3 plays for Tuesday:
Cleveland Cavaliers +3.5
Mathematically projected score: Celtics 91 Cavaliers 93
Looks like the public is bullish on the Celtics coming out of break. Maybe everyone has forgotten the Celtics forgettable start to the season. I’m expecting to read a lot of people say the Celtics are “rested” so that is the reason they will cover. Ah, the public and their futile attempts to explain why they make bandwagon bets on road favorites.
The fact of the matter is that the Cavs are competitive enough to be favored in most of their games at home, why would this Boston team be an exception? A good way to evaluate this line is by looking at the UTA/SAC game tomorrow, Sacramento is laying 2 at home against a Jazz team that is quite similar to this Celtics team, I actually rank the Jazz a bit higher than the Celtics. Cleveland and Sacramento are my #23 and #24 ranked teams, respectively, so they are as similar as it gets. However, there is a 5.5-point disparity between the lines in these games. It’s a simple case of line-inflation for a road favorite with a strong tradition.
I expect this line to improve with time.
New Orleans Hornets +13.5
Mathematically projected score: Hornets 92 Bulls 98
The Hornets are quietly becoming one of the most undervalued teams in the NBA. They’ve snuck into my top-15 road teams and lines are still inflated despite the ATS cover streak they took into the break. Chicago holds a trend advantage on New Orleans, but that isn’t nearly enough to offset the resounding ATS edge the Hornets hold in this match.
Chicago is a major contender that took a 60% cover rate into the break, books tend to evaluate themselves at the midway point and try to correct some of the teams they undervalues in the first half. Chicago is one of the teams that is likely to see far less ATS covers in the second half of this season, because the books lose money on popular teams that cover at a high rate.
Another reason for this inflated line is the trouncing that Chicago put on the Hornets last time out, in NO. Every game is an independent event when it comes to probability, the public doesn’t understand that so you can always get value with a team that got blown out in the last match-up against a given team. The most recent memory I have of this situation is when we were on the Suns +2.5 at home against a Laker team that beat them by 12 points 2 days earlier. To jog your memory, the Suns won that game by 12 points.. I don’t expect the Hornets to beat the Bulls, but they will hang tough in a game where most of the Bulls focus will be on heading to San Antonio on the following night.
This line has already moved a full point in the Hornets favor, so just let it push it’s way higher and higher.
New Jersey Nets +10.5
Mathematically projected score: Nets 92 Mavericks 97
As you know, I love betting on New Jersey when they are on the road. They are on of the few counter intuitive teams that plays better on the road than they do at home (based on my weighted power rankings.) Also, the Nets are on Vegas’ midway evaluation as a team that needs to be boosted in order to avoid profitable blind fading. They covered only 43% of their games in the first half, anything that is outside the 48-52% range is a huge deal to Vegas odds makers. Keep in mind that most teams land within that 48-52% range by the end of the season, in terms of ATS win pct.
On the other hand the Mavs are covering 58.8% of their spreads, an
alarming figure that should be priority #1 for odds makers to move on.
You CANNOT undervalue the defending world champions if you are trying to
minimize loss and maximize profits.. and Vegas undervalued the Mavs in
the first half of the season, don't expect them to continue making that mistake.
This is another look-ahead game. Dallas is on the first leg of a b2b against a seemingly harmless Nets team and they have to head to Memphis the next night to take-on a divisional foe. The only issue is that the Nets have arguably the best point guard in the game, second-chance points from Humphries’ efforts, a top-5 rookie in Brooks.. oh, and they just got their 7-footer back. If the Nets are firing on all cylinders they have a shot with any team in the league, I’ll take a double digit cushion any day on the Nets.
Once again, we are opposing public perception with this play so we can wait for a better number.
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