There’s a new favorite in the odds to win the NBA Finals this season, and by a wide margin.
Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets are -215 favorites to take home the first title in franchise history after taking a 3-0 lead on the Los Angeles Lakers in the Western Conference Finals.
The NBA Finals matchup is almost set in stone, as the Miami Heat and Denver are both up 3-0 in their respective series. In the history of the NBA, no team has ever come back from a 3-0 deficit in the playoffs.
At -215, Denver has an implied probability of 68.25 percent to win it all. As someone who is holding a preseason ticket on Denver to win the NBA Finals at +1800 odds, this is about as good of news as I could possibly get.
Here’s how Denver stacks up with the rest of the teams left in the playoffs:
Latest odds to win the NBA Championship
Inevitably, the Nuggets will face the No. 8-seeded Miami Heat in the NBA Finals. A No. 8 seed has never won the NBA Finals, a positive sign for a Denver team that has never been to the Finals in franchise history.
There are a ton of reasons to love the Nuggets in the playoffs, as they are No. 1 in offensive rating, No. 5 in defensive rating, No. 1 in net rating, No. 1 in rebounding percentage, No. 1 in turnover percentage and No. 2 in effective field goal percentage among playoff teams.
That’s pretty damn good.
The Nuggets have the star power with Jokic and Jamala Murray to compete with just about anyone, and they’ve shown against the Lakers that they have one of the deeper rosters in the league.
Obviously, the Nuggets have to get past Los Angeles first, but Vegas clearly thinks the team is set up well to win its first ever title.
Nuggets fans have to love that.
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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.