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Pictured: Donovan Mitchell. Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images

NBA season preview: Eastern Conference best bets

Originally posted on Action Network | Last updated 10/10/24

Most of the coverage of the Eastern Conference has divided it into five tiers for the upcoming season. Those tiers are:

Tier 1: Boston
2: Milwaukee, New York, Philadelphia
3: Orlando, Indiana, Cleveland, Miami
4: Atlanta, Toronto, Charlotte, Chicago
5: Detroit, Washington, Brooklyn

I think there are some teams misidentified in this tier system, which means there is a lot of value in betting on them.

Cleveland Cavaliers

Last season, I was all in on the Cavs. In 2023, they finished with the seventh-best offense, the best defense and the second-best net rating on their way to 51 wins. In 2024, they finished with the 18th-best offense, sixth-best defense, the 13th-best net rating and 47 wins. They were also the No. 4 seed in the Eastern Conference.

Cleveland had a nightmare season. Evan Mobley and Dean Wade were the only major rotation players who were more efficient than they were the prior season. Mobley (50), Darius Garland (57) and Donovan Mitchell (55) all played fewer games than they did in 2023.

Garland in particular had a devastating season. He broke his jaw and couldn’t eat, which led to him dropping to his lowest weight since high school, and having his worst season since 2021, before he really came into his own. Not only did he miss so many games, but he was never himself in those games. He is back in shape now, and should be back to the form he was when he was an NBA All Star.

In 2023, with Jarrett Allen and Mobley on the floor, the Cavaliers had a net rating of +8.6 and were elite offensively and defensively. Last season, it was +.3, a massive dropoff. Mobley was worse on defense and had a harder time finding a groove.

The Cavaliers added Max Strus to their starting five and were way better with him than without, but he also had a career-low in terms of shooting percentage.

Going into this season, the Cavaliers replaced J.B. Bickerstaff with Kenny Atkinson. As a head coach in Brooklyn, Atkinson’s teams focused defensively on limiting high quality shots and taking away attempts from the rim and 3, something Cleveland has been average at over the past two seasons.

A better shot profile would help the defense improve. Meanwhile, Allen started to become a force under Atkinson in Brooklyn. I expect the Cavaliers to be better on both ends of the court this season.

Last season, Indiana and Orlando both massively improved, and were near Cleveland in the East, with all three finishing with 47 wins. But both teams were exceptionally one sided, with Indiana as the number one offense and Orlando as the number two defense. Typically, top-end teams regress, and Orlando still doesn’t have a great way to improve its offense, and Indiana is relying a lot on Tyrese Haliburton, who has struggled to stay healthy and had an MRI during the Olympics.

New York and Philadelphia improved, but Joel Embiid still has a knee brace on, which will limit his effectiveness, and should lower his regular-season minutes.

Milwaukee also had a nightmare season last year. Additionally, Khris Middleton just had offseason surgery and their key guys (Damian Lillard and Brook Lopez) are older. If they get any worse, this team won’t be as strong. I like all three of these teams better than the Cavs in the playoffs, but for the regular season? I don’t.

The best bet on Cleveland is to bet its seed total. It is currently set at 5.5, which means betting the under is betting that the Cavaliers will finish with a top-five seed.

I’m also betting the Cavaliers to get the No. 2 seed exactly. I think they are in the same tier as Philadelphia, Milwaukee and New York, and should be favored to be the No. 2 seed amongst those teams. If this is close toward the end of the season, we can also easily hedge with these long odds.

Cleveland Cavaliers Bets

Cavaliers No. 2 Seed (+1000, BetRivers, .2u)
Cavaliers Under 5.5 Seed (-125, DraftKings, 1.5u)
Cavaliers Over 51.5 Wins (+190, DraftKings, .25u)
Cavaliers to Win Central Division (+250, DraftKings, .2u)

Atlanta Hawks

The Hawks have been mediocre for two straight seasons with Trae Young and Dejounte Murray on the floor and Quin Snyder as their coach. This offseason, they pulled the plug on the Murray experiment and traded him for Dyson Daniels and Larry Nance Jr., plus some picks.

The Young/Murray experiment didn’t work. Last year, they had a -6.3 net rating with both of them on the floor together. Most surprisingly, their offense was worse with both of them on the floor than it was with either on individually.

In the minutes Young played without Murray, the Hawks had a +3.1 net rating with an offensive rating that would have been second in the NBA. Young also got hurt last season, playing the fewest games of his NBA career. Murray was also quietly terrible defensively both seasons in Atlanta, and didn’t provide the defensive complement to Young that was expected.

In 2021, Young figured it out. The Hawks offense has been top 11 every year since. With Dyson next to him, he finally has a decent guard defender. The Hawks have a lot of room for growth and I’m a believer in these players, and in Quinn as a coach.

Most importantly, the Hawks don’t own their pick this season. They have no incentive to tank, and every incentive to push to be as good as they can be.

The Bulls pick is top-10 protected, Charlotte’s is protected 1-14, Detroit 1-13 and Toronto owns its pick outright. These teams all have incentive to keep their pick or get a high one, while Atlanta will be pushing all season long.

The Hawks over/under is set at 36.5 — six wins ahead of Charlotte and eight wins behind Miami. That 14-win gap is the fourth largest in the past 20 years. Of the 14 teams that have had a win gap between the two next closest over/under teams of at least 12.5 wins, 12 finished within one seed of their expected seed.

The Hawks are projected to be the No. 9 seed. Over the past 20 years, of the seven teams projected eighth or ninth preseason with a win gap of at least 8.5, six wound up in seeds 7-10.

We’ve never had a team more destined for the play-in than the Hawks. I have them at 80% to make the play-in. I hate betting futures at minus odds, but I think the Hawks are a play-in lock.

I’m betting two units on the Hawks (-185 at FanDuel) to make the play-in and would bet this down to -200.

Washington Wizards

Sometimes, it feels like the Wizards have been bad for forever. However, this is only the second real year of this rebuild. Last year, the Wizards started the season with Deni Avdija, Daniel Gafford, Tyus Jones, Kyle Kuzma, and Jordan Poole in their starting lineup. Avdija had a great season, shooting the ball well and making positive plays. Gafford was dealt at the trade deadline and Jones, along with Delon Wright, left in free agency.

In their first preseason game, the Wizards started Kuzma, Poole, Alex Sarr (rookie), Bilal Coulibaly and Jonas Valanciunas. That’s a starting lineup with no solid defensive players. The Wizards will be giving more and more offense to their three young players and desperately need a high-value pick to continue this rebuild. The moment they can trade Kuzma for positive value, they will. They also have Malcolm Brogdon, who is coming into the season hurt.

Last year, we bet the Wizards to finish with the worst record in the NBA, and despite them winning just 15 games, we lost that bet. This year, we can bet their seeding, which is set at 13.5.

The over (meaning they finish with one of the two-worst records in East) is -150, which is the same as the odds for going under 21.5 wins. Last year, the Charlotte Hornets became the first team in the past 20 years to win under 21.5 games and finish with the 13 seed or better. I’m not worried about that this year.

Detroit will be better and try harder and the Nets have to trade away players to get worse. So, the Wizards are slated to be the worst team in the NBA.

As a result, I’m betting two units on the Wizards to go over the 13.5 seed at -150 on DraftKings and would bet that down to -180. This is also available on ESPNBet.