Boxing Betting Tips: Examining Method of Victory Market

Boxing’s method of victory market is a way to place slightly riskier wagers on fights that return greater returns than those typically available on the outright win market.

While it’s not as easy to select both which fighter will win a fight and how the fighter will win it, the winnings returned on these market bets are often large enough to make the risk palatable.

To play the method of victory market, the bettor selects the fighter who will win the fight as well as the method of victory.

This market is similar to the rounds market, except instead of pinpointing which specific round (e.g. round 7) or group of rounds (e.g. rounds 1-3) the fight ends, the person placing the wager selects from a pool of available methods, including going the distance.

What are Methods of Victory in Boxing?

• Knockout (KO): When a fighter fails to rise from a knockdown before the referee’s count of 10.
• Technical Knockout (TKO): When the referee stops the fight without counting to 10 due to an injury caused from a punch, the recommendation of the ringside physician or the fighter’s corner requesting the fight to end.
• Disqualification (DQ): When the opposing fighter is disqualified because of a foul.
• Decision: When the ringside officials, most often three ringside judges, score the fight for the winner after the scheduled number of rounds has ended.
• Technical Decision (TD): When a fight is halted because of accidental injury (e.g. accidental headbutt), and a winner is named by the ringside officials based on the scorecards at the time of stoppage. Different governing bodies (e.g. WBA, WBC, WBO and IBF) have slightly different definitions of how and when a fight is ruled a TD.

Methods of victory can be grouped together (e.g. Mayweather defeats McGregor by KO, TKO or DQ -135) or by themselves (Mayweather by KO +1600, Mayweather by TKO +240, Mayweather by DQ +800) based on the bookmaker’s preference.

Betting Tips for Method of Victory Market

Placing a bet on any of boxing betting markets requires an incredible amount of research. So when laying money down on the method of victory market, it’s important to consider all the various data points available.

While there are many different ways to approach an upcoming fight, the three most important factors in general are the accomplishments of the participants, the fighters’ styles and their overall talent levels and abilities.

Gambling.com’s boxing betting strategy guide offers helpful tips for betting on all the top boxing markets, including boxing’s method of victory market.

Key Focus Method of Victory Market

A good indicator of what a fighter might do in the future is what the fighter has done in the past. Boxrec.com is a trustworthy resource for fighter records. This includes information on how many knockouts a fighter has, how many times the fighter has been stopped and all of the fighter’s opponents.

It’s important to review things like knockout percentages and overall resumes before betting on the method of victory market. If a fighter is undefeated but only has a few knockouts, it’s probably not a good bet that the fighter will win the next one by knockout.

The same is true on the other end of the spectrum. If a fighter has tons of knockouts on his record against high quality opposition, betting the fighter’s next bout will go the distance against an unranked contender might not be the best play. Other important research tools include CompuBox and BoxStat.

Carefully Consider Resumes

While looking at a fighter’s past bouts can be fruitful, it’s important not to be fooled by a fighter’s overall record.

Just because a fighter is undefeated and has knocked out most or all opponents doesn't mean that will happen when the fighter faces an opponent of equal or greater skill.

Moreover, a fighter’s manager and promoter have the fiduciary duty to make a fighter as marketable as possible. All that means is that as a fighter rises through the ranks, the manager and promoter go to great lengths to ensure the fighter wins the fights.

A couple of handy resources to help understand who’s who in the sport, along with the general consensus among those who follow boxing closely about where a fighter ranks in regards to his peers, are available to help.

Both The Ring and the Transnational Boxing Rankings Board (TBRB) offer reliable and trustworthy divisional and pound-for-pound rankings. Before placing a bet on any fight, it’s good practice to see where the fighter ranks according to The Ring and the TBRB.

Watch More Boxing

Watching a fighter’s work in past bouts is also important. There’s at least some footage available on YouTube for most professional boxers in the sport today, and a good review of how a fighter looks in the ring versus the competition is important when deciding who might win an upcoming battle in what specific way.

To someone new to the sport and hoping to get up to speed as fast as possible in order to place winning wagers on upcoming fights, the best advice (short of hot betting tips on specific bouts) is to watch as much boxing as possible.

After all, like any other sport, the more you watch boxing, the better you will be at picking out what makes a good fighter. Good fighters win fights, and a good bet on a good fighter wins money.