The first five innings in numbers
Average runs per inning, both teams, 2026 regular season. Gold bars are the first-five window.
Where each team stood after five innings
| Team | Led after 5 | Then won | Tied after 5 | Then won | Trailed after 5 | Then won | F5 runs for | F5 runs against |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Milwaukee Brewers | 83 | 86% | 25 | 64% | 54 | 30% | 2.87 | 2.09 |
| Los Angeles Dodgers | 83 | 82% | 24 | 71% | 55 | 27% | 2.78 | 1.98 |
| Washington Nationals | 81 | 75% | 23 | 43% | 58 | 10% | 2.83 | 2.56 |
| Tampa Bay Rays | 81 | 91% | 23 | 57% | 58 | 19% | 2.57 | 2.07 |
| Detroit Tigers | 75 | 75% | 28 | 39% | 59 | 15% | 2.59 | 2.10 |
| St. Louis Cardinals | 74 | 80% | 24 | 42% | 64 | 13% | 2.44 | 2.39 |
| New York Yankees | 73 | 89% | 31 | 61% | 57 | 16% | 2.35 | 1.99 |
| Philadelphia Phillies | 73 | 89% | 25 | 40% | 64 | 20% | 2.38 | 2.28 |
| Atlanta Braves | 73 | 85% | 24 | 67% | 66 | 24% | 2.34 | 2.25 |
| Minnesota Twins | 72 | 82% | 18 | 33% | 72 | 17% | 2.78 | 2.68 |
| Pittsburgh Pirates | 71 | 83% | 24 | 63% | 67 | 12% | 2.68 | 2.50 |
| San Diego Padres | 71 | 89% | 28 | 54% | 63 | 21% | 2.48 | 2.49 |
| Texas Rangers | 70 | 87% | 19 | 58% | 73 | 11% | 2.56 | 2.54 |
| Miami Marlins | 70 | 81% | 23 | 52% | 69 | 16% | 2.42 | 2.40 |
| Los Angeles Angels | 68 | 71% | 25 | 24% | 69 | 12% | 2.44 | 2.51 |
| Chicago Cubs | 67 | 84% | 38 | 61% | 57 | 18% | 2.81 | 2.41 |
| Cleveland Guardians | 67 | 88% | 36 | 33% | 59 | 24% | 2.40 | 2.25 |
| San Francisco Giants | 67 | 75% | 23 | 39% | 73 | 10% | 2.33 | 2.67 |
| Arizona Diamondbacks | 66 | 88% | 20 | 55% | 76 | 22% | 2.42 | 2.63 |
| Chicago White Sox | 65 | 80% | 30 | 67% | 67 | 18% | 2.85 | 2.67 |
| Seattle Mariners | 65 | 78% | 25 | 60% | 72 | 14% | 2.36 | 2.30 |
| Boston Red Sox | 64 | 89% | 29 | 62% | 69 | 17% | 2.30 | 2.33 |
| Baltimore Orioles | 63 | 84% | 22 | 45% | 76 | 21% | 2.55 | 2.57 |
| Toronto Blue Jays | 63 | 84% | 22 | 64% | 77 | 16% | 1.98 | 2.38 |
| New York Mets | 62 | 85% | 29 | 34% | 71 | 15% | 2.36 | 2.62 |
| Houston Astros | 62 | 84% | 19 | 58% | 81 | 22% | 2.61 | 2.96 |
| Cincinnati Reds | 61 | 80% | 27 | 37% | 74 | 22% | 2.44 | 2.93 |
| Athletics | 61 | 72% | 16 | 44% | 85 | 15% | 2.38 | 3.23 |
| Kansas City Royals | 57 | 81% | 30 | 40% | 75 | 15% | 2.30 | 2.82 |
| Colorado Rockies | 47 | 79% | 20 | 30% | 95 | 16% | 2.52 | 3.54 |
Click a header to sort. A team that leads often after five but wins less often than the league's 82.6% is losing games late, usually in the bullpen.
Plenty of good baseball opinions fall apart in the seventh inning. You liked the starter, the starter was great, and then a middle reliever walked two guys and gave up a three-run double. First 5 innings betting exists for exactly that problem. F5 markets settle on the score after five complete innings, so the part of the game you bet on is the part the starting pitchers usually control.
