The Herd with Colin Cowherd - The Favorites - NBA Midseason Betting Update

Episode Date: March 2, 2023

The NBA season is in its stretch run, so Action Network hosts Chad Millman and Simon Hunter welcome on NBA insider and colleague Matt Moore to discuss all things NBA futures betting and playoff races. #Volume #HerdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter.

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Must be 21 or older and in select states. gambling problem, call 1-800 gambler or visit fanduel.com slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, Virginia, and Ohio. 1-800-next-step or text next step to 533342 in Arizona, 1-888-78-9-7-7-7-7-7-7-7. Or visit C-CPG slash chat in Connecticut, 1-8109 with it in Indiana. Visit KSgamblinghelp.com in Kansas, 1-8777-7-0 stop in Louisiana. visit MD gambling help.org in Maryland 1-8-778, Hope, NY, or text, Hope, NY, 467-369 in New York, 1,800-2-2-470 in Wyoming, or visit 1-800 gambler.net in West Virginia. Welcome to the favorites, the podcast from the Volume Podcast Network.

I am Chad Millman, Chief Content Officer of the Action Network. I am joined as I am. For every episode by my BFF, my companion, my compadre, professional better from all over the world. Simon Hunter. Hello, Simon. Aloha, Chad. How was the birthday? Oh, man, it was fantastic.

I had a great day. Thank you. Thank you for all the birthday wishes. Was that? Did you feel very loved? I did. I felt very loved at the end of the day. My son, my 16-year-old son, got me a Chicago Bears trivia book, which was outstanding.

And so I made him and my wife, and we had some friends over, answer many, many questions about the Chicago Bears, which was fantastic. And then our close friends here in West Hartford, one of their daughters, she's an amazing baker. I'm not a big sweet sky. As you guys know, I treat my body like a temple, a lot of exercise, a lot of eating fruits and nuts and, you know, plants. But she made me a cake that I love. I ate it. I had two slices.

It was delicious. It's a great day. That is a great day. I'm not in Hawaii. I'm not, you know, living it up like some rich single dude who can just go wherever he wants, whenever he wants, and live wherever he needs to live. So there's that. If you can get over the feeling of the end, the,

the never ending feeling of being alone forever, Chad. Life's pretty good. If you can just love yourself, it's a good deal. But there are some nights where I'm alone. I'm like, God, I wish I had the wife and kids. And then there's days like today where, you know, I just walk down to the beach and I just do whatever I want. Where I'm like, man, I don't know about this whole wife and kids thing, Chad.

So it's the constant battle of a man. But, yeah, made it to Hawaii, brother. So it's going to be a good month here. I'm going to tell you one more story. And then we got to bring in, our NBA expert, Matt Moore, who hosts the Buckets podcast daily with a rotating cast. And he's trolling me. Trolling me, Chad, wearing Chiefs gear.

He's trolling you wearing Chiefs gear today. He's got Sean Little. He's got Jay Money, a whole crew of guys who come on that podcast. Let me tell you something. We used to do that podcast once or twice a week, and we had to pull off the Band-Aid and go every single day because NBA betting happens every single day. Matt Moore is everywhere. He's doing videos.

He's doing podcasts. He's writing. He's breaking news. We're going to have him on. I highly recommend Bucket's podcast. It's just a great listen. Like, NBA is a nerd out kind of league. And the guys who cover the NBA and are doing this Bucket's podcast are nerding the

fuck out. And we're going to nerd the fuck out on the NBA today. obviously massive conversation about LeBron and the Lakers. All of a sudden, the Bucks are the top team in the east up by game, I think, on the Celtics. The nuggets in Matt Moore's backyard are fantastic. And they've got Nico Yokic, who could win his third MVP and is averaging a triple double. But I still don't think the nuggets are the team to beat in the West. There is a lot of shit going on, Simon.

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Download GameTime today. Last minute tickets, lowest price, guaranteed. One more thing before we bring in Matt Moore. Simon, hearing you talk about, you know, being alone versus wife and kids and family, I'll tell you one story. And we've had this guy in the podcast before us, my buddy, Alan Loeb, who's a very successful screenwriter and has been in L.A. forever. And he's written a lot of big movies that everyone who's listening, you know, has heard of. He wrote Wall Street 2. He wrote the movie 21 about the guys who brought down Vegas and they were the car counters in Vegas. He wrote the movie Rock of Ages.

