Trail Blazers vs. Nuggets Odds & Betting Predictions - February 3, 2024

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Portland off 2 outright wins vs Philly & MIL

The Nuggets host the Portland Trail Blazers tonight in a game they should be able to handle from start to finish. One matchup to watch is Nikola Jokic against Deandre Ayton. While Ayton defended Jokic pretty well at the start of his career, this has been a matchup that Jokic has dominated over the last few seasons. Over the last 2 seasons, Jokic has averaged an absurd 36 points, 14 rebounds, and 10.8 assists across 6 games. Some of this includes the Playoffs so that skews a bit of the stats but the point is made - Jokic has figured Ayton out. Even looking at the last 5 regular season matchups we can see Jokic has exceeded this 26.5 Points line in all 5 while averaging 31.2 ppg. There’s been a ton of discussion regarding Jokic’s passing proficiency against “bad” teams; however, Portland is much improved over their last 2 weeks with a -2.7 Net Rating compared to their season long number of -9.4. They’re closer to league average than the bottom of the league. It’s obviously a new team here for Ayton, but this is an exploitable matchup for Jokic, and I’ll back him to exceed 26.5 Points.