Friday marks a busy night on the NBA calendar, providing us with plenty of choices on the prop market.
The pregame narrative: My favourite target is Brandon Ingram, and I’m also recommending plays on Ja Morant and Donovan Mitchell.
Check out the best NBA prop bets for Oct. 25.
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Best Bet: Ingram over 19.5 points (-107)
The Pelicans forward is coming off a 33-point season opener and now gets a Portland Trail Blazers team that surrendered 140 in its first game.
On top of that, the Pelicans are without key offseason acquisition Dejounte Murray, who was set to complicate the offensive output of several players on this deep roster.
With Murray (hand) out of the equation, we’re looking at a similar situation to last season in terms of the offensive pecking order.
Zion Willamson, CJ McCollum and Ingram all averaged 20-plus points per game. They did the year before that, too.
Ingram’s scoring average did drop considerably from 24.7 to 20.8, marking his lowest production in five seasons with New Orleans. But the gifted scorer is just 27 years old and has routinely cleared this number, averaging 23.1 points per game as a Pelican.
Part of the dip last season can be attributed to injuries (a common theme with Ingram) and reduced shot volume.
He took nearly three fewer shots per game compared to his career-best scoring year in 2022-23. And he’s not a big 3-point shooter, either.
While it’s only one game, which I’m certainly not drawing conclusions from, Ingram did take 23 shots and attempt five triples in the Pelicans’ season-opening win.
Portland, a bottom-10 team in defensive rating last season, allowed 20 long balls in its 36-point loss to the Golden State Warriors.
Key stat: Even in a down year, Ingram topped this number in 53% of his games a season ago.
Quick picks
Morant over 29.5 points/assists (-125): Morant delivered a 22-and-10 performance in his first game since January.
The Memphis Grizzlies’ all-star guard was limited to nine games last season but picked up where he left off.
I unsuccessfully recommended Morant on this prop at a 33.5 line for the season opener and have no concerns going back to it at a reduced number.
Morant and the Grizzlies get the Houston Rockets, who were a strong defensive team a season ago and held the Charlotte Hornets to 110 points in their first game.
But Hornets point guard LaMelo Ball lit up the Rockets for 34 points and 11 assists and the Grizzlies will once again be without 20-plus-point-per-game scorer Jaren Jackson Jr.
That means Morant and Desmond Bane should continue to shoulder a larger load on the offensive end.
Morant has averaged at least 33.0 points/assists per game in each of the last three seasons.
Mitchell over 2.5 threes (-117): If Mitchell shoots from distance the way he has the last few seasons, you won’t be able to get him at this price. Not on a 2.5 line, anyway.
The Cleveland Cavaliers’ scoring threat has made more than three triples per game in each of the last four seasons on an average of 9.2 attempts.
He nailed 2-of-5 in Cleveland’s first game but only played 28 minutes in a blowout 30-point win.
There’s risk of another blowout tonight versus the Detroit Pistons, but Mitchell should carve them up as long as he’s on the court.
Picks made at 1:11 p.m. on 10/25/2024.
Chris joined NorthStar Gaming from Covers.com where he was a publishing editor and wrote betting content. Before that, he was the sports editor at VICE Canada, worked for theScore and covered the Blue Jays for MLB.com. In addition to filling out the lineup card each day for the editorial team, Chris writes frequently himself, primarily on the NBA and MLB.