He's written movies that started Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman. So I was hanging out with him one year. At the time, he had this beautiful house in the Hollywood Hills. And it's January. It's late in the day. We had just watched NFL playoffs all day. We had been drinking. He had made soup with fresh ingredients from the farmer's market.

We had a bunch of people over. It's the end of the day. We're sitting in the hot tub. And I say, oh, I'm going to call it. my wife and he goes, man, I wish I had a wife. And I look at the guy, I go, dude, you're a fucking cliche. You don't want a wife. You're perfectly happy.

You're not looking for that. You're rich. You got a place in the hills. You're sitting in a hot tub. You're living your life. Don't start thinking you want a wife. It's not for you. And maybe Simon, it's not for you.

Oh, it is. I'm a romantic type. I'm just going through my phase of went through a heart break, sleeping as many girls as I can until I found the right one. And I think that's how most guys do it where it's like, you know, once you find the right one, you know, I just haven't yet. So I doubt it's going to happen here in Hawaii, Chad. I could already tell I'm probably not meant for Hawaii. I'm very East Coast.

I got a little edge to me. So, you know, I'm just going to try and embrace the culture and see where life takes me. But I'm with your buddy. There's moments, Chad, where you're like, I was on the airplane behind this just new married couple. So this woman's kissing her husband every two seconds on this six-hour flight. Like, I've never been more happy in my life to be single. I was dying inside for this guy because I was like, this is awful. But once I got here, I was like, you know, this is the most romantic place in the world.

So I'm telling you, Chad, constant battle, brother. But let's talk hoops. When you've been married almost 25 years like me, your wife will not be kissing you every six seconds. Matt Moore, dude, where the fuck do we start with this hoop stuff? Like, I want to counter. I don't want to talk about LeBron first. Okay? I want to talk about the Bucks and the Celtics in the East.

Hold on. Boo. Well, Simon wants to, you know, want to talk about the Sixers. And that's totally fine, by the way. Like, the Sixers could be legit contenders, but they haven't shown it. So what are we talking about here, Matt Moore? Yeah, I mean, look, this season is bizarre. bizarre by a lot of accounts.

Talk to people at All Star Weekend, it was kind of funny. There's a little bit of discomfort with the fact that nothing makes sense. Like, there's just too much of like, I don't know. Like, I don't know what's going to happen. Like, we don't know who like the dominant team is. We don't know who like the dominant teams are. I think from our perspective, from a betting perspective, like this is awesome because there's so much that can happen between now and June.

There's so many ways to track the market to identify like, I like this team. but there's probably going to be a better spot later, tracking all of these types of markets to be able to find opportunities when things are uncertain because the books are unable right now to be like, yeah, no, it's going to be like, you know, one team should be a massive favorite in either conference. I think even now the markets are a little off. It's been a fascinating season from a parody perspective.

I think most casual fans are uncomfortable with it, but I think from a betting perspective, we got a lot of opportunities. the Eastern Conference. My big takeaway on the Eastern Conference is I got to see the bracket. Like that's what I got to see because Boston, I think, has the advantage over most of the teams that are in it. There is one team I think that has an upset potential. And that's the Cleveland Cavaliers who the Celtics beat last night. Yep.

But if the bracket shakes out differently, if it ended today and it was Bucks 1, Celtics 2, Sixers, 3, Cavs 4, now all of a sudden, especially with where the market is right now, Fandul, Bucks are number one team in the Eastern Conference, won 16 in a row, and they're plus 185. I'm getting plus 185 on a team that would have home court that went toe to toe with the Celtics last year without Chris Middleton. So you can tell, again, the markets don't really know what to make of the season, which if you can find some inside that you feel good about from a betting perspective,

there's opportunity there. Well, look, it does feel a little bit like the, what the bookmakers are identifying with the Celtics, who are also the top overall favorite to win the NBA title, is the Celtics have generally been the team fans of favoring all season long. That's where their biggest liability is. So they're keeping the number low on the Celtics because if it goes any higher, they do think that they're the public team,

whereas the box have come in kind of sleepily, wanting 16 in a row. Middleton hasn't played all year. Janus has been injured. You've had Holiday Janice and Middleton on the court almost together, almost not at all. Middleton hasn't even been himself. So they're winning, Pat Conantin hasn't played much like he was injured a lot early in the year. This team hasn't even played its best and it's won 16 in a row. Simon, you're shaking your head. Well, I just think it's the same thing as last year of the East just has three or four really dominant teams and they all have their own flaws. I mean, the Sixers have major flaws still.

