RADIO
Hello, RotoBallers, and welcome back to Thunder Dan's NBA best bets! Tuesday was a mixed bag of results but I was happy to see the Nuggets cover and my highest confidence total prediction hit as the Suns-Heat game resulted in 211 points.
Too many points in the Washington/New York game (which we get a rematch of tonight) prevented the teaser from cashing and Michael Porter Jr. came up one long ball shy of hitting his O/2.5 threes prop.
There are five games on tonight's card, including two nationally-televised games on TNT with Portland-Miami and Los Angeles-Philadelphia. For those who are joining me for the first time, let's start with an overview of how I approach betting and DFS in the NBA on a daily basis.
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Overview
For me, betting and DFS analysis goes hand in hand. We are often looking for some of the same information and trends when deciding which bets to make, player props to hit, or players to roster in DFS contests. If we love the over in a game, then it would also make sense to stack that game up in a GPP. Personally, I like to spread out my investment each night between betting and DFS and have found that doing so helps smooth out the sometimes uneven returns of the rollercoaster that is NBA DFS.
I have been working hard over the last months developing my own models for NBA games. I've had enough success using them that I feel comfortable in passing along my highest confidence picks at this point. I am by no means a professional bettor, but simply someone who bets on the NBA daily and has spent a good deal of time trying to make it a profitable endeavor.
In this article, I'll be providing my favorite picks against the spread, game totals, parlays, teasers, and player props for NBA games on Thursday, March 25th, 2021. If you ever want to chat about NBA DFS or betting hit me up on Twitter @ThunderDanDFS. Good luck!
Thunder Dan's NBA Best Bets
- Season Record 2-2
- Against the Spread 1-0
- Over/Under 1-0
- Teasers/Parlays 0-1
- Player Props 0-1
Against the Spread
Washington Wizards (+3) @ New York Knicks
This is easily my favorite pick against the spread tonight. The Knicks are much better this year than most people realize and despite having two stars in Russell Westbrook and Bradley Beal, the Wizards still bottom-feeders in the Eastern Conference.
These two teams just met on Tuesday, with the Knicks cruising to an 18-point victory and dropping 13 points on this Washington defense. They also beat them by that same margin back in February. I don't buy into the old "hard to beat a team three times in a row" mindset here, the Knicks are just a better team, and their style of play, which features an emphasis on defense (Coach Thibs MO) has been able to slow down the Wizards offense.
The trends all line up here nicely as the Knicks have covered 58% of the time season and are 7-2 as a home favorite, covering by an average margin of nearly 7 points in those games.
The Pick: New York -3 (good up to -4.5)
Over/Under
Philadelphia 76ers (-5) @ Los Angeles Lakers (213 total)
The Sixers continue their west coast road trip tonight by taking on the Lakers, who will continue to be without their two superstars LeBron James and Anthony Davis. I like the Sixers to win here, but I also think this total is really low. It has already gone up 1.5 points since opening at 211.5. I understand why Vegas has set it so low as the Sixers are without their best offensive player Joel Embiid and the Lakers have struggled on offense without their stars, too. However, the defenses on both teams take significant hits without those players, too. The Lakers defense drops off the most and we saw the Pelicans hang 123 points on them the other night.
It's going to be tight because Philly plays a bit slower without Embiid and the Lakers also play slower without their studs, but I still think both teams find ways to score tonight. Simmons and Tobias Harris have been picking up the slack lately and the Sixers have some other talented scorers like Shake Milton and might get Seth Curry back. All we really need here is a 110-105 game to hit the over and I wouldn't be surprised to see this total continue to rise as the day goes along.
The Pick: Over 213 (play all the way up to 215)
I'm addicted to parlays and teasers, but I wouldn't recommend overdoing them if you're new to betting. It can be tempting to parlay 4-5 teams' money lines or tease a bunch of spreads or totals, but the odds are attractive for a reason - because every time you add another outcome you are adding more variability into the bet. Now having said, I am going to give you my favorite 3-team ML parlay or teaser.
Today we are rolling a three-team money line parlay. I am betting the Knicks, Sixers, and Clippers to win outright, with no spreads involved. This acts as insurance for my Knicks spread bet a bit, in case they win but don't cover. I think the Sixers likely cover, but I'd rather bet them outright here. The Clippers are six-point road favorites and I don't quite trust them to cover either, so I'll just bet them to win here. Anytime I can get +200 odds or better on three teams I feel pretty good about, I'm happy.
Player Prop of the Day
This is where you'll find my favorite prop of the day. I am looking at Sixers forward Tobias Harris and trying to take advantage of his increased rebounding since Joel Embiid went down with an injury. His season average is 7.6 boards per game, but he has averaged 8.7 rebounds in the last six games that Philadelphia has played without Embiid. He's facing a Lakers team that will be without their best rebounders (LeBron James and Anthony Davis) and we've seen him have two double-doubles in the last week with 13 boards against Golden State and 11 against the Kings.
The Pick: Tobias Harris over 7.5 rebounds (-104 FanDuel Sportsbook)
Thanks for checking this new column out and check back every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday for the rest of the NBA season! Good luck and bet responsibly!
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