NBA

3 NBA Player Prop Bets to Target on Monday 12/20/21

LaMelo Ball's points prop looks beatable even in a tough matchup. Here's why.

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.

Lonzo Ball Under 15.5 Points (-112)

The model at numberFire is pretty low on Lonzo Ball's expected scoring output tonight against the Houston Rockets, who rank 29th in defensive rating over their past 10 games.

Ball is slated for 34.6 minutes, down a minute from his full-season rate, and for just 14.4 points, a full 1.4 points over his season per-game average.

So, the matchup is good, but the volume doesn't seem to be. Ball is shooting well this year with a 55.0% effective field goal percentage (up from a four-year average of 52.0%), and that comes with an increase in both three-point field goal percentage (41.7% from 37.5%) and free-throw percentage (73.7% from 61.4%).

However, even with an increase in his projected points per minute (he's slated for 0.42 in this matchup, per numberFire, which bests his full-season rate of 0.37), he's still expected to finish shy of 16.0 points.

My simulation model, assuming a 14.4-point projection, views Ball's odds as 58.8% likely to stay under this prop.

LaMelo Ball Over 20.5 Points (-102)

Let's keep it in the family but swap to an over on LaMelo Ball's points prop.

Our model projects LaMelo for 21.8 points against the Utah Jazz, who do rank 10th in defensive rating over their past 10 games.

The Jazz, though, rank 24th in points per game allowed to opposing backcourt players (46.7, around 5 percent higher than the NBA median). They're second in points per game allowed to opposing frontcourt players, so Ball has a path to points tonight.

Also helping is that the Charlotte Hornets rank tied for third in shot quality generated over the past three weeks.

At a baseline of 21.8 points, Ball is 57.3% likely to go over (meaning -134 is a fair number), according to my simulation model.

Dejounte Murray Under 18.5 Points (-108)

Here is another points under at reasonable odds.

Dejounte Murray has averaged 17.9 points per game this season across 34.4 minutes, and our model anticipates a scale back in both categories (17.0 projected points and 33.4 projected minutes).

Notably, Murray is maintaining a similar effective field goal percentage (48.5%) to his three-year average (48.8%) despite a severe drop in free-throw percentage (68.7% from 77.1%).

The Los Angeles Clippers are dead median in points per game allowed to opposing backcourt players and are the best team over the past 10 games at limiting three-point attempts from backcourt players. Murray isn't the most prolific three-point shooter but has averaged a non-negligible 1.3 makes on 4.0 attempts this season. That could be all the difference.

My simulation model views Murray, at a base of 17.0 points, as 56.4% likely to stay under 19.0 points.