Getting Value with in Progress NBA Series Lines

by: Nite Owl Sports

We have bet NBA series sparingly, and until this final round we did not make a single series pick TY for our Top Ten clients, primarily because the odds for the faves we clearly expected to win each series have been ridiculous, and taking a dog at plus odds makes sense only if we expect the dog to win, which we did not to this point. In high profile series like this one, we like to speculate before odds are released about what we expect the odds to be, and after predicting this series to open at "pick em" for both sides, we were shocked to see LA open at around  -150 to 155, and even more shocked to see that price rise quickly to as high as -170, with a +150 "take back" for Celtics, and finally settle at about –180/+160. While the fact that the Lakers are admittedly more of a "public" team than Boston could partly account for this surprisingly high series line on LA, the more likely reason of the public perception favoring the Lakers is that LA is presumed to be better than Boston because the Western Conference is so much stronger than the East, making LA's stellar W-L record against largely tougher NBA West opposition (than that faced by Celtics) even more impressive than Boston's NBA best W-L record accumulated by wins over largely inferior NBA East opponents. While we have little quarrel that the "middle rung" teams (i.e., those who barely made or missed qualifying for the playoffs) in the west are better than those in the east, that does not mean that the Beast of the East is also inferior to the Best of the West. But even more importantly, when a team gets as far (and in doing so has won as many regular season and playoff games) as both these teams have in order to get to the finals, each team is capable of beating the other, in either an individual game or the series, so it made sense to take Boston as a heavy dog at this nice "plus money." We saw basically the same situation with the match-up between the two NFL Super Bowl contestants TY, which is why we took the NY Giants at +400 odds (for an official one unit pick on this site) to knock off NE, as well as for 3 or 4 units to cover ATS at +13.

But back to the NBA and this series, what about those thousands of fans who still think LA will take this series, and either didn’t make a series bet, or made only a small one, at the above mentioned ridiculous odds? Is there any way that they can still  bet the Lakers to win the series, at improved odds, while the series is in progress? In the write up for our winning 5 unit pick on Boston in game 1, we mentioned a series "hedging" strategy, which would apply if Boston won game 1, which they did. In order to utilize it, you will need to have access to a sports "book" that allows series bets to be placed, at updated odds based on result(s) of prior game(s), during the series. So if you have access to such “in progress” series odds, read on. The strategy is value based, and assumes that you either like LA to win the series, but did not bet them at their high pre-series “price,” or that you already have some series money on Boston at the great pre-series odds for them, but you aren’t convinced they will win the series. In any event, in either situation, we prefer a phased in strategy, after games 1 and 2. Specifically, we suggested that if Boston won game 1 (as they did), our subscribers consider partially hedging their recommended 3 unit Boston series bet with a smaller series bet of one or two units on LA, at the adjusted improved odds for LA, to take the series (with the # of units on LA depending on the new odds). We thought the adjusted series price would be close to "even money," but after the adjusted series price came out at -130 on Friday and briefly dropped to -125, it then rose to -140 or 145, which does not have much value for LA, but is still a lot better than –180. So for those LA backers, we suggest betting on Lakers before game 2, at –145 or less, but only for one unit, since those odds are not great, and LA will not be "out of it" by any means even if they lose game 2, given the 2-3-2 format of the finals. In fact, if LA does lose game 2, we would also suggest doing another series bet on LA (at much better odds, probably “even” or possibly “plus money), probably for two units if odds are decent (of course, assuming no series ending injury to any key LA player in game 2). 

With the aforementioned 2-3-2 (home-road-home) format used for the NBA finals the above strategy has worked well for us in a recent finals series and was a last second three point shot away from working for us two consecutive years. Specifically, in Miami’s memorable upset of Dallas in NBA finals just three years ago (even though it seems like 20 years ago after the way the Miami team has disintegrated over the last two years), Miami was a small series dog to Dallas before the start of the series, but after losing games 1 and 2 in “Big D,” they were “written off’ by many and the odds rose to +200 for Miami on the adjusted series line  at many sports books at that point. As we all remember, Miami stormed back and won the next four to take the crown and win us the series “money,” leaving Mavs owner Mark Cuban not only reportedly a few hundred thousand dollars poorer at the “betting window,” but also speechless for one of the few times in his life. Next season the same scenario started to unfold with Detroit going down 0-2 to the SA Spurs, and heading back to Mo Town as +200 series dogs on the adjusted series line, only to storm back and rout SA in games 3 and 4, but have the crown snatched away from them with Robert Horry’s 3 point dagger in the final minute of game 5. Although Pistons did manage to win game 6 in SA, they lost game 7 and the series bet two nights later. But by now you get the point I’m sure, that even if a team goes down 0-2 in the finals, it in no way means they are “done,” especially a team as talented and well coached as the Lakers.

It will be interesting to see how this series unfolds, but don’t count on it being short or one-sided for either team. However, we have made it look easy lately at Nite Owl Sports, by going 9-2 for +15 units during the last two weeks on our NBA picks, including winning both our money line and ATS picks on Boston, for +6.5 units, in game 1. But as our pleased subscribers have seen for themselves, we don't just do a "pick or two" with a brief explanation on these games – we give our subscribers a full betting "attack strategy" for the game, which results in more play options to choose from and more profits to be made, especially if all of our recommendations are followed.

Whether it’s just $25 for our individual picks (like our strong side pick for game 2 tonite) or our one day NBA pass, or our new reduced rates for 3 days or 7 days of  NBA , or our best deal at just $79 for the remainder of NBA playoffs, you can't find better value in a sports handicapping service than Nite Owl Sports for the rest of the NBA playoffs.       

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