NBA

3 NBA Player Prop Bets to Target on Thursday 10/21/21

Will Tyler Herro be held in check again against the Bucks, or should we target the over on his points prop instead?

Player props can be useful in a variety of ways, from taking advantage of them straight up within the betting market to measuring a player's potential to produce in daily fantasy basketball.

Here we'll focus on utilizing our projections and a slew of other tools and simulations to help make money betting player props.

For this article, we are using the odds provided at NBA Finals odds to pinpoint spots where value can be had tonight.

Please note that betting lines and our player projections may change throughout the day after this article is published.

De'Andre Hunter Over 4.5 Rebounds (+110)

There's a clear discrepancy in juice on this rebounding prop for De'Andre Hunter. The over is +110, and the under is -134.

So with numberFire projecting Hunter for a baseline of 5.3 rebounds across 33.0 minutes, we're going to want to inspect the over regardless -- but at +110, that's especially true.

Hunter's historical deviation in rebounding data (plus a regressed expectation based on his median projection) would -- across thousands of simulations -- suggest that he's 62.6% likely to hit the over on the 4.5 number.

That implies it's the over that should be minus odds (and actually as steep as -167). That's a spot we can exploit.

Tyler Herro Over 14.5 Points (+100)

The base projection for Tyler Herro's points (14.9) isn't that much higher than the prop (14.5), so a recommendation here will depend on the odds we can bet it at.

Herro can be had at even money to get to 15 points against the Milwaukee Bucks at FanDuel Sportsbook.

The Miami Heat offense will have new looks with Kyle Lowry in town, yet it's very plausible that the point guard helps facilitate better chances for Herro and the Heat and make the offense more efficient than it was a year ago.

And, sure, Herro averaged just 12.0 points per game against the Bucks last season across a seven-game sample but went over 20 points twice in that split and -- as someone who has a lot of hats -- I'll eat one if the Heat get significantly worse on offense with Lowry at point after finishing 18th in offensive rating a year ago.

According to my simulation model, Herro should get to 15 points about 54.5% of the time, indicating -120 odds on the over. That makes +100 very fair game.

Reggie Jackson Under 2.5 Three-Point Makes (+128)

Three plus-money props? Sure, why not?

The juice on Reggie Jackson's three-point prop is -164 on the over, which is pretty wild.

Yes, our projections have him at 2.8 made threes across a projection of 32.0 minutes, and yes, he's more likely to get to three made threes than he is to fall under, but the simulation model views +128 as a very fair number for such nice prop odds.

It's always good to examine opposing three-point defense trends when looking for three-point props, and the Golden State Warriors were better than average last season at preventing three-pointers on a per-game and per-attempt basis.

That should allow us to scale back Jackson's expected three-point attempt numbers -- or at least, more accurately, not bump it up too aggressively.

Lastly, looking at Jackson's per-minute three-point make rate in games without Kawhi Leonard last season (0.07) and combining it with his minutes projection to assume a baseline, he'd be at 2.4 makes.

Using that number in the simulations, Jackson should be viewed as a coinflip to go under.