NBA Premium Card 01/09

NBA - 503 Oklahoma City Thunder @ 504 Denver Nuggets

Play #1

This will be the third consecutive time that I’m playing the Nuggets and even though I don’t expect the same beating that DEN applied to LAL & BOS, I really expect the Nuggets to be super competitive.

It all starts w/ Ty Lawson that is playing in an extreme high level. In the last game against the Celtics, Lawson had 5-10 FG, 8-9 FT & 19 points but he also found his teammates as well w/ 13 assists. Note that his opponent in that game was Avery Bradley, who is an excellent defender.

DEN is running and gunning right now, they dominated the boards in all L3 games vs. MEM, LAL & BOS and even their defense is more aggressive by creating 15, 16 and 20 TO’s.

I understand that OKC is in bounce back mode after being humiliated @UTA and Serge Ibaka is back, but OKC’s offense has not been the same without Westbrook. In the L5 games they had only 15, 20, 22, 28 and 18 assists – a good sign of lack of ball movement.

OKC is 2-0 vs. DEN so far this season and Russell Westbrook was the MVP in both games: 1) 30 points, 12 rebounds and 7 assists and 2) 21 points, 13 rebounds and 8 assists. In the last h2h, I had one of my biggest plays of the season w/ OKC (Triple Dime Play), but since then, DEN has improved dramatically while OKC sans Westbrook will have natural problems to dominate teams, especially on the road.

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 504 Denver Nuggets (+3.5) @  -110 / 1.91 on Bovada