If You Want to Bet on the Blazers Tonight, Bet on the Warriors This Way Instead

This topic came up in our NBA slack chat here at The Action Network when someone mentioned betting the Blazers moneyline tonight in order to hedge his Warriors sweep bet. If you're in that same camp, or if you want to bet the Blazers tonight because you think they'll win, don't do it with the Blazers ML, though — do it with a Warriors bet.

Let me explain.

The Blazers moneyline is at about +130 tonight at home for Game 4. But sportsbooks also offer odds on exact series outcomes (like the Warriors to sweep). The current odds on the Dubs winning in five games is +165, which means if you think the Blazers are going to win tonight and the Warriors will take care of business at home on Wednesday, you're getting superior odds.

I think there are two potential betting lessons here. The first is that you can sometimes increase your upside by embracing risk.

Diving into the math a bit, a Warriors in five games bet at +165 means that you're getting the +130 odds of the Blazers tonight and then -375 odds on the Warriors moneyline in Game 5 at home. For reference, the Warriors closed at -310 in both Games 1 and 2, so perhaps that -375 mark is too high and thus lower EV in a vacuum than just betting the Blazers at +130 and then Warriors at their lower moneyline in Game 5, whatever it may be.

In that +165 number for Warriors in five is the risk that the Warriors lose Game 5, obviously. It's accounting for the Warriors winning in six and seven. But if you're already planning on betting the Blazers tonight and the Dubs in Game 5, you aren't concerned about Games 6 and 7.

So if want to bet the home teams anyway, then you might as well get the best odds on that outcome. And importantly, the events aren't happening at the same time, which means you can get Warriors in five at +165 and still bet them on their lower moneyline in Game 5.

This isn't a parlay happening at once; you're finding the outcome you want to bet on (Warriors winning Wednesday to close the series) and finding the best odds to do just that.

And that leads to the second lesson, which is to explore the betting market more fully than just sides and totals. Sportsbooks offer a variety of prop bets and futures outcomes. It's possible, like in this scenario, that you can raise your expected bankroll by eschewing lower-juice game bets and embracing risk on props and futures.