They’re finally here: NBA player props for Sunday’s All-Star Game in Inglewood, California, are on the board, at least at some online sportsbooks.
Not every location wants to deal with this year’s “U.S. vs. the World” format, which will see three teams (USA Stars, USA Stripes, Team World) play a round-robin tournament of four 12-minute games. Bovada has stepped up with NBA props for the three round-robin games leading up to the championship round.
Can we get some betting value out of our three featured players?
Team World F/C Alperen Sengun (2+ Rebounds –120)
Team World vs. USA Stripes – 5:55 or 6:25 PM ET
Sengun (9.4 boards per game) has been crushing this year’s basketball props, appearing regularly in the NBA projections for rebounding in particular.
We don’t have those projections to lean on for Sunday’s game, but all the old-school earmarks are there; first and foremost, Sengun is arguably the best player on the Houston Rockets, but he’s playing second fiddle to Kevin Durant this year.
The betting public is more likely to support the American than the Turk.
This tendency will be writ large for the All-Star Game when Team World takes on the USA. If we were to do a quick “power rankings” for all three teams, this is how it would look:
- World
- Stripes
- Stars
However, for this particular prop, we’ll take Sengun in his matchup versus USA Stripes, since the odds are the same for both round-robin matchups, and Team Stripes is lacking when it comes to big men. We’re also rolling with 2+ rebounds for this “milestone” prop; that’s the lowest threshold available, and we don’t want to hazard a guess how many minutes Sengun will play under this format.
USA Stars G/F Cade Cunningham (4+ Rebounds +350)
This time, the odds are slightly different for Cunningham (5.6 rebounds per game), and they get longer for his matchup against Team World – the betting public may not think highly of the global contingent, but it’s hard to ignore a team with Nikola Jokic, Luka Doncic, and Victor Wembanyama on its roster.
We’d get +400 if we took Cunningham vs. Team World instead, but the increased payout doesn’t match the increased degree of difficulty.
Cunningham himself has betting value playing for the resurgent Detroit Pistons, who have yet to fill their bandwagon despite leading the Eastern Conference – all those years of finishing high in the draft lottery are finally paying off. We’re going with 4+ rebounds as our threshold because of the pricing.
At +350, that’s a 22.2% implied break-even point; we’re getting over twice the payout as 3+ rebounds at +170 (37.0% break-even).
USA Stripes G De’Aaron Fox (2+ Made Threes +200)
Fox (2.0 made threes per game) has made plenty of hay for the San Antonio Spurs playing alongside Wembanyama. He’ll bring much of the same betting value to USA Stripes as a second banana, even if Wemby will be on the other side this Sunday.
We’re going with Fox vs. Team World here because the payout for 2+ threes goes up from +180 versus USA Stars, even while the larger World lineup might encourage more outside shooting – and two is the sweet spot for Fox’s milestone threshold in this case.
Bet Like an All-Star at OddsTrader
It’s generally a good idea to bet smaller with NBA player props, since they tend to be more volatile than the point spread, moneyline and total; that goes double (at least) with these All-Star player props under the new format.
Not every sportsbook is doing business this Sunday, so use the resources here at OddsTrader to see which books are on the board at what price, and whether you should open betting accounts there if you haven’t already. Shop smart, bet accordingly, and we’ll see you in Inglewood.
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*The line and/or odds referenced in this article might have changed since the content was published. For the latest information on line movements, visit OddsTrader’s free betting odds tool.
