Navigating NBA Injury News with an Advantage (using BetStamp Pro)

Apply this strategy in countless situations.

The cadence of the nightly newsletter is quite simple. It includes a recap of that night's NBA games, a fun highlight, as well as both an actionable & available best bet at the time I send it out. I will also mention the plays have positive record in both January and February, when the newsletter transitioned from weekly NFL strategy concepts (The Gridiron Gold Series) to daily NBA guides. However, every now and then, it's important to revisit a strategy session, and the way the OKC Thunder injury report was released, along with the subsequent line movement, provides a valuable learning opportunity that can be applied to countless other NBA situations.

It’s March in the Association, and, suffice to say, wonky injury reporting happens. Often, star players remain in limbo, listed as questionable all day. It helps to know every NBA team’s beat writer(s) and stay updated with their Twitter feeds, so definitely follow all of them and perhaps make a twitter list of NBA beats. But we also need to know how to price these players. If we as bettors understand how to price a questionable player, we can get ahead of closing lines by anticipating injury reports that are about to emerge or by going in the opposite direction of injury reports that overreact. You’ll often see a news drop, a line move in one direction, and then return to somewhere in the middle of the movement. Being on either side of the closing line with a good number should be profitable in the long run.

How can you learn how much players are worth from reading the betting market?
I mention on the podcast every day that BetStamp Pro is the odds screen I use. Having an odds screen is the most fundamental gambling tool, and therefore, BetStamp Pro is the best gambling resource I have ever come across. Trust me, I’ve tried them all. I often demonstrate the software in real-time on live streams by sharing my screen and finding a bet together. You can see how BetStamp scrubs the market data and highlights discrepancies. One feature I don’t show, however, is the line history feature.

You can see at any individual book how the line has moved from open to the current price. If you pair that with Underdog NBA’s Twitter — the best resource for immediately reporting NBA injury news and moving the market — you can actually track the value of the players. Look at how we can do this with OKC vs. Portland.

On Friday (tomorrow), the Thunder play at home against the Portland Trail Blazers. The early line had already been released, neither team is on a back-to-back, and multiple books opened with the Thunder at -15. Then we got a wave of news showing that MVP candidate SGA was out, NBA All-Star JDub was out, DPOY candidate (!!!) Chet Holmgren was downgraded from available to questionable, Lou Dort was out, and Isaiah Hartenstein was out. That’s the entire starting lineup. The line crashed continuously, and we can essentially match it and understand the player values for the OKC stars.

Here are photos of BetStamp’s line history for FanDuel’s odds on that game, along with the corresponding injury news.

Matching information and line changes with BetStamp

· Opening line for Blazers @ Thunder: OKC -15 🤯

· SGA and Jalen Williams ruled out: OKC -7 reopens 👀

· Chet ruled questionable: OKC -5

· Lou Dort Out: OKC -4

· Hartenstein Out: OKC -2

· Resistance to bring it back to OKC -2.5

Here is what we just learned:

SGA worth ~5 points (id shade higher)

Jdub worth ~3 points (id shade lower)

Chet ~2 points (on prob 40% to play given the wave of news)

Dort: ~ 1 point

IHart: ~1.5 points (+cluster situation emerges if chet ends up being out)

Use this general information to price upcoming situations for the Thunder, and make sure to take note of these things for other players as well! We have an ever-updating database here at The Advantage that records these details, so we know expected player values. However, as I always say with betting opportunities, if you see something — please share it with me! I ALWAYS LOVE a DM that says, “Tyler Herro was questionable, causing the Heat line to move 1 point, and then when he was out, it moved another 1.5. I think he’s worth 2.5.” Yup, thank you, love you — IT'S US VS THE BOOKS!

If you’re interested in using BetStamp Pro as your odds screen, use the button below to get a demo of the program. A BetStamp rep will meet with you and show you around. Even if you’re not a candidate for a premium odds screen, still check out BetStamp for other tools, like bet tracking and a variety of smart gambling content.

Of course we are back with another live show tomorrow at 10am ET breaking down the Friday NBA slate. We believe our show is the sharpest NBA betting podcast out there, and also just a lot of fun! Here is the link to YouTube, but the video will pop up as a tweet on our twitters as well. If you cant tune in live at 10am ET, you can still use the link below to watch later or listen on The Advantage Sports Betting Podcast audio feed.

Early read- like the Clippers and Kings, but no formal best bet in a strategy email. See you guys tomorrow morning.