It's one of those teams where I was with a bunch of pros this weekend. They do not trust the Sixers team. They trust the Bucks because they've done it before. And they trust the Celtics because this same team went to the finals last year. And they think this team might be better than they were last year. So it's just interesting here in perspective right now where I'm trying not to be the homer, but I kind of see the right on the wall here where the Valley is not in the Sixers. It seems like the value is what do you just talk about.

It's in the books and it's in the Celtics. So the Sixers, I think, are an interesting talking point because this is one where you got to follow the NBA because of the subtext of what's going on because it's such a messy, drama-filled, nonsensical league. Like, it's just the constant nonsense going on. So this week, the athletic reported on the worst kept secret in the league, which is that James Harden has a significant interest in going back to Houston this summer. The way to break down this equation is basically he signed a short-term deal with the Phillies. I'm basically a make-good. Hey, you can upgrade the team.

I'll take a discount, but I'm going to get paid the next year. And this is either a leverage move to make sure that Philadelphia offers him the five-year max that he wants, which would be a disastrous contract at his age and usage, by the way. Or he does genuinely have like real personal reasons to go back to Houston. He was comfortable there. He was essentially a God king there.

he likes being there. The nightlife opportunities are ideal for James there. The fact that you have this out there, that's not good for a team. You don't want the sense of, yeah, this is probably the last year. Like we tried it, but guys are probably going to move on. And there started to be like a lot of rumblings about what's going to happen with this team long term. So I don't think you can bet Philly. That doesn't mean I think that they're dead in the water.

If they can get somebody else to knock out Boston, I like the same. Sixers as an underdog play. Like, I actually don't mind the matchup versus Milwaukee. They're probably closer than what the market will show there. They would destroy Cleveland. They would destroy the Knicks, and that's it. But they can't beat Boston. So those are the kind of things that you're trying to figure out here is like,

if they can get on a roll, even with all this off court stuff, the Sixers can make a run. But as long as Boston is in the playoffs, as long as they have not been eliminated, I cannot bet the Sixers. Well, I, the Sixers, are such an interesting team because they are the epitome of the NBA drama. Right? Embed, they won't trade Tyrese Maxie.

He's an untouchable. Hardin has transformed his game to become one of the best point cards in the NBA, one of the best distributors in the NBA. He doesn't want to be there anymore. They've got Daryl Morey, who is brilliant as a GM. But this team is not anything like what he built that made James Hardin the god that he was in Houston. But that was part of the Ben Simmons thing, though.

Like he just needed to move Ben Simmons, and that was by far, even looking back now, it's like, I can't comprehend we got James Hardin for Ben Simmons. And slow play it the whole year, too. Yeah, it was really. That was a masterclass. That was a masterclass. It was brilliant GMing.

Also, look, we know Daryl is super, smart when it comes to playing percentages. And, you know, back during the pandemic days, we would do these late night poker games with a lot of talent from ESPN and from, from the ESPN from action, but ESPN people were on it too. And Darrell would come on the games and play. Like, he's legit when it comes to deal making. You know what I mean?

Like, that's as good as it gets. Yeah. Even if he doesn't win a music title. Darryl very aware of our odds pages at Action Network, too, by the way. Darrell always check it to see where the Sixers probabilities land on the odds as well. He's brilliant at that. All right. The West, meanwhile, we've talked about the East.

The West, all of a sudden, KD comes back last night, has 23 points. They win. Plays for the Sons, obviously. The Sons have the shortest odds of all Western Conference teams right now at Fandwell, plus 450. The Nuggets plus 750. the Clippers plus 1100. So right now it goes Celtics, bucks,

Suns, Nuggets, Clippers. Matt Moore, are you buying Sons, Nuggets, or Clippers as an NBA champion? So I've already got positions on the Nuggets and Clippers from preseason.

I grabbed them early at longer numbers, thinking that there was no way that the Clippers number would not go down. Like obviously, and yeah, I've lost CLV on that, which is annoying. The Clippers are annoying.

