With nine games on Tuesday's hoops slate, our Action Network NBA Analysts have found four matchups with value. Matt Moore has a spread pick, Kenny Ducey and Joe Dellera are betting props, and Raheem Palmer is eying a total bet.
Read below to get their analysis and best bets for Tuesday night.
NBA Odds & Picks
Charlotte Hornets vs. Toronto Raptors
Matt Moore: For starters, I put this at Raptors -0.3 (pick'em, essentially) on a neutral court. Now, the Raptors don't have fans as Ontario has barred attendance until February 21. So the typical homecourt advantage is muted here to at least some degree.
Then there's the matchup. The Hornets' defense is poor, but they run unconventional schemes compared to most teams. They switch a ton, and they play zone more than any other team in the league. Toronto is 27th offensively per possession against zone defense per Second Spectrum and 18th vs. switching defense in pick and roll.
Meanwhile, the Hornets are top 10 offensively vs. the three types of defense Toronto plays the most (drop coverage in pick and roll, at-level in pick and roll, and zone).
Gordon Hayward is questionable, and that makes me nervous. But the homecourt situation and matchup are enough to get me on board.
New Orleans Pelicans vs. Philadelphia 76ers
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Kenny Ducey: The New Orleans Pelicans have had some good moments on defense over the course of the past two weeks, but one area remains a massive weakness: the 3-point line.
New Orleans entered Tuesday with the second-highest Defended Field Goal percentage on 3-point looks at 37.1% and over the past two weeks ranks sixth despite making larger strides as a defense. This leads me to believe this 3-point prop in this game between the Pelicans and Sixers is ripe for betting.
Philly has been missing a whole host of wings including Matisse Thybulle, Seth Curry and Danny Green on top of losing Shake Milton to injury, and that’s forced Furkan Korkmaz into action. In the past two games since Curry went down, he’s played an average of over 37 minutes and gone a combined 9-for-20 from the field and 4-for-11 from three.
With the 5.5 3-point attempts per game, Korkmaz will have plenty of volume in this game to get us over 1.5 threes. This is a sneaky-good prop.
Los Angeles Lakers vs. Brooklyn Nets
Joe Dellera: The Nets host the Lakers tonight, and that means Kyrie Irving cannot partake in this contest. Kevin Durant is already out with injury, and Nic Claxton (hamstring) is questionable. This should result in the offense running entirely through James Harden and Patty Mills. Both players have been dynamite this season when they are given the reigns to the offense, but I like this spot for Patty Mills in particular.
In the five games both Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant did not play, Patty thrived. He averages 21.8 points, 2.8 rebounds, 3.6 assists, and 4.6 3s in 35.6 minutes per game. One of those games was against the Lakers on Christmas where his stat line was 34 points, 2 rebounds, 7 assists and 8/13 from 3-point range.
The Lakers’ defense is just 18th in Adjusted Defensive Rating, and the Lakers allow non-corner 3s at the fourth-highest frequency in the league. Patty thrives from 3-point range, 49% of his shots are from non-corner, and 69% are from 3-point range overall (nice).
This is a good spot for Mills, and I’ll take his over on points 14.5, a number he has cleared in all five of those games without KD and Irving, and I’ll escalate it to 20+ (+240), a number he cleared in three-of-five games.
Dallas Mavericks vs. Golden State Warriors
Raheem Palmer: Over the past two weeks, the Dallas Mavericks have the league’s best defense, holding opposing teams to just 102.6 points per 100 possessions over that span. The Mavericks defense has completely turned the corner this season, and they’re now up to fourth in Defensive Rating (107.2) for the season.
They’ll be taking on a Golden State Warriors team which is missing Draymond Green but is still sixth in Defensive Rating, allowing 108.2 points per 100 possessions over the past two weeks. More importantly, these teams played to a 99-82 scoring on January 5th, and I think we could see a repeat of that for various reasons.
The Mavericks are 29th in Pace (95.7) and 28th in Offensive Length of Possession (15.4) according to DunksAndThrees.com. The Warriors are middle of the pack in pace and OPL, ranking 13th in both, however the real issue comes on offense for this team.
The Warriors have dropped down to 16th in Offensive Rating (110.9) for the season and are scoring just 108.8 points per 100 possessions over the last two weeks— 23rd among NBA teams. They’re simply struggling to score with Steph Curry in the midst of a January slump where he’s scoring just 20.8 points per game while shooting 35.9% from the field and 29.9% from behind the arc.
The loss of Green also hurts this team’s ability to score in transition and in the half court given his ability as a playmaker. I don’t see how that changes here. My model has this game going well under the total of 212 in what should be a slow paced game.
