How Sharps are Betting Saturday’s Blockbuster NBA Playoff Card (4/19)
Slate Features Lakers, Knicks, Clippers, Pacers in Must-See TV
Fantastic opening day to the 2025 NBA Playoffs on tap. Marquee superstars and super-teams. Let’s see how sharps (professional wagerers) have been betting Saturday’s four games so far. Matchups are presented in tipoff order.
Milwaukee at Indiana
Opening line of Indiana -4.5 sat for a few days before rising a tick to -5. The early freeze suggested sharps DIDN’T like the Pacers because usually they bet favorites quickly. Felt more like public money lifting the game to -5. But, we then saw another rise to the current line (as of publication time) of Indiana -5.5. Resistance isn’t showing from dog lovers. It’s possible that some of the early favorite money was on Indiana -4.5…as sharps were deciding how much value they wanted to place on home court advantage in this round. I talked about my own issues trying to pin down Power Ratings in that stat summary last night. If there was disagreement amongst different sharp syndicates about whether HCA should be around two (like in the regular season) or three (more common for past postseasons), then it might have taken the combination of “some” sharp money AND the public’s love for favorites to cause that initial rise from -4.5 to -5…with the more recent rise to -5.5 coming more from the public.
Dog lovers will probably come in eventually. Many prefer to have additional motivation off a bounce-back, or a developing personnel matchup that makes itself apparent, to express LOVE for a playoff dog (unless there’s a “clearly” overrated favorite as we’ll see in later game). Milwaukee +6 would definitely get hit. We may see that Milwaukee +5.5 generates some buzz in the morning. For now, let’s call Indiana -4.5 at least partially sharp. Milwaukee +6 would be sharp too.
Opening total of 225.5 rose initially to a ceiling of 226.5 before backtracking hard all the way down to a current floor of 224. Reads like sharps arguing with their money. Likely some quants expecting energy in this particular series opener rather than playoff pressure (Indiana was #6 in pace this season). Old-school guys knock several points off regular season projections to make playoff predictions That mindset seems to have ruled the day market-wise…pending any public interest on the Over (public almost always bets Overs) between now and tipoff. Granting that Over 225.5 saw early money…right now…we’d have to say that Under 225 or more is sharp. Respect for the Under direction is clear.