Free NBA Betting Picks - Today's Best Bets, Expert Predictions, Odds (5/16/23)

Thunder Dan's top NBA betting picks and best bets for today's NBA games on 5/16/23. His free picks against the spread, teasers, parlays, and NBA player props.

The Conference Finals are finally here! We start things off in the Western Conference tonight with a somewhat surprising matchup against the #7 seed L.A. Lakers and top-seeded Denver Nuggets. I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that Nikola Jokic led a finally fully-healthy Denver squad here considering how good they were all year, but not many folks expected the Lakers to get their act together in time for a deep playoff run.

Today I'll preview this series and give you my prediction while offering some thoughts on tonight's game one result, too. And tomorrow my colleague Josh Wiesel will do the same thing with the Eastern Conference finals as well.

As always, in this article, I'll be providing my favorite picks against the spread, game totals, parlays, and teasers for the NBA playoff game that tips off at 8:30 PM EST on Tuesday, May 16th. Now, let's see how we want to attack these games with the books tonight!

Thunder Dan's NBA Best Bets

• First-Round Series Predictions: 5-3
• Second-Round Series Predictions: 2-0
• 2022-2023 Postseason Individual Games: 12-17
  • Against the Spread: 7-5
  • Game/Team Totals: 2-7
  • Moneyline Parlay: 2-2
  • Teasers: 1-3
• Overall: 19-20

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NBA Betting Picks: Western Conference Finals

Los Angeles Lakers (+6) @ Denver Nuggets (222.5 total)

Season Series: Tied 2-2

The Lakers have been a great story this season and even I, a self-proclaimed Laker-hater, found myself rooting for them to upset the Grizzlies (it's pretty easy to root against Memphis right now) and the Warriors. I have a ton of respect for LeBron James and what he's done this season at his age and the Lakers made the right decision - and I am sure it was a tough one - to cut bait on Russell Westbrook and bring in some important role players in trades (Russell, Vanderbilt, Hachimura).

I wonder if the Lakers have enough left in the tank to overcome Denver in this series, though. They've had to expend a lot of energy in their first two series to get this far, while the Nuggets dispatched the Wolves and even the Suns without so much as breaking a sweat.

I'm not really down on the Lakers, I am just pretty high on the Nuggets and I think they are the best team remaining of the final four. A lot of people fell asleep on Denver down the stretch as they lost some games and then rested some players going into the playoffs. And while that strategy can be pretty risky as you risk going into the playoffs in poor form, it's clearly paid off for Denver as they are as healthy as they have been all season - and really over the last several seasons.

Denver not only has the two-time MVP (and probably should have been again this season, sorry Embiid) in Nikola Jokic, they have a stone-cold bucket-getter in Jamal Murray as the Robin to his Batman. Murray's success is just as important to this team as Jokic's and the two of them form such a formidable duo on offense. It's not always pretty, but these players can both score at will and make each other, as well as the rest of the players surrounding them better.

Let's not forget that players like Aaron Gordon and Michael Porter Jr. would likely be 20-10 players on other teams if they were the first or second option in an offense. Both guys have games that are complimentary of Jokic's and Murray's and the foursome (along with KCP who is an underrated "Three and D" wing) are an incredibly balanced and efficient unit on offense.

To me, the Lakers just don't have enough to keep up with Denver in this series. LeBron probably has a big game left in him and AD does, too, but we've seen Davis be incredibly inconsistent this post-season and the Lakers' supporting cast is pretty inferior to Denver's.

As far as tonight goes, the Nuggets are 6-0 at home in the playoffs this postseason and have been excellent at home all season long. I think they cover tonight against the Lakers here and set the tone for this series that I have them winning in six games.

I like the over here, too. Three of the four meetings between these teams went over 223 points this year and while games tend to slow down in the playoffs, we've seen Denver continue to get into some high-scoring contests this postseason, too. I don't think the Lakers slow them down here and that we see a higher-scoring Denver win.

If you don't like all of my angles, just bet those that you agree on! But I wanted to give you a few different options for the game tonight and for the series. Let's go Nuggets! If they advance to the Finals, they'll be underdogs against the Celtics but I like their chances to win it all at much better odds here as well (Boston is +100).

The Picks: Nuggets -6 (-110 DK), OVER 222.5 points (-110)

Series Prediction/Pick: Denver wins 4-2, Denver -1.5 games (+145)

Team Futures: Denver to win NBA Finals (+240)

Good luck, RotoBallers, and enjoy the game tonight!

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