The wait is almost over for the start of this season’s NBA Finals featuring Round 3 of an epic showdown between the league’s top two teams. The Cleveland Cavaliers made short work of Indiana, Toronto and Boston in their straight-up 12-1 run to a third-straight Eastern Conference title, while the Golden State Warriors only needed 12 games to get past Portland, Utah and San Antonio to lock up their third Western Conference crown in a row.
One of the best things about the NBA Finals is all the added betting action that BetOnline has added to the plate. Along with a full set of betting lines for the games themselves, there are any number of futures odds and prop bets posted for this series as a whole. The following is a look at a few of my “best bet” picks based on the value in the numbers.
NBA Finals MVP
Picking a winner in this NBA futures bet hinges on which team you have winning this series. If Cleveland does find a way to win as a heavy +225 underdog on the current series price odds, then you would have to go with LeBron James at +240 betting odds. If you have Golden State avenging last year’s loss in the NBA Finals after taking a dominating 3-1 series lead, then the top two choices would be Kevin Durant at +190 or Stephen Curry at +200. The top two longshots on the board would be Golden State’s Draymond Green (+600) and Cleveland’s Kyrie Irving (+1200).
I am going chalk in this one with Durant as my top pick. He specifically came to the Warriors to win NBA titles and he has the added bonus of being matched up head-to-head against James in this series. The stage is set for him to shine and I believe he will live up to the task.
NBA Finals Exact Outcome
The best odds on the board for this NBA futures bet are set at +260 for Golden State in five games. The odds that the Warriors win in seven are next on the list at +325 followed by a six-game series win at +375. The best odds for Cleveland winning this series are set at +500 for six games followed by a seven-game series win at +600.
Since I have Golden State winning this year’s championship, I decided to stretch the odds a bit by going with the 4-2 series win in six games similar to the 2015 NBA Finals. The Warriors should actual sweep this series given the way they have been blowing teams off the court in the postseason and going back to mid-March of the regular season they have just one SU loss in their last 28 games. You cannot discount James’ impact on the sport’s biggest stage so I will give Cleveland the benefit of the doubt that it can find a way to win at least two of three at home.
NBA Finals Most Points
After averaging 32.5 points over 13 playoffs games, it is no big surprise that LeBron has the best odds on the board for this player prop at +115. Curry led his team in scoring with 28.6 PPG in the 12-game run to the NBA Finals and his odds to lead the way in this series are set at +350. Durant’s postseason scoring average stands at 25.2 PPG and he is actually the second-favorite at +300. Irving’s odds to score the most points are set at +500 and Thompson rounds out the top five players on the list at +1000.
James is going to have to go off to keep his team competitive against a Golden State lineup that is averaging 118.3 points in the postseason, but staying true to my overall predictions for this series, I am also going with Durant as my “best bet” pick in this prop. He will still have to share the ball with Curry and to a lesser extent Thompson as two of Golden State’s top outside shooters, but I believe that he will put up some pretty big numbers of his own.
