NBA - 747 Denver Nuggets @ 748 Los Angeles Lakers
Projected line: 198 points
We have the big Game 7 of this series today that clearly came from a clear domination from the Lakers in the beginning to the series to Denver now getting the upperhand in the last games. I have a small lean in Denver for today, but it's not enough for me to take them in here. My fair line is the Lakers to be favored by 4 points, so we would need to have Denver +6/+7 to hake a play on them. However, I think we have value on the Over and this recent line movement towards the Under only gave us more value.
Denver entered the series a bit scared and they were clearly defeated in the 1st game of the series, with an offensive rate of just 95.6! The Nuggets shot 19-39 FG at the rim and 4-14 on 3pts, But after that game, Denver's offense improved and they have been consistent with offensive rates with 110.0, 113.2, 103.8, 110.8 and 117.1! The most incredible is that they only managed to have good inside-out numbers in one game that obviously resulted in an offensive explosion. That happened in the previous game where they scored 113 points, while shooting 19-30 FG at the rim and 10-20 3pts! I don't expect them to be super hot again from behind the arc, but note that the Nuggets scored 102 points at LA, despite shooting 3-19 3pts in that game!
Sure that Metta World Peace is back and the Lakers' big men will be more aggressive, however on a defensive standpoint, I think that the Lakers will have some problems to contain the Nuggets tonight. I really don't think the Nuggets will score just 14 points in the first quarter like they did in the Game 1 of the series. They are now confident, so they will be aggressive and they will push the pace in order to score points.
The big difference should come from the Lakers side. First of all, I really expect the referees to be "homerish". The Lakers will get some calls and I expect this contest to have a high number of free throws, especially favoring the Lakers. In the last two games of the series, both Bynum and especially Gasol disappeared. I understand that the fact that these players got burn out after constantly playing 40 minutes per game, however in the last game of the series where Denver got an easy win, these two players were on court for just 29 and 30 minutes, so they will be in a better spot for tonight.
After dominating the paint early on the series, the Lakers frontcourt didn't show up in the last two games, as they shot only 13-27 FG and 9-18 FG at the rim. Without their inside game established, it was easy for the Nuggets to slow down the Lakers' bad perimeter offense. The difference for tonight is that I expect both Gasol and especially Bynum to hedge hard in order to get good inside position and not only they will get more touches, as I also expect them to make the Lakers offense look sharper tonight.
Looking at the fact that this is a "win or go home" spot for both teams, I also believe we will have a lot of late free throws at the end. I expect both teams to produce decent offense tonight, in a medium/fast paced game and therefore, I'll take the Over in here.
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 747/748 Over 195 @ -110 / 1.91 on Betonline
No comments:
Post a Comment