The markets mirror the full-game board, just cut in half. For the full-game versions and how the prices read, see our guide to baseball betting lines.
The three F5 markets
F5 moneyline: two-way or three-way
The F5 moneyline asks who leads after five innings. The catch is that baseball games are tied after five far more often than after nine, where extra innings settle the matter. Books handle this in two ways.
A two-way F5 moneyline lists only the two teams. If the game is tied after five, the bet is a push and your stake comes back. A three-way F5 moneyline adds the tie as its own option, often priced somewhere around +400 to +500 depending on the matchup, and if the score is level both team sides lose. The team prices on a three-way market are longer because they carry that extra way to lose. Say the Guardians are -130 on a two-way F5 line; the same book might price them at +105 or so on the three-way. Neither version is a trick. They are different bets and you should know which one you clicked.
F5 run line at -0.5
Full-game run lines sit at 1.5. The first-five version usually sits at 0.5, which turns it into a cleaner version of the moneyline. The favorite at -0.5 needs any lead after five. The underdog at +0.5 wins with a lead or a tie. No push is possible. In practice, the underdog +0.5 is a way to bet that a game stays close early, since you win on every tie. Our full run line guide explains why the spread behaves so differently over nine innings.
F5 total
The F5 total is an over/under on combined runs through five innings. It usually lands a bit above half the full-game number, because starters face the top of the order more often early and lineups are at their strongest. A game with a full total of 8.5 might carry an F5 total of 4.5. The same drivers apply as on a full game: the pitchers, the park, the weather and the umpire, all explained in our MLB over/under guide.
Why starters dominate the first five
A starting pitcher typically works five or six innings, so in most games the first five are almost entirely his. That is the whole appeal. If your edge comes from reading pitchers, the F5 market strips away the bullpen noise that dilutes it in a full game.
There is a subtler reason too. Hitters do better the more times they see the same pitcher in a game. The first trip through a lineup is where starters are at their best, and the third trip is where they tend to get hit. Managers know this, which is why so many starters are pulled around the fifth or sixth inning. F5 bets capture the two strongest trips through the order and leave the weaker third one mostly out of the picture.
This also means F5 prices depend heavily on the listed starters, even more than full-game lines do. If a starter is scratched, the F5 line can swing hard, and whether your bet stays alive depends on the listed-pitcher rules at your book, which we cover in our page on baseball betting rules. Check the day’s MLB probable pitchers before you bet so you know who is expected on the mound.
When the game is shortened before five innings
Rain is the usual culprit. At most books, first five innings bets need five full innings to have action. If the game is stopped in the fourth and never resumed that day, F5 bets are typically void and refunded, even when a full-game moneyline might later be graded on a completed game.
The edge case is the middle of the fifth. A full game becomes official after four and a half innings if the home team is leading, because the home team would not need to bat. Some books apply the same logic to F5 bets and grade them at that point; others insist on the bottom of the fifth being played. Read your book’s house rules on this one, because the difference decides whether a winning ticket pays or is voided.
How F5 relates to NRFI
Go shorter than five innings and you get to the first inning alone. The NRFI bet (no run first inning) and its opposite, YRFI, are graded on whether anyone scores in the first frame. Both markets lean on the same idea: the starters are fresh, the top of each order is up, and the bullpen is irrelevant.
The two work well together as a way to think about a game. A pitching matchup that projects low through five often starts with a clean first inning, but not always, because the first inning is when the best hitters bat and when some starters are still finding their command. Our NRFI rates by team show which clubs score early and which ones start games quietly.
Picking your F5 spots
The best F5 situations share a pattern: one team has a clear starting pitcher edge and a bullpen that you do not trust with a late lead. A full-game bet on that team pays you for innings you have no confidence in. The F5 line lets you bet just the part you believe. The reverse also works: a strong bullpen behind a mediocre starter is a reason to look at the full game instead.
Before any bet, run the numbers. Convert the two-way price and the three-way price into implied probabilities with our betting calculators and see which one gives you more for the outcome you expect. If you are still learning the basic markets, our baseball betting guide is the place to start. Set a budget first and stick to it; sports betting is legal only in states that allow it, most of which require you to be 21+, and 1-800-GAMBLER is free and confidential if betting stops being fun.
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