NBA Best Bets Monday March 4th

3 Best Bets, 1 Email, 0 Typos

Hopefully our nice winning Sunday made up for my typos and sending two emails yesterday lol. Monday presents a six game NBA slate where the lines seem very fairly priced. I only have three small plays and I will break them down, but first…

AV and I recorded an episode of Check Ball today, where we step away from the gambling angles and just touch on the hottest stories in the NBA. This weeks topics included:

👑 Lebrons 4Q comeback vs Clips and 40K
📞 Iverson getting a statue in Philly
🔥 Heat and Warriors 2nd Half Surge
🔪 Strus’ Dagger + Wemby Chet pt 3

It was a great episode of Check Ball. Please give it a listen ⬇️

🏀 NBA Best Bets Monday March 4th 🏀

Brooklyn Nets -370 ML (1u to win 0.27)
The Grizzlies are going to be without Ja, Bane, JJJ, Smart, Clarke, Tillman and Adams were traded, and they are purely rolling out a G League squad. The Memphis Hustle take on the Brooklyn Nets. It is a steep spread to play on a low total; and I do not want to play a juiced -114 -8.5 or a -9 when the game total is 210.5 and dropping. Instead I will just play the ML. Just because it is a ML favorite at a steep price does not mean I need to vastly increase my exposure, and obviously I’m not sticking this in a parlay. Instead 1unit for 0.27unit return. Slow and steady wins the race. Drive for show, putt for dough. Idc what expression we use, lets do smart betting tactics and win money.

Trail Blazers at Timberwolves Under 213.5 (1u)
Both of these offenses are faltering in a big way coming out of the All Star break. As Raheem mentioned on my appearance on The Ringer Gambling Podcast- the Blazers offenses rating is like 99 points per 100 possessions, a dreadful 2024 NBA efficiency number. The Wolves are not doing much better as of late, scoring only 88 in a loss to the Clippers on Sunday. We can also take into account that the Timberwolves are on the second leg of a home back to back and their young stud Anthony Edwards has been playing through a questionable tag. If he were to skip the game against one of the leagues worst teams, at home, on the B2B, the total would drop another few points. I did not have a high enough degree of certainty on Antmans status to make this a big position, but it was definitely worth the 1unit investment.

Lakers -1 (-105, 0.75u)
Lets get back to one of our basics because I know there are a bunch of new followers on the substack recently (hi, welcome, happy to have you 😊)! Whenever I am betting into the +1 or -1 number, I am doing it at less exposure. I’m sure there are some rare exceptions, but the vast majority of the time I will not bet a full unit on a +/- 1. Why? One is the 11th most common outcome in NBA games and tying on the 0 is impossible. Therefore, while we may see 2 digits of closing line value, it is only 1 point on the NBA numbers scale, and a number where obtaining some movement is not very relevant.

I do however like the spot for the Lakers at home. They get the Thunder on the second leg of road B2B, where the second half against the Booker-less Suns got tight for a good chunk. The Lakers have size and a matchup advantage that has given OKC fits at times. I expect the LakeShow to get this one done and still worth a bet despite not the best number.

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