I just want to state that. for the record on this podcast. The Sons, I grabbed the minute that Kyrie Irving requested a trade before Kevin Durant's stuff had come out because we had reported over the summer. Like we reported when the Kyrie stuff came out, one of the first things that I was writing about was, hey, the sons are like, this is their guy. And when I reported throughout the year, like in all of our intel reports, it was the sons are looking for a bigger move.

It was really funny listening to the aftermath of the KD trade, listening to people around the league because they would have these conversations with Phoenix about various players to act because the sons didn't know if KD was going to happen, but they would have these conversations about possible trades. And they would be like, they seem really interested. But the sons would always end it with, okay, we'll get back to you. We're checking on some other stuff, but don't do anything before coming back to us. And the reason they were doing that is they were waiting for KD. They lined up everything in the event that Durant was not available. And then Durant became available and they pounced on it.

And they would not make a move to limit their trade flexibility until Kevin Durant was 100% off the table. It was a really good job by their Intel Department of recognizing in advance that the Kyra Irving extension thing was going to be a problem, that this could implode midseason. So like got to credit the Suns a lot with that. As far as the value goes, let me cut you off for a second. Yeah, go ahead. What does that mean Intel Department? I've never heard that phrase for NBA before.

Okay, so there's this idea that the scouts in the NBA, that what they do is like they go to games and then they write down all the plays and they do assessments on, like you have your personnel scouts, your pro scouts and like your college scouts, right? The biggest value that those guys get is talking to other scouts, other video guys, people they know in the league and media, gathering intel. The best organizations, not all of them I found, but the best organizations actually have databases where all this stuff goes into.

So they dig and they dig. and they dig and they dig and they dig and they dig and they hear all of these little bits of pieces of information and then you use that in reference to what you're doing. I don't know if the sons have that database. I don't know that well enough. But there is like the intel department of what are teams, how are teams performing? And there's the intel department of our guys happy. What do they want in contract?

That's where you hear a lot of numbers about what guys want in extensions, et cetera. And all of that stuff is, in my opinion, way more valuable than all of the stuff about the basketball side. A guy could be shooting terribly from the field or not fitting in with a system and be great on the next team he goes because he's not happy there and he would be happy somewhere else, especially if he gets paid. So like the league operates on these two simultaneous levels of the basketball side and then this this underground intel side, which is a lot of like hearing rumors and trying to gather as much like did you hear this from multiple places or not. That's the information that eventually gets distributed out in part, not all the time. Some of it's direct. But a lot of that's what winds up getting reported by various reporters around the league. Oh, well, that is new information to me.

And that is cool to think about there are the on-court reports. And then there is this secret, you know, CIA file of all the little notes and information that is happening. And the rumors that are being traded amongst the bureaucracy of the NBA to help make decisions and the fact the sons used it so well to their advantage, that's fucking next level shit right there. That's the difference between a good organization and organization that can't shoot straight. Yeah, I mean, look, a lot of it, you know, you talk to the GMs and they'll say, I don't even pay attention to the database file because I don't know how much of it's just complete nonsense. I just don't know if any of it's real, right? There's a lot of information swapping

that goes on in the league and a lot of GMs are just like, I don't know how much of it is real. I know what I've talked to teams about and that's about it. But if you're trying to put together, especially these bigger pieces, you need to keep an ear out for not only, it's not just stuff like, oh, yeah, they're looking for this, or they want this type of player or this guy wants an extension. It's also like, hey, you know, he was a lot more like he's got family in this town and it turns out he's really missing them.

Or like one of the pieces on Bradley Beale, a lot of the reason there wasn't like a big push for Bradley Beal a few years ago is during the pandemic, it was pretty well known that Beal had no interest in moving during the pandemic. that he did not want to relocate during the pandemic. And that changed the way that the league in terms of how many calls they were generating because the word kind of gotten out. Like, hey, Bradley doesn't have any interest

in getting moved right now. And that changes the course of how these conversations go. Man, that's cool. Bet the NBA on TNT with a no sweat, same game parlay from Fanduel. America's number one sportsbook. It doesn't matter if you're new to Fandual or already have an account. Every Thursday night, you'll get bonus beds back if your same game parley doesn't hit.

