National Football League

Super Bowl 2023 recap: Bettors win on Over, sportsbooks win on Chiefs, MVP

Updated Jul. 20, 2023 2:50 p.m. ET

It was a doozy of a Big Game for both bookmakers and bettors. The various Super Bowl odds markets ended up a mixed bag on both sides of the counter, with oddsmakers and customers both notching some wins.

And it was a subpar day for the high rollers with the largest bets. There were five reported wagers of $1 million or more, and only two got to the pay window in the Kansas City Chiefs' 38-35 victory over the Philadelphia Eagles.

Usually, this column wraps up with all the major wagers. But since we’re recapping the Super Bowl, the largest single-day event on the American sports betting landscape, let’s lift off with the highs and lows of Sunday’s largest plays.

Time to dive into all of the action and take a look ahead to next season's title odds.

I Like Big Bets and I Cannot Lie

As the first half unfolded, it certainly looked as if those who bet big on Philly were going to have a massive payday.

The largest Super Bowl bet dropped three hours before kickoff at Caesars Sports, a $2.2 million wager on Eagles -1.5. That bettor had to be feeling good when Philadelphia went to the locker room with a 24-14 lead.

Ditto for two BetMGM customers with the following bets: $1.25 million on Eagles moneyline -125, and $1 million on Eagles moneyline -125.

But K.C. outscored Philly 24-11 in the second half, including 17-8 in the fourth quarter, to win and cover as a consensus 1.5-point underdog. Chalk up $4.45 million for the sportsbook coffers.

However, two big players got some of that money back, in less orthodox ways. As the scoring rang up in a hurry, a Caesars customer made an in-game bet of $1.2 million on Over 62.5. That cashed with 5:15 left in the fourth quarter on Jalen Hurts’ TD and subsequent 2-point conversion run to make it 35-35.

A DraftKings customer put $1.68 million on Chiefs +3.5 (-168), making an alternate point-spread play on which the bettor would win as long as K.C. didn’t lose by more than 3 points. So that was a $1 million profit.

There were more six-figure bets than this article could possibly contain, but the most noteworthy came in four hours before kickoff: $870,000 on Chiefs +1.5 at BetMGM. That customer netted $790,909.09.

Right After All

When Super Bowl odds first posted on Jan. 29, Circa Sports was an outlier at Chiefs -2.5. Most books opened the game at pick ‘em or Eagles -1. Within 21 minutes of posting, Circa had gotten slammed with bets to the point that it moved from Chiefs -2.5 all the way to Eagles -2.5 (-115).

At the time, Circa sportsbook operations manager Jeff Benson tweeted: "The market disagreed and said our opener was garbage. It will be interesting to see where this number goes in the next two weeks."

Well, two weeks later, Kansas City posted a 38-35 victory — coincidentally right around Circa’s opening point spread.

"Our opener of K.C. -2.5 was pretty good," Benson said late Sunday night.

Hail to the Chiefs

It’s pretty much impossible to find an oddsmaker who needs the Over in the Super Bowl. All the public/recreational bettors — which this game attracts more of than any other — want to see scoring. They’re not betting on the Under.

The SuperBook had no shortage of Over money, including a $200,000 bet on Over 51. That bet and every other Over wager cashed just three minutes into the fourth quarter on a Patrick Mahomes-to-Kadarius Toney TD pass to put the Chiefs up 28-27.

But K.C. going on to finish off the job helped take the sting out of all those Over payouts.

"The Chiefs winning saved us. Eagles and Over would’ve been pretty ugly," SuperBook executive director John Murray said.

Added Casey Degnon, senior risk supervisor for The SuperBook: "We had a good day overall. The full-game market, in-progress and futures market were the workhorses for a winning day. We were a very small loser on the props, which will we take in a game that combined for 73 points."

Indeed. Generally speaking, if the Super Bowl sails over the total — which closed at 51.5 at The SuperBook — then Super Bowl prop bets tend to go very well for the customers, too. Prop bettors won the day, but it wasn’t as huge a win as a 73-point game might indicate. One prop was particularly key behind the counter.

"We were sweating Travis Kelce Over 6.5 catches and thought we were dead after he had three in the first quarter," Degnon said.

But Kelce had just three more catches the rest of the game to finish with six, a win for the Under and the book.

Regional Bias Bolsters FOX Bet

FOX Bet acknowledged a market or two in which bettors got the best of the sportsbook. But overall, trading operations senior manager Dylan Brossman pointed to a much more successful day for FOX Bet than was had by other books.

