RADIO
Another massive trade has blown the doors of this season wide open. Joel Embiid was already putting up career-high numbers with little support in the backcourt and there’s no saying how much adding James Harden can boost his production.
Obviously, Embiid’s usage will go down in certain areas and some stats will naturally fall to Harden, but the addition of another elite playmaker will create better situations and the double-team that has befallen Embiid more frequently as of late won’t be as effective with Harden looking to capitalize on it. The 76ers were desperate for this type of offense and even with Harden not scoring nearly as much as he had in previous seasons, his floor remains incredibly high because of his ability to get to the rim regardless of defense.
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OKC @ PHI
Joel Embiid (PHI) MORE 30.5 Points – Luguentz Dort (OKC) MORE 18.5 Points
With the addition of one James Harden, comes the subtraction of one Andre Drummond, the only other legitimate center on the 76ers. With Paul Millsap, Paul Reed, and Charles Bassey all on the roster, it’s safe to say Philadelphia has options, albeit low-grade options. Before everyone sells Embiid now that he’s playing with someone who naturally controls the pace of a game, the 76ers don’t have many realistic frontcourt pieces and Harden has yet to play with a big anywhere as skilled as Embiid. Even if Harden was to play tonight, the combination should be more deadly than detrimental.
For the Thunder, there isn’t much hope this game and they should just feel lucky they aren’t the first team facing the NBA’s newest tandem. Luguentz Dort is still taking a ton of shots each game and it’s safe to say that he remains a focused and dedicated part of the offense. He will get shots against this team and with so few options elsewhere, it will only take making one or two three-pointers before the rest of the Thunder are willingly finding ways to get him open. The way Dort scores in bunches, every shift is another opportunity to put 10 points up and he’s done it plenty of times already this season.
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CLE @ IND
Darius Garland (CLE) OVER 19.5 Points – Tyrese Haliburton (IND) OVER 15.5 Points
Caris LeVert joining the Cavaliers won’t have nearly as much of an impact on Darius Garland’s production until LeVert is either starting or comfortable in the offense. Until then, and even until after that point, it’s pretty clear that there are already few point guards better than Garland and his bad games are masked by overall consistent play elsewhere. If he doesn’t score, he finds teammates and keeps the ball moving. If he can’t do either of those, he’ll either close out on the shooter or box out the nearest defender and actually supply help defense. Regardless of that, Garland is a natural scorer, effective from anywhere on the court, so any time the over is 19.5 or lower, you take it.
Tyrese Haliburton has yet to play a game for his new team and with so many mouths to feed in that backcourt, it’s only likely that his will be the only one worth feeding. Normally, Haliburton is a pass-first guard that will gladly step-back and fire up a 30-foot shot if you really want him to, so the natural occurrence of things is that he feeds shooters like Chris Duarte and Malcolm Brogdon, while relying on both Goga Bitadze and Isaiah Jackson in the frontcourt. He has some weapons at his disposal, but looking at this lineup and assuming he won’t be relied on for his own scoring ability is ignoring some serious flaws in the rotation.
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SAS @ ATL
Trae Young (ATL) MORE 29.5 Points – Dejounte Murray (SAS) MORE 21.5 Points
Dejounte Murray is absolutely the future of this league, but he goes unmentioned being on a sub-500 team, averaging well under 20-points a game…but if you really want to throw stats around Murray’s name without mentioning his defense or his league leading steals per game rate, then whatever you say about him, says more about you. In a championship setting, Murray is most likely the one following around Trae Young here, but Murray’s defense is also wasted when it’s put on someone who makes defense look about as useful at wet socks. Even if he is tasked with guarding Young, the resistance on the opposing end is what makes matchups against Atlanta guards so enticing.
The Hawks bring resistance to both ends of the court, but Trae Young playing 40 minutes for Atlanta every game means someone on the Spurs has a favorable matchup. Granted, this has been the case for some years now and the Hawks, especially Young, is used to it at this point, but it doesn’t make guarding the 6’5 Murray any easier when he gets going downhill. His floater and mid-range jumper were effective last game against Cleveland and he’s going to get more looks at the rim facing Atlanta’s defense.
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DEN @ BOS
Jayson Tatum (BOS) MORE 28.5 Points – Nikola Jokic (DEN) MORE 24.5 Points
The Nuggets have been streaky this season to say the least, but at least Nikola Jokic is getting the help he needs to win games, not just play well in bad losses. There aren’t many players who you can rely on going out and putting up consistent stats every night with disregard of who he might be playing. Jokic is one of those players and it might be the lack of support, much like in Embiid’s case, that funnels a lot of the usage toward Jokic, but when you need someone to score, it’s better the ball is in their hands rather than they are waiting to see if the play comes to them. Even if Jokic faces a surprisingly stingy combo of Robert Williams and Al Horford, it’ll take a game-long double-team to keep him under 25-points.
Before this bet was typed in, there were quite a few double-takes. With Jokic putting up a hefty share of points more than Tatum over the last week, you’d assume Jokic was the one projected to hit 30-points. Instead, it’s Tatum, but really, it’s not difficult to see why this projection still rings fairly true. Add in Aaron Gordon potentially taking on Tatum for most of this game, as Gordon usually assumes the toughest defensive matchup each night, scoring 29-points may not come as easy for Tatum as it will for someone like Jaylen Brown. But this is also putting stock in regular-season-out-of-conference-NBA-defense, which is usually suspect, even on good nights.
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