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Within probably 10 days, I'd put on 10 pounds. I was having trouble stopping the muscle growth. Listen to Superhuman on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right. I cut you off before. You were going into a conversation about the Western Conference and the Sons and their place in the Western Conference. Now that they have maneuvered to get KD on the roster. Yeah.

So we all, all of us at action, it was me and Joe DeLera and Brandon Anderson. We all kind of talked about the initial reaction to the trade. and it was pretty predictable, right? Like the suns get hammered and they get pushed and pushed and pushed. And as a consequence, like the nuggets go down. And that was a pretty good spot to bet the nuggets. And we said, like, look, this is going to equilibriumize. There will be a better chance to bet the sons later.

I don't think it's now yet because KD just came back. They won their first game. He goes off for 20 plus points in less than 30 minutes last night. I was on the bet stream for that for Action Network. You look great. The defense was better than we expected. But they're also playing Charlotte. So like there's going to be a low point here where the sun's like struggle a little bit.

This team is not like the 2017 Warriors. Are they the best team in the Western Conference? They could very well be. Like this may be one of those things. Like I remember last year like Simon was like, what are we doing here? It's the Warriors. Like what are we doing here? Like this, that may just be what we wind up in when we get into the playoffs.

Like what are we doing here? It's the sons. I've looked back at the history though of how the odds kind of shift before the playoffs start. It's rare. You're going to get a bad number on the eventual champion before. the playoffs start relative to what you're going to get by conference finals or even second round. Like you got some time to see how Phoenix shapes up versus some actual competition. I think there's some value.

I bet Suns Celtics is a finals matchup. I bet Suns Bucks is a finals matchup to get those numbers added, you know, to what I've already got. But I don't think that there's necessarily a lot of value in betting Phoenix right now. I don't think it's like you got to get it on this number at plus 230 to win the West at Fandul. The bigger thing here is that trying to find. a long shot is really difficult because this year is extremely messy when it comes to historical

trends about how you got to be good in the regular season versus teams like the Warriors defending champions who have been so good who have been basically telling us for 60 games we're not very good even when we have Steph Curry. It's a mess out there. And that's why I think the nuggets are one of the teams that a lot, the sharps have gravitated towards it. They've got the most handle at several books because I think they're the one team that everyone can go like, at least I know.

that they're good. They may not get there, but at least I can trust them more than I can a lot of these other teams for various reasons. I don't even know if they trust them though. Like I was with these groups. We had a bunch of meetings these past weekends and the same guys that turned around the Golden State last year. It's just like if Golden State's healthy, they're going to be the best team heading into the playoffs. And that was really fluked, them at 10 to 1 heading into the playoffs. That's really rare. A team has doubted that much. But I think it's what you talked about. They're not, they weren't the new sexy thing. like this is the crazy stuff about basketball is these guys like I think Matt was just touching on where

people just know what's going to happen like people that are in this league and things are set up years in advance so these guys knew in the summer that if there was any little thing with that broken thing Katie was going to the Sons apparently he was going to go to the Sons in August but that fell through they held on to him because they're like you know we got Kyrie's back we can make this work so to me what Matt's saying is so true of like these teams already had this deal in place months ago like they're they're literally way ahead of everyone else in the public perception of like these deals are already in place that there's waiting for the next shoe to drop and you know these guys were over the kings this summer like that was their team the kings all i heard all summer was the kings and again

i don't know basketball and i was like i'm not putting money on the kings i'll put money on them to go over their win total i'm not putting money on them to win championship because to me that felt like a stupid bet where they don't have the superstar right they're not going to win a championship come the end of the year because you need that superstar. You need a KD in that final two minutes where you can't run some plays. There's no plays that are going to work. These guys are too good. So the Kings think to me is interesting where guys are still on that, Matt.

I would love to hear your view on it where these guys I'm talking to, they have the Kings that say they got $10,000 down. It's like $10,000 and win $300,000 if they win the championship. So I'm interested to hear your perspective of can they really go to Denver and that high altitude come playoff time and really take down Jokic? Like, is this a team that really? really can make a playoff runner. Is that just one of those bets that's dead? Like is it really Clippers, Denver, and then yes, we've got to throw the suns in there, of course. But is that

really it in the West, do you feel like? I mean, a lot of this I think is that the market is so much, there's this combination that happens, like talking to bookmakers about how there's certain markets that just never going to generate enough handle. Like Memphis is never going to generate enough handle. That's why their win total is always lower than it needs to be. Milwaukee's another one. Like, this is a good example. The Kings right now have a four game lead in the loss column. with less than 20 to play. That's a big lead. And they have had this good surge.

