LEARNEXPECTED VALUE & MARKETS

What Is Closing Line Value?

CLV compares the price you took with the price the market closed at. It grades your timing and your process, not your luck.

2 MIN READ · BETTORWISE RESEARCH · EXAMPLES MARKED AS ILLUSTRATIVE

Bet Brunson Over 28.5 at −110. The market closes at −125. You beat the close by 15 cents of price — in probability terms, roughly three points of break-even. That’s closing line value.

TOOK −110 (52.4%) · CLOSED −125 (55.6%) · NO-VIG CLV ≈ +3 PP (ILLUSTRATIVE)

Why the close is the benchmark

The closing line is the market’s most information-dense snapshot: news, lineups and flows have all been priced in. Beating it consistently is one of the few measurable signs of a repeatable process.

Use it before the record does

Results take hundreds of bets to mean anything; CLV accumulates meaning faster. A bettor with positive CLV and a losing month is usually unlucky. The reverse is usually lucky.

RELATED READING

01What Is Line Movement?

Lines move on news, money and disagreement. Direction, size and timing turn a moving line into information.

ODDS & PROBABILITY · 2 MIN02How to Track Your Betting Results Properly

Dollars distort. Units, prices and CLV show what your process is actually doing.

TRACKING · 2 MIN03Why a Good Model Still Loses Bets

Positive expected value loses often. Variance doesn’t care about your edge.

MODELS · 2 MIN

Compare the market yourself.

Join the Bettorwise Beta