When it comes to betting college football playoff futures prior to the playoff, things are pretty straightforward. There are four teams in the College Football Playoff and the winners of each New Years’ Day game will face off in the national championship. This makes it easy to find edges between the semifinal spread market and the futures market. I will lay out the best way to play each team if you have an opinion on who will win the national championship and if you don’t have a lean on a direction right now, I will lay out the best values on the board.

College Football Playoff Futures

From odds obtained from BUSR on December 31st, the current national championship odds are:

Team	Odds
Alabama	-200
Clemson	+225
Ohio State	+700
Notre Dame	+2500

Coming into Friday’s games, Alabama is a 20.5 point favorite against Notre Dame and Clemson is favored by 7.5 over Ohio State. Let’s take a look on how to play each team.

If You Think Alabama Wins

Let’s start with the favorite. Betting markets and fans alike expect Alabama to win the CFP National Championship this season. Currently the Crimson Tide at -200 favorites to win the title (66.7% implied probability). Being favored by 20.5 in the semi-final game against Notre Dame, Alabama is -1300 on the moneyline on Friday (92.9% implied probability).

With these two probabilities in mind, this means that if Alabama were to beat Notre Dame, there would be a 71.79% chance that they defeat their next opponent. This means that their expected spread would be seven points with a moneyline of -255. If you get odds better than -255 on Bama in the title game, you would be best suited to just take Alabama on the moneyline this week and parlay this into a Bama ML bet on the night of the championship. With odds shorter than -255, you would be better off betting their futures at -200.

Lookahead lines for possible championship games that Alabama would be involved in would be Alabama by 3.5 over Clemson or by 9.5 over Ohio State. There would be a 30.8% chance that they play Ohio State and a 74% chance they play Clemson, based on the implied probabilities. These current lookahead moneylines on Alabama would be -152 and -286 respectively. If you believe Clemson beats Ohio State, then it would be best to wait on Alabama while -200 would be a good time to grab the futures if you believe they end up playing Ohio State.

Parlaying Alabama -1300 and -152 would payout odds of -127, while parlaying Alabama at -1300 and -220 would payout at -220. With this in mind, bet Alabama futures if you think they win and play Ohio State, but if you think Clemson beats Ohio State then you will have better value just betting Alabama in the national title game.

The Pick: Alabama -150 or better against Clemson

If You Think Clemson Wins

Things for Clemson get a little more difficult because they are favored now but would be underdogs if they were to play Alabama. If you are convinced that Clemson wins the national championship game, your best bet is to take them +225 right now. In the likelihood that they play Alabama, they would be +118 on the moneyline. If you parlayed that with the -285 against Ohio State, it would pay out at just +194. Clemson would be heavily favored against Notre Dame, so the odds of that moneyline parlay would be even worse. Taking just Clemson futures would be the best value on the board if you believe they will be victorious.

The Pick: Clemson +225 to win National Championship

If You Think Ohio State Wins

Ohio State is in a similar boat to Clemson that they would be underdogs to Alabama and favorites against Notre Dame, however, they are also underdogs to Clemson and will have to get past them first. OSU is +225 to beat Clemson while they would be +225 against Alabama as well and -295 against Notre Dame. With current title odds at 7/1, this would pay out better than the +335 moneyline parlay if they were to play Notre Dame, but worse than the +956 you would get if they play Alabama. Assuming that Notre Dame doesn’t get by Alabama, I think Ohio State at 7/1 is good value here.

The Pick: Ohio State +700 to win National Championship

If You Think Notre Dame Wins

First off, why? Second, no.

In reality, 25/1 is tempting, but you have a lot more value to gain by just taking the Fighting Irish +750 against Alabama. If this hits, then you take these winnings and parlay them into the national championship game. Whether it is Ohio State or Clemson, these moneylines are currently +235 and +540. If you were to make this a moneyline parlay with the +750 from the first round, these would pay out at +2747 and +5340, based on current odds. With this being the case, don’t mess with 25/1 and instead take Notre Dame on the moneyline in both matchups.

The Pick: Notre Dame moneyline parlay of both games

Best Values

My personal belief is that the winner of the Ohio State and Clemson game wins the national championship. With that in mind, I would take Ohio State and Clemson futures while also placing a small bet on Notre Dame at +750 against Alabama. Fading Alabama is a dangerous game, but it is one that I am willing to take on.

For more analysis, listen to this week’s episode of The Campus Cover, where we preview the college football playoff.