They're plus 180 just to win the division because that's how much the sons, they've got KD. And the sons can definitely catch it. Right. Like it's not four is not impossible, but it's higher than most people think. The Kings are interesting.

I was actually asking some folks about it this week. I was throwing that name around and trying to figure out, like, are we sure that they're dead in the water? The problem really is that like they are so bad defensively. and Denver has the perception of being bad defensively, but since December 7th, so almost we're coming up on three months of basketball, December's been, or the Nuggets have been top 10 in defense.

Like they rideed the ship there, which is why the value on them is pretty good, because it looks like they're much worse defensively than they are. But the Kings, it's all offense. And they're versatile and they have a lot of options. They're very well coached. I think Mike Brown is, like Mike Brown's moved to be the favorite for coach a year in the market. That makes a lot of sense.

he was a good bet like a month ago when people were still like really the kings and it's like yeah really the kings what i will say is like i think the kings are going to be a great bet series by series because they're probably going to hang closer than teams than people expect them to um even versus denver they'll probably be competitive like in a first round series versus dallas would probably be the favorite and dallas would probably wind up getting the majority of the money kairie and lucca and dally they've been there versus like the mavericks are a mess then they're so badly coached. And the home court advantage that Sacramento is going to have is going to be through the roof. Like I'm trying to figure out if I can get out to Sacramento for that first playoff game to be in the building or something like that because it's going to be such an insane experience there. So like I think there's value in Sacramento, but I don't want to go all the way to championship because I do think there's a point where you get there like Dallas last year when they got to the Warriors and it was like you're not in this class. Like you beat a very good Phoenix team that we thought was in this class. but they might have gotten COVID.

But when you get to like the conference finals, you're just not at that level. That's how I feel about Sacramento. But I think there's going to be value on them betting them series by series, especially on the wind spread lines. They're like a year or two early, right? That's the thing. It's a year or too early, right?

Yep. How are we glossing over what Simon said about the Warriors and Matt, what you said about the Warriors, who at this point to win the NBA title, their odds are 17 to 1. You've said through 60 games, when Steph has played, they even then haven't been very good.

Yet, do we give them such a benefit of the doubt that you still put some money, excuse me, put some money on them at 17 to 1? I held out on Golden State. I held out on them the entire year until All-Star break.

I was like, no. I was like, this team, Simon mentioned this. When they have their starters, their starting lineup of Kavana Luni, Steph Curry, Clay Thompson, Dremon Green, Andrew Wiggins. That five-man lineup has the best net rating

of any five-man lineup lineup in the league, minimum 100 minutes. If you want to know, like, what does that mean? They kick-ass more than any other team's five-man lineup in the league. That's the best way I could describe it. So they're still extremely dangerous. The problem is we can. go against some historical trends, which have just been tried and true in the NBA.

Only in the last 20 years, no team below a three seed has won the NBA championship. Like, that matters. The Warriors are not going to get to a top three seed. In the last 20 years, no team with a below 500 road record has won the NBA championship. No team. the Warriors are one of the worst teams on the road. Yeah. It is inexplicable how bad they are.

Like they go from world beaters at home to hot garbage water when they are on the road. And that differential is really important here because now we've got another layer, which is, all right, let's say that they get past, they somehow get past Phoenix, which I think is a pretty good matchup for them. Like they actually match up pretty well with Phoenix. And they go to Denver and you're like, well, it's the Warriors versus Denver. Come on. The Warriors are coming out of this.

I would tend to agree with that, right? And you go and the counter would be, well, what if they're on the road? And Simon can kind of speak to this. There's always been this thing with the nuggets and the jazz, which is that the regular season home court advantage is way higher than their playoff home court advantage because teams have more time to acclimate to altitude and the travel isn't as bad. So like now your home court advantages is kind of is kind of less. But we have to ask her, like this is where you're two with the Warriors is they have told us

all year for 60 games. And you can say, but Steph's been out. Even when Steph was in there, they were a 500 team. like this is not like a great team when Steph plays. They're a great team in the Steph minutes where he plays with that five, that five guys and everything else is mediocre. And so trying to figure out that differential, I don't know.

