NBA Betting Guide for 1/15/21: Will Memphis Beat Minnesota Again?
Betting on the NBA can get a little overwhelming throughout the season because there are games virtually 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 our oddsFire section of the site allows you to track movement in those lines and see where the action is coming from on particular games.
Where do our algorithm, our power rankings, and the betting trends identify value in tonight's games? (All odds from NBA Finals odds.)
Memphis Grizzlies at Minnesota Timberwolves
I always like to be looking for where the betting trends and the algorithms line up, and we have it here for the Memphis Grizzlies' spread. They're listed as 1.5-point underdogs, but that's down from 2.5 at open. Driving that line down is the heavy money on the visitors to cover (72%).
numberFire's algorithm actually likes the Grizzlies by a smidge outright, too. They are 54.2% likely to beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, per our game projections. Covering the spread wound up being 58.2% likely to occur. My model also prefers the Grizzlies to win this one.
Minnesota actually ranks as the worst team in the NBA, per our team rankings, and their -7.7 estimated net rating is a full 6.1 points worse than the Grizzlies' -1.6 rating. The Grizzlies won 118-107 in this matchup on Wednesday.
Orlando Magic at Boston Celtics
We haven't seen the Boston Celtics play in a week, a span in which the Orlando Magic have fallen to some stronger teams by big margins.
They lost 132-90 to the Houston Rockets on Friday, 112-98 to the Dallas Mavericks the next night, and then 121-99 to the Milwaukee Bucks on Monday. Those are all top-half teams in our power rankings, including two inside the top four. The Celtics rank 11th for us here at numberFire.
So it's not a big surprise that our model likes the Celtics -3.5, which we rate as a four-star bet out of five. The Boston moneyline (-156) is a five-star bet. We project the Celtics to win this game outright 82.5% of the time, implying odds of -456. The -156 moneyline suggests the Celtics are only 60.9% likely to emerge with a win.
Boston's estimated net rating is +2.6, and the Magic sit at -3.9, a differential of 6.5 points over 100 possessions.
Los Angeles Clippers at Sacramento Kings
I keep sticking with a lot of unders to start the season, but there typically seems to be value on them (54.4% of games so far have hit the under on the posted total this season).
oddsFire shows some heavy money on the under (52%) when compared to the percentage of tickets on the under (37%). The total has dropped from a 230.5-point open, though, so check around for the best odds at oddsFire.
numberFire's projections indicate value even at a 227.5-point total. We project a median score of 225.3, so we're cutting it close, but there's still an anticipated return of 5.1%. That gets it a one-star rating out of five. My projections expect a spread of 223.4, so if you can snag this at a higher number, that's the play, but even 227.5 shows value.
