NBA

NBA Betting Guide for Thursday 10/21/21: Digging Into All 3 Games

With just three games on the board, let's dive into all of them and see what -- if anything -- pops from a betting standpoint.

Betting on the NBA can get a little overwhelming throughout the season because there are games every day, and there's just a lot to track throughout the season and entering every night -- spreads, over/unders, injuries, and so on.

But you can rely on numberFire to help. We have a detailed betting algorithm that projects out games to see how often certain betting lines hit, and you can track line movement within games and compare odds over at the oddsFire section of the site.

Where do our algorithm, our power rankings, and the betting trends identify value in tonight's games? (All odds from NBA odds.)

Dallas Mavericks at Atlanta Hawks

With just three games on the slate, we can dive into each and see what -- if anything -- looks good to bet.

That being said, we'll go chronologically and start with the Dallas Mavericks and Atlanta Hawks in a game with a 225.0-point total and in which the Hawks are -134 on the moneyline to win.

numberFire's preferred way to get exposure to this game is on the over, which comes out as a two-star recommendation out of five.

In total, our model considers the over as 59.7% likely to hit, which leaves room for an expected return of 13.9% on our wagers.

Each of the top four most comparable games to this one in our database hit the over, and these teams went over in both of their matchups last season -- by 14.5 and 4.0 points.

Milwaukee Bucks at Miami Heat

We have a larger sample between these two teams from last season than in most because they met in the playoffs. Yes, it was a first-round sweep for the Milwaukee Bucks, but hey, it's a bigger group of games to look at.

Unfortunately, that may be leading to more efficient lines overall, as none of the bets on the spread, moneyline, or over/under rate as better than a one-star recommendation for tonight's matchup.

Of course, the addition of Kyle Lowry needs to be factored into the equation for the Miami Heat.

Notably, the spread has trended down from 1.5 points for the Bucks to 1.0 points as they remain positioned as slight road favorites.

That movement has taken a pick off the board, per our algorithm, and the lone one-star recommendations sit on the under (224.0) and the Bucks' moneyline (-116).

For what it's worth, the Bucks went 5-4 as slight road favorites last season (favored by three or fewer) despite a -1.2 point differential.

Overall, this one is looking like the easiest to avoid. Still, the algorithm leans on Milwaukee and the under.

Los Angeles Clippers at Golden State Warriors

The final game of the night comes with better betting options, including another under (227.5) and the Los Angeles Clippers as 3.5-point road underdogs -- both of which are two-star recommendations, according to our algorithm.

Let's start with the Clippers' status as underdogs.

They have guard turnover after adding Eric Bledsoe and losing Patrick Beverley and Rajon Rondo and are top-seven in NBA championship odds at NBA odds (+1600), trailing the Golden State Warriors (+1200), even without Kawhi Leonard.

That helps explain the spread, and so does the fact that the Warriors picked up an opening-night win over the Los Angeles Lakers.

But, anyway, it's a close game overall based on season-long expectations, and the algorithm anticipates the Clippers to lose by just 0.85 points across thousands of projections.

The Clippers covered in 7 of 13 games as road underdogs a year ago.

Regarding the over/under, we should note that the Warriors were third-worst at cashing overs during the 2021 season and that in three matchups last season, just one Clippers/Warriors game hit the over.

The trio of matchups fell short by an average of 9.0 points even when accounting for the game that went over.