Like is there value on them? Could they be the exception to the rule in a weird year? Yeah. Do you want to bet on an outlier? Maybe it depends on what your, what percentage you put that at versus the EV. Like trying to figure those equations out is been my life for the, since All-Star break, and I've got to be honest with you,

I still don't have an answer. I can't rule out the Warriors. I'm in this Princess Bride situation. I can't drink the wine in front of him. I can't drink the wine in front of me. That's so good. I love that. That's a great analogy. It's so

interesting. The Warriors plus 1,700 Sacramento Kings are significantly high. to win the conference right so the warriors plus 800 the king's 5500 just to win the west yeah at at fate like if you ask me like is that number accurate no like that number is not accurate

right if they get past dallas and nikola yokech suffers an injury the sacramento kings are are going to the conference finals that's that's happening like i expected to be four five uh kings mavericks because i do kind of think the sons might wind up catching them like i've got them projected to catch them. It's getting real close. Even if the kings are in the three six, right? Memphis, I have, we've been talking about how I don't believe in Memphis. We talked about it last year and we profited on it on buckets. We've talked about it this year. Like Memphis is a no bet for me. If it's two, three, Memphis versus the Kings, if the Kings somehow get like a three six Dallas matchup and then Memphis,

then I've got to look at the Kings. I'll still get this kind of a number. Then I would be betting the kings because I would be able to hedge them in a conference finals and bet the other way and still profit huge. Like that would be the position that I would take is like if the kings wind up in a bracket where it's Memphis and two, kings in three, they're facing the Mavs in the first round and the grizzlies get a non-lakers warriors matchup in the first round. They get wolves, blazers, and pelicans, whoever. If the kings don't have to get to avoid the sons and the nuggets and the clippers and all

these other teams, the Kings can absolutely make a run to the conference finals. That is very much on the board. I have two things I want us to discuss before we get out of here. You, they're going to be, and I'm going to preview them for you. One, I feel like we've talked about a lot of different matchup bets, but we haven't nailed who's the one NBA finals best value futures bet to make today. So start thinking about that. But before we get to that, we got to talk Lakers. Like train wreck of a season, train wreck of a team,

bad roster management, trades haven't worked out, Pat Bev gone, Russell Westbrook gone, LeBron now hurt, Anthony Davis in and out. Forget about now. What is the future of this team? So today there's a report that LeBron is not going to require surgery. that's significant because there was a lot of like worrying reports early on. The win last night was a must win for them for their chances to make the playoffs or plus

225. If we're talking about the future of the Lakers, one of the things that has yet to be resolved is that is the tension between LeBron, his agency clutch, who represents over half of the Lakers roster and the front office and ownership, which resisted trading picks because of concerns about limit. their future flexibility. The other problem we have is that there's eventually going to just come to a point where

LeBron has missed enough time. I don't know how he doesn't reach the conclusion. I can't have Anthony Davis as my number two because he and I are going to miss enough time together. Like LeBron has to take an honest look at how many games he's missed over the last four seasons. Like he's missed a lot of time, which is understandable. The man's old. Like give the man a break.

He should be able to take some time off. That said, you can't have. have that be the situation when you were in the prime rising superstar top 75 player quote unquote it always misses this many games and his day to Davis you just you can't do it and like that's where I hear a lot of people in the league asking questions is like are they really like they haven't opened them up for trade talks they haven't made them available teams of call and they've been like we're not interested but like the long term question is can you you drive here and russell westbrook as the kind of buffer to keep that team afloat like okay even if davis and lebron this time russ

will be there with one of the other ones. And then there was times where both of those guys were out and Russ couldn't keep them afloat and Russ made them overall worse. So can you get another guy? Can you get a Bradley Beale for some sort of really terrible package? Can you pull off a Powell-Gasol type deal for a Bradley Beale? I think it's pretty questionable. But I do think that the bigger question that you have to ask is if they're going to write out the LeBron era and LeBron's going to continue to apply the pressure that he and Clutch have in this power struggle with ownership, you have to ask the question. of is to solve for this trading Anthony Davis for a cast of characters that is more reliable

