If You Had $100, Would You Bet It at Football or Keno?

Can you settle a bet for us, please? My husband says the bet that gives you the biggest bang for the buck is on a sporting event. I say you get the biggest bang for the buck in the live keno lounge. If you had $100, would you bet it on a football game or on 100 keno tickets?

Sorry, but we're with your husband.

We've long maintained that you get the best bang for your betting buck by making a sports wager. It doesn't have the lowest casino edge by any means, but by comparison, live keno, depending on the number of spots you play, can have among the highest. But a sports bet does give you the most excitement for your money while you're in action.

Fact is, gambling is a form of entertainment and nowhere is this more apparent than in sports betting. Even the smallest bet can turn an otherwise dull sporting contest into a riveting energy-charged experience that's guaranteed to get your adrenaline pumping.

Putting money on a game is also a great way to involve a friend or family member who doesn't share your game-day preoccupations. Here's an experiment for you. Give your husband $50 to go halves on a sports bet and see if you get into the game a little more than usual. If so, bet the whole $100 yourself next time and see if it generates more excitement than sitting in a keno lounge for hours waiting for 100 games to be completed.

Your expected loss on a typical $11 sports wager is about 50¢. (Assuming a 50% chance of winning, laying $11 to win $10 and ignoring ties, the house edge is 4.54%.) Now, divide that 50¢ by the three hours it takes to play a game and you wind up with a 17¢-per-hour expected loss.

And it takes no special knowledge or strategy to make a bet on a sporting event. Sure, you can take sports betting as far as you like, all the way up to doing it for a living and beyond. But you can also just bet on your home team for the sentimental value, on the underdog hoping for an upset, on the favorite hoping for a rout, or on the team with the color of uniform you like best or the one with the fewest beards on the players.

Bottom line: Sports betting is one of the world's great entertainment values.

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Scott Fegley Jan-16-2026

Sports Bet / Keno

I agree with LVA on this. If bang for your buck is priority #1, sports betting is King. Stay away from parlays and teasers. To be clear, you will still lose in the long run, just at a much slower pace.

Toni Armstrong Jr. Jan-16-2026

Betting ups the ante

I agree that wagering even small amounts can make ordinary things more fun. My mom and I have been in multiple Survivor (TV show) betting pools since the very first season. With Survivor 50 on the horizon, the excitement level is very high! … Super Bowl grids are another fun way to ramp things up.

John Hearn Jan-16-2026

I've been missing the boat

I rarely make sports bets when in Vegas, which I now see is folly. Even if I'm sitting playing nickel VP at 4Q, the sports book is right there and screens everywhere. At the bar, EVERYONE has money on the game, it seems, including all the bartenders. I'm going to wager $110 on ten $10 sports bets next trip, and spread them out so I am in action a large part of the day. Great QOD!

Glenn Leonberger Jan-16-2026

Futures Bets Give Months of Excitement

Each year in August or September a small group of us puts $10-20 down on 3 teams from each NFL conference to win the Super Bowl. We stay away from the favorites and only bet teams woth ods of 15-1 or higher. This combined between of less than $100 / year gives us excitement for 4-5 months. We've always had at least 2 teams make the playoffs and have won 5 times since 2000.  All in.all were just about even between what was spent and what we won so it's a lot of fun with minimal cost.

Jeffrey Small Jan-16-2026

OK--the rate of return on Keno sucks but...

So you buy 100 keno tickets; they draw the numbers every 5 minutes, so you have 8 hours of entertainment for the $ 100 investment.  You probably will lose about 30% of your money based on the keno odds--but if you buy a "long shot" keno ticket you could win big--that is not possible on a football game...  (and you could lose everything--but you could put $100 on the wrong football team as well...). In comparison the slow pace of Keno vs. the crazy fans screaming at the screen watching football appeals to some  gamblers!

Question of the Day - 16 January 2026

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