"We cleaned up on the spread and total points markets. We ran a pretty balanced book for the moneyline, just about breaking even. Pre-live player props cost us some money, but we clawed a lot of it back with our in-game player props," Brossman said. "And Super Bowl outright winner was a huge positive for us, thanks to our heavy Philly base."

That heavy Philly base, of course, was all in on an Eagles Super Bowl victory.

FOX Bet customers got out of the gate quickly, winning big when the coin toss came up tails.

"The public was all over the coin toss," Brossman said.

Other good winners for the customers:

Eagles to score 13-plus points in the first half (+100)
Jalen Hurts rushing TD in the second half (+300)
Chiefs win and Over 50.5 total points (+300)

On the bookies’ side of the counter, Brossman said Mahomes locking up the MVP was a significant winner for FOX Bet. Additionally, the book did well on:

Hurts 25-plus rushing yards in each half (+333)
Hurts and Miles Sanders to combine for 100-plus rushing yards (+100)
Travis Kelce and Kenneth Gainwell to have one-plus touchdown each (+700)

None of those three props came to fruition for bettors. On the first prop, Hurts piled up 63 first-half rushing yards, but added just seven more yards in the second half. On the second prop, the Eagles QB more than did his part with those 70 yards on the ground, but teammate Sanders had just 16 rushing yards.

And on the third prop, Kelce scored the Chiefs’ first TD, tying the game at seven in the first quarter. But he didn’t get into the end zone again, nor did Gainwell score for the Eagles.

The Good, The OK and The Ugly

BetMGM vice president of trading Jason Scott had a succinct review of Sunday’s results.

"The spread was great, the moneylender was decent, the total was bad," Scott said.

BetMGM needed the Chiefs on the spread, even with that aforementioned $870,000 K.C. +1.5 bet. And those two seven-figure Eagles moneyline plays had the book needing the Chiefs not just to cover the short spread but win the game outright.

That said, the total going way over BetMGM’s closing number of 51 was a big win for bettors. That included a few players who went in large on the total:

$500,000 on Over 50.5 (-115), to win $434,783
$300,000 on Over 50.5 (-115), to win $260,870
$200,000 on Over 50.5 (-115), to win $173,913
$547,000 on Over 49.5 (-125), with the bettor buying the total down a point, to win $437,600
$500,000 on Over 47.5 (-150), with the bettor buying the total down 3 points, to win $333,333

That’s $2,047,000 in wagers, on which BetMGM paid out $1,640,499 in winnings.

BetMGM dodged a potential big loss in the prop markets on an option that got legs thanks to a purported Super Bowl script landing on social media. That script had the Eagles winning 37-34, and bettors at BetMGM and elsewhere bought in by playing that outcome on the exact final score prop.

As it turned out, the score was close at 38-35 but with the wrong winner.

BetMGM also had significant liability to Eagles running back Kenneth Gainwell in the Super Bowl MVP odds market. Gainwell was a 125/1 long shot. Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce was also in trouble, as was Eagles linebacker Haason Reddick.

"Gainwell is a seven-figure loser, Reddick is a half-a-million bad," Scott said pregame. "Both QBs are significant winners."

In the end, the book got what it needed when Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes nabbed MVP honors.

‘Take it and Move On’

Rex Beyers, head of wagering for PlayUp USA, said his operation — which is in New Jersey and Colorado — didn’t get an ideal result Sunday, but it was good enough.

"We needed Chiefs and Under, but we needed the Chiefs for more than we needed the Under," Beyers said. "Eagles and Over would’ve been horrible. So I’m relatively happy. It’s OK. Take it and move on."

Which is what we’ll do in looking ahead to the 2023-24 Super Bowl odds. BetMGM and a host of other sportsbooks already have odds up for Super Bowl 58. No surprise, the newly minted champion Chiefs are the +600 favorite at BetMGM. The Chiefs are also next year's Super Bowl favorite at FOX Bet.

The Cincinnati Bengals, vanquished by K.C. in the AFC Championship Game, are the +850 second choice. Philadelphia, the Buffalo Bills and the San Francisco 49ers are all slotted at +900.

And that’s a wrap on NFL betting for the 2022-23 season. Hope you enjoyed reading about it as much as the FOX Sports betting team has enjoyed bringing it to you. September can’t come fast enough!

Patrick Everson is a sports betting analyst for FOX Sports and senior reporter for VegasInsider.com. He is a distinguished journalist in the national sports betting space. He’s based in Las Vegas, where he enjoys golfing in 110-degree heat. Follow him on Twitter: @PatrickE_Vegas.

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