in playing all 82 or at least a majority of them. That to me is a long-term question. Isn't it fair to say, though, that I don't know if 80 hates LeBron, he doesn't like him. Like that whole thing of him sitting there when LeBron broke the scoring record, that was the weirdest thing ever. If I'm, again, if me and Chad are doing this for years and this guy has the most podcast minutes ever recorded. I wouldn't sit there sulking, pissed off. I'd celebrate the guy. It just felt like that was very human moment of something's going on with those two in the locker

room, like a week or two before that. And when that happened, he did not look like someone that was happy for LeBron. He looked like someone that was just like, God, I am so sick and tired of this being a LeBron James show. So to me, that's why I didn't bring them up. They're just a team I wouldn't touch because it doesn't seem like they have the chemistry at all. It just seems like very bad vibes coming out of the Lakers. Yeah, I mean, look, the trade definitely helped them. They're a better team.

They have, I made this comment on Twitter like, hey, it's funny when you have actual NBA players to a roster, they look better. They can, they can figure this out because LeBron is that guy. Like, he's still that guy. He's still so good when he's available. It's incredible. And Davis has these moments where, you know, he's had a stretch this season when people were like, is he the MVP? and we laughed at that in buckets. But like, you know, he still has these stretches. They can make the run. But we're talking about what's the probability of that happening. And as far as the Davis stuff goes, I think it's really complicated.

This is where everyone kind of winds up and when they're in the spot. Chris Bosch had this too. When you're that guy and you're supposed to be the defensive anchor and when the Lakers lose, you're the guy that's responsible. And when the Lakers win, LeBron's a guy that's responsible. And there was a lot of talk when Davis was traded that that's what he wanted is. he didn't want to have to be like out front handling all the pressure and the weight and the responsibilities that like LeBron would be able to provide that for him and he could just thrive

and they want a championship like it worked but now over time you're saying like how hard this is when when LeBron's out it's like come on AD can't you get on the floor and Davis is battling his body always I think there's probably some tension with the team with LeBron and AD just about like James has to be like you can't expect me to play 72 like I'm 38 you can't. cannot expect this of me. And Davis being like, what do you want me to do? I'm injured. Like, I can't help that.

And that causes, I think, a lot of tension because when they're together, they're pretty good. They're not great, but they're pretty good. And that's probably good enough to make the playoffs. And if you get into a, you know, a series versus the nuggets where everyone, there is a prevailing thought the nuggets are kind of fraudish. Maybe they can make a run. I don't think the value is enough there.

Like, I still kind of look at it and go, I just don't think this team is very good. I do they even with LeBron at a diminished state, even as good as he is. is that it's not good enough. And I can't trust that Davis is going to stay healthy for the run. They had a rest day schedule for him last night. They won that game, thankfully. But like, you can't have a rest day right now if you're healthy. Like, you've got to go.

Like, you guys are in 12th place. Like, there's got to be some urgency here. And you're not seeing that from either of the L.A. teams. All right. Matt Moore, you can give us one NBA future value play. as of today, who's it going to be? We get the bucks at plus 440. What are we doing?

Like, could have beaten the Celtics last year. Chris Millington was healthy. They got the number one defense. The thing I'll say about the bucks, get your money in early, because I know this from the last four years of experience. Betting them series by series is torture. And I can tell you statistics to back this up,

but I'll just give you the basics here. They miss more open shots than anyone else in the league in the playoffs. It's just, they just miss them. Whether it's a product of the offense of the personnel, they clank shots that should go in. Well-generated offense, create the open look, clank. They just don't go in. It's going to be a grind.

It's going to be tough. It's going to be difficult. But at plus 440, you get arguably the best player in the league in Yonisat and Kumpo and elite defense. Holiday's been fantastic. Brooke Lopez is the best rim protector in the league outside of Jaron Jackson. They've got better depth now with Jay Crowder and Joe Ingalls. They're well coached.

They've been there before. Milwaukee bucks plus 440 is a ridiculous price. That's the best price on the board right now for the title. All right. There you have it. Matt Moore, host of the Buckets podcast, which is fantastic. Also, one of the best insiders covering the NBA today. The man knows the league inside out.

He's his own intelligence department. And he's here. My wife disagrees with that assessment. He's working at the Action Network. How lucky you. Here we. Matt Moore, Simon Hunter in Hawaii, Matt Mitchell in a basement in Milwaukee, firing away in the box plus 440. I'm Chad Milman. This has been the favorites podcast from the volume podcast network. Download it from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts.

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