Bettors have been enraged with ESPN BET after a five-leg Same Game Parlay went viral on social media for voiding because one leg — Eagles -3 — pushed. The rest of the selections won and would have paid out a healthy profit. Instead, the bettor just got his money back.
ESPN BET launched earlier this month in 17 states and figures to eat into market share across the ecosystem as it integrates fully into game broadcasts.
And while voiding SGPs because one leg pushes is standard practice across the industry — for reasons we'll delve into — ESPN BET has particularly predatory house rules relative to its competition. The rules of which have, ironically, nothing to do with this recent controversy regarding Bills vs. Eagles.
@ESPNBet@ESPNBetSupport can you please the portion of your bylaws that makes this entire push? Have never seen this on any other book I’ve been on. pic.twitter.com/YwjqBIs7w9
— Kelce Johnson, 2022 (@CalculatorGrant) November 27, 2023
In essence, ESPN BET is the sole sportsbook that only voids SGPs that win when one leg voids. In other words, other major sportsbooks void SGPs in these scenarios, too: but they void losing bets in addition to winning ones. At DraftKings, BetMGM or Caesars, you could go 0-for-4 with one push and you'd still get your money back. At ESPN BET, you could go 3-for-4 with one push and lose your stake.
For what it's worth, FanDuel is the only major American sportsbook that recalculates odds on Same Game Parlays should one or more legs void.
For regular parlays, the rules are different in general — sportsbooks will recalculate odds and grade as normal on those because odds aren't correlated. But for Same Game Parlays, correlation is the key as to why books void the entire parlay in these scenarios.
Because each leg in an SGP is correlated in some form or another, if you take one leg out, there isn't one uniform answer as to what the final odds should be. Different algorithms and different qualitative assessments play a part in those decision making processes — in short, every book has their own opinions about an SGP's fair price.
So, if one leg is voided, odds might vary wildly between sportsbook to sportsbook. And odds may vary wildly between a sportbook's pregame assessment and postgame assessment.
Using this as cover — and not wanting to pay out recalculated odds at a misprice — sportsbooks like ESPN BET, DraftKings, BetMGM and others void bets in these situations.
But as aforementioned, ESPN BET's policy is by far the worst among the bunch.
FanDuel
- In cases where one or more legs of an SGP void: Wagers are regraded without the missing leg.
"If a selection within the wager is voided, the wager odds will be re-calculated using the remaining legs."
DraftKings
- In cases where one or more legs of an SGP void: All SGPs are voided — winning or losing bets.
"In the event a Same Game Parlay contains at least one (1) selection, other than a selection containing a Non-Participating Player, which is settled as void, then the whole Same Game Parlay will be settled as void, irrespective of whether the Same Game Parlay contains other winning or losing selections, unless the game associated with the Same Game Parlay is abandoned.
ESPN BET
- In cases where one or more legs of an SGP void: Winning wagers are voided. Losing wagers are losses, though.
“If one or more selections in a same game parlay portion of a Parlay+™ wager settle as a push (for example, due to a total ending up exactly on the number that was selected), the same game parlay portion of the Parlay+™ wager that contained the applicable selection will be deemed a push, except if a selection of such same game parlay portion results in a loss, in which case <Section B, Para 6.2.a> above applies. The remaining selections in the Parlay+™ wager will be graded in accordance with the Operator’s house rules.“
"If Selection A results in a push and Selection B results in a loss, then SG1 results in a loss and the Parlay+™ wager will be graded as a loss, regardless of the outcome of Selections C, D, or E."
BetMGM
- In cases where one or more legs of an SGP void: All SGPs are voided — winning or losing bets.
"If any selection within a SGP is voided, then the entire SGP is voided."
Caesars
- In cases where one or more legs of an SGP void: All SGPs are voided — winning or losing bets.
"If any leg of the Same-Game Parlay wager is made void or settles as a push, then the whole wager would become a void or a push."
