I really felt like I was in an ’80s movie montage this afternoon searching for plays for tonight. While Huey Lewis and the News blasted around me, I looked everywhere, on every corner of the internet — far and wide — for numbers to support the plays that I thought could be good.
Alas, very little came up.
On this Valentine’s Day, I only wanted to post plays that I loved AND could support with evidence. I came up with two wagers centered around one player.
We are all Kawhi fans tonight.
Categories:
Layups: 2-Unit Plays
Two-Pointers: 1-Unit Plays
Three-Pointers: 0.75-Unit Plays
Half-Court Shot: 0.5-Unit Plays
Last Week: 1-1 (+0.21 units)
Season Record: 30-23-1 (+1.78 units)
Two-Pointers
Kawhi Leonard Over 22.5 Points (-110): Kawhi has a pattern in 2023. After almost every game that he sits out due to “load management,” he scores a lot. In games he’s played this calendar year after sitting out the game before, Leonard is averaging 26 points. After resting against the Bucks last week, Kawhi now plays one of the NBA’s worst road defenses with almost six days off. The Warriors allow a whopping 123 points per game on the road and give up the ninth-worst field goal percentage to forwards. This should be a solid Kawhi game after plenty of rest.
Half-Court Shot
Kawhi Leonard Over 1.5 Threes (+115): Let’s bet his threes, too! Kawhi is very up and down with his three-point shooting, and since he was down last game, let’s bet that he’ll be back up against the Warriors. Golden State is fairly pedestrian in its three-point D, ranking in the middle of the pack in most three-point defensive metrics. But Kawhi has been shooting 40% from downtown in his last ten games, and takes anywhere from three to six attempts a game. There should be plenty of opportunities for threes tonight, so let’s put a small amount on Kawhi here.