Who the experts are picking in Celtics-Warriors NBA Finals
BOSTON -- The matchup between the Celtics and the Warriors in the NBA Finals figures to be a classic. The Warriors are going for their fourth title in the last eight years, while the Celtics are going for their first since 2008.
Another championship would further cement Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green among the greats in NBA history. But Boston's young core of Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Marcus Smart are looking to show the basketball world that they've arrived. It's experience vs. inexperience, but the Celtics are ready to take down Goliath and take their spot atop the NBA.
The Warriors have been the favorite to win it all since the conference finals began last month, and are -160 on most betting sites to win the series. The Celtics sit at +125.
So that is how Vegas feels heading into the NBA Finals, but what about the hoop heads? Does anyone believe that the Celtics will get the best of the Warriors over the next two weeks?
Not really. The majority of the experts are going with Golden State to win another Larry O'Brien Trophy this summer.
On ESPN, 16 of the 21 analysts are picking the Warriors to beat the Celtics. At CBS Sports, five of the eight writers polled are going with Golden State.
Things are slightly more even on SI.com, though not by much, with eight of the 13 writers picking the Warriors. Michael Pina is one of the five going with the Celtics, and expanded on that selection Thursday morning.
"The margins are thin and picking a winner feels like a coin flip. But as a bet on Tatum's offensive maturation and the NBA's top defense, Boston in six is the choice here," Pina writes.
The Athletic asked an unnamed scout, coach and executive for their picks, and two of the three -- the scout and the coach -- are going with the Celtics in six. The unnamed executive is picking the Warriors in seven, though they note that if Tatum and Brown elevate their games to another level this series, their prediction "is gonna look stupid."
DraftKings, which is based in Boston, predicts the Warriors will win it all. At least they're saying the Celtics will push the series to seven games.
Is anyone leaning heavily toward the Celtics? Humans are not, but the computer models love the Celtics. And we mean LOVE the Celtics.
ESPN's BPI (Basketball Power Index), which is used to predict a team's performance the rest of the way and represents how many points above or below average a team is, is giving the Celtics an astounding 86 percent chance to beat the Warriors in the Finals.
That's pretty high. It's slightly higher than what the folks at FiveThirtyEight are giving the Celtics, with Boston getting an 80 percent chance to bring home Banner 18.
While the computers are leaning heavily toward the Celtics, the writers are mