Betting the NBA Playoffs: Lakers in trouble
The NBA Playoffs tipped off over the weekend and home-cooking never tasted so good with each of the eight home teams winning their inaugural games and seven of the eight covering the spread.
The boys of Bet the EDGE took a look at each of the series on today’s episode of the pod. Here’s a taste.
Jay Croucher (@croucherJD) quickly touched on the failures of the Dallas Mavericks and the Indiana Pacers against teams missing Kawhi Leonard and Giannis Antetokounmpo respectively.
“The problem with just losing Game One when the opposing star is out, one it’s obviously very bad to just go down 1-0 in a seven game series, but it also just means you give the other team time. You've given Giannis and Kawhi time to get back, which is maybe the worst thing of all.”
Bet the Edge is your source for the day in sports betting. Get all of Jay Croucher and Drew Dinsick’s insight weekdays at 6AM ET right here or wherever you get your podcasts.
The Knicks took care of business against Philadelphia in that series opener, but it was not the walk in the park Drew Dinsick (@whale_capper) would have preferred.
“As a heavy Knicks’ man, first of all, yes, Quarter One and Quarter Three were terrifying….were it not for Josh Hart finding the absolute perfect time to hit the best shots of the season for the Knicks that could have gone sideways…this is now the Knicks’ series as far as I can tell because the quick turnaround and the likelihood that the injury that Joel Embiid had in that game has some impact on his performance in Game 2 I think is high.”
Croucher then led a deeper dive back into the Clippers/Mavs’ series.
“I'm not worried about the Mavs. One, the Clippers shot 50% from three. The Mavs shot 30% and to my eye they were getting better shots than the Clippers. I just cannot buy the idea that one, a team that is starting Terrence Mann, Amir Coffey, and Ivica Zuboc can have an elite offense…Secondly, we've seen enough of Luca going up against Zuboc and going up against Harden. Harden was not exploited enough today. I just don’t but the idea that Dallas’ offense won’t be awesome in this series...I think this Dallas team just…plays with their food.”
Dinsick enjoyed a profitable weekend…with the exception of the Lakers’ result against the defending champion Nuggets.
“The way that they were playing in the first half I thought was certainly enough to keep this game competitive and absolutely enough to get +7 home. The fact that the Lakers blew this cover really hurts…I will say that the big concern here is that Anthony Davis played 45 minutes and Lebron and DeAngelo Russell were both at 40+. That is the playoff rotation minutes you were hoping to see and ultimately all of those guys were minuses. D’Angelo Russell weirdly was actually +2...but he wasn’t good.”
As mentioned, the pod touched on each series and offered insight into how Jay and Drew are betting each.
Enjoy it and learn from it.
Bet the Edge is your source for the betting the NBA Playoffs. Get all of Jay Croucher and Drew Dinsick’s insight weekdays at 6AM ET right here or wherever you get your podcasts.
