NBA - 701 Indiana Pacers @ 702 Toronto Raptors
Projected Lines: 184 points / pk line
Toronto will surely be one of the most improved teams this season: they have a good coach, they got one of the most underrated players in the league in Kyle Lowry and a rookie like Jonas Valanciunas, who decided to join the NBA and he will have an immediate impact on the team, especially on defense. This isn't obviously enough for me to take them +3 against a "superior" team like Indiana, but the truth is that Toronto is currently more prepared to face the new season than Indiana.
Even though Toronto has three new players on their projected starting lineup in Kyle Lowry, Landry Fields and Jonas Valanciunas, the truth is that Coach Dwayne Casey didn't have to deal with injuries during the preseason (the only exception was Lowry that had to miss the first two games against NBA teams). Therefore, Coach Dwayne Casey was able to maximize the time by working on the rotations and not just inserting some players on the court to burn some time. He really prepared this team during the preseason to play in a similar way in the regular season!
Let's take a look at Toronto's starting lineup on the preseason:
vs DET: Calderon – Fields – DeRozan – Bargnani – Gray “starters”=64min
vs DET: Calderon – Fields – DeRozan – Bargnani – Valanciunas “starters”=97min
vs WAS: Lowry – Fields – DeRozan – Bargnani – Valanciunas “starters”=122min
vs NYK: Lowry – Fields – DeRozan – Bargnani – Valanciunas “starters”=149min
vs MIL: Lowry – Fields – DeRozan – Bargnani – Valanciunas “starters”=143min
vs MEM: Lowry – Fields – DeRozan – Bargnani – Valanciunas “starters”=102min
Note: By "starters", I mean the time of game that the five projected starters played in those games
Very few teams in the league used the same starting lineup on the last four games of the preseason, but this was the case of Toronto. I watched some of those games and even their second unit has already a good identity formed, with Jose Calderon, John Lucas, Linas Kleiza and Amir Johnson providing energy and pushing up the pace a bit more than the starting unit. Kyle Lowry has already become the team's playmaker with his all around game, DeMar DeRozan is well focused in working near the basket and forget his terrible outside shooting ability, Jonas Valanciunas had 4 blocks in one game and I really liked the team's flow in those games.
On the other hand, we have the complete opposite with Indiana. The team had several injuries on the preseason and some banged up players that conditioned Coach Frank Vogel and prevented him from creating an early dynamic on the team. Indiana lost Darren Collison in the offseason and that allowed George Hill to become the team's new PG. The problem is that Hill didn't play a single minute on the preseason and he is even questionable for this game. Also Danny Granger is banged up and he participated in only two games. Unfortunately, he is still far from 100% right now.
"(The knee) is testing me," Granger said. "They're telling me the pain can't do anything else to my knee. I'm going to have to play through the pain, but it hurts."
As usual, Indiana is also dealing with some problems on ball movement, with a low assist rate. D.J. Augustin has been playing well on offense, but he is a clear liability on defense and we will have in here a matchup between Kyle Lowry and D.J. Augustin that will clearly work in favor of the Raptors. I expect a lot of problems to the Pacers offense, as they lack continuity on their backcourt, while their frontcourt is the biggest concern Toronto will have on this game.
Indiana has a good frontcourt that defends well and they are extremely physical as a team. Therefore, I expect a physical game, with Indiana struggling offensively, but they will also make things tough to Andrea Bargnani and rookie Jonas Valanciunas, who is still quite raw offensively. Toronto was a good defensive team under Dwayne Casey last year and he has more options to continue the good defensive work he has been developing with the Raptors. I expect a good defensive game from both teams, with Toronto showing that they are more ready to face the new season than the Pacers, with more chemistry and less injuries, therefore I'll be taking both Toronto and the Under in here.
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 701/702 Under 188.5 @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 702 Toronto Raptors (+3) @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker
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