Another exciting season of the NBA is nearing its conclusion at the time of writing, with the Golden State Warriors taking on the Toronto Raptors in the NBA Finals.
The Warriors and their team of future retired jersey numbers, as we discussed here at talkbasket.net, are, once again, the heavy favourites to take the championship, but we’re sure to see another exciting offseason of twists and turns before we start again to try and predict which team will ultimately come out on top this time next year.
So, in preparation for this final series of the 2018/19 NBA calendar and the 2019/20 season to come, we’ve constructed this guide of top tips and tricks to help enhance your basketball betting.
Select the best websites
The place to start for anyone who fancies placing a basketball bet is with the website selection.
You’d be hard-pressed to find an online bookmaker which doesn’t offer NBA odds or odds on any other big basketball league across the world for that matter. With so many options, it can be difficult to select the website which is best for you.
For basketball bettors, the best websites not only need to boast great odds, but they also need to be regulated, make use of SSL security measures, and have good customer service.
Overall, the best basketball betting sites found in the guide on bestbettingsites.co.uk account for a huge range of different factors that we normally wouldn’t consider when browsing.
So, it’s best to use their stacks of information, which includes odds levels percentages, to make a very well-informed decision. From there, you have the basis for a great season of basketball betting ahead.
The power of each-way betting
Sometimes best placed before the start of the free agency if you can foresee the way that signings are going to go, or before the start of the season if you have a major hunt, but some of the longest basketball odds are in the outright markets. Be it to win the division, the Conference Finals, or the NBA Finals, outright betting is rife with long odds.
If they win the championship again and move another step towards a potential dynasty debated on sfchronicle.com, the Warriors will start the offseason and beginning of the season at short odds to repeat.
The shorter the Warriors’ odds are, the longer all other teams’ odds will be. As the NBA Finals have to feature a Western Conference and an Eastern Conference team, basketball bettors can make the most of the long odds of Eastern Contenders to win the championship by utilising the each-way option that many bookmakers offer.
In the Eastern Conference Finals this year, the two teams with the most regular season wins clashed, with our piece at talkbasket.net showing how the Raptors moved past the Milwaukee Bucks to get to the Finals.
In the opening odds, Toronto were at 40/1 to take the trophy. If backed each-way, which usually incur half odds for losing in the final, bettors could have swept up a cool 20/1 return on their wager.
If the Warriors look as mighty again next season, consider which teams from the Eastern Conference may meet them in the Finals.
Examine the intricate markets
Simply betting on winning teams can become repetitive and a bit boring, even when amassed in accumulators.
Luckily, there are many different markets on offer across the best basketball bookmakers. A favourite market set for many bettors is the player markets.
Here, you can back players within a game based on if they’ll score more or less than the number of points, assists, or rebounds selected by the bookie.
In a league where master craftsman James Harden is averaging 36.1 points per game, which is the most since Michael Jordan in 1986/87 according to houstonchronicle.com, betting on under/over points markets in games can be very enjoyable.
Many bookmakers will also allow you to create an accumulator of multiple under/over point, rebound, or assist players from different games, enhancing the odds that usually sit just under or over evens.
Finally, check if overtime is included
It seems like a trivial factor, but some bookmakers won’t include overtime in their odds, meaning that if you select a team to win and it goes to overtime, your bet loses.
Or, if your player nets 25 points to win you an over-23.5 points bet, but two come in overtime, you’d lose if the bet doesn’t include overtime.
The markets which include overtime will, for the most part, expressly mention it in the heading for each market. If you’re unsure, contact customer services to find out.
There you have it: our top tips and tricks to helping you enhance your basketball betting experience in 2019 and for the coming 2019/20 season ahead.
