +7 means getting 7 points.
- Cover
- Beat the spread. A +7 underdog covers by losing by fewer than 7, or by winning.
- Push
- The final margin lands exactly on the spread. The bet is refunded.
- ATS
- “Against the spread”: a record of covers, not wins.
- −110 (the juice)
- Standard spread pricing: risk $110 to win $100. It’s why 52.4%, not 50%, is break-even.
- Opening line
- The first spread the sportsbooks post for a game, usually the Sunday before.
- Closing line
- The spread at kickoff, the market’s final and most informed number.
- CLV
- Closing line value: how much better (or worse) the number you bet was than the closing line.
- EV
- Expected value: the average profit or loss a bet would return if it were made many times.
Bet responsibly
Our picks and tags are statistical signals that we track in public, not guarantees. No model beats the spread every week. Only bet what you can afford to lose, and only where sports betting is legal for you. If gambling stops being fun, call 1-800-GAMBLER for free, confidential help.