NBA

3 NBA Player Prop Bets to Target on Friday 12/3/21

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.

The prop-betting experience on FanDuel Sportsbook is getting even more fun. You can track your player props with real-time updates and place in-game props with ease.

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

Malcolm Brogdon Over 2.5 Made Three-Pointers (+114)

The Miami Heat have been very generous to opposing players on three-pointers.

Sure, they rank around the NBA average in three-point field goal percentage allowed (34.1% compared to the NBA average of 34.5%), but that's not a stat that defenses control.

What they can control are three-point attempts, and boy, Miami doesn't really do that. Opponents are averaging 40.6 three-point attempts per game, second-most in the NBA and well above the league average of 35.6.

This should lead to an increase in three-point attempt frequency for the Indiana Pacers players.

One such player with plus-money three-point odds is Malcolm Brogdon. Brogdon is projected by numberFire for 2.5 made threes, meaning we could simply trust the projection and the plus money to make a bet.

But even better: if we adjust his three-point attempt rate on a per-minute basis (0.17) for the matchup and multiply it by his minutes projection (34.8) and his four-year three-point field goal percentage (37.5%), Brogdon should be projected for around 2.75 three-point makes.

At plus-money, that's worth betting.

Tobias Harris Over 6.5 Rebounds (-112)

The Philadelphia 76ers are taking on the Atlanta Hawks tonight, and Tobias Harris projects well for a good rebounding outing.

Harris, who has averaged 8.2 rebounds per game this season, is projected for 7.6 boards tonight across 34.6 minutes, per numberFire's model.

That projected rate equates to 0.22 rebounds per minute, just a tick above his four-year average of 0.21. In total, though, Harris' rebounding rate is up to 0.24 per minute this season, and he's been virtually exactly on par (56.9%) with the league-average conversion rate (57.2%) in terms of rebounding chances.

Though the Hawks are top-10 in rebounds per game allowed to opposing frontcourt players, their allowance (31.5) is essentially the same as the league median (32.2). We shouldn't feel the need to bump down Harris' rebounding rate substantially in this matchup.

Seth Curry Under 15.5 Points (-108)

The baseline projection for Seth Curry's points output, per numberFire's model, is only 13.6, so he has a sizable way to go to get to 16.0 and cash an over ticket.

That's why it's the under that stands out here.

Curry is facing the Hawks, who do allow a good number of three-point attempts per game (38.0, ranking 7th-most), but he could be due for slight shooting regression.

Curry has posted four-year rates of 86.5% from the free-throw line, 62.1% in true shooting, and 59.7% in effective field goal percentage; all of those are up this season (91.7%, 64.7%, and 61.1%, respectively).

Using his projected shot volume and his four-year shooting splits, Curry should be projected for 13.6 points -- the same output as numberFire's model.

Given the 13.6-point baseline, my prop simulation model views Curry as only 36.9% likely to go over, meaning we could bet the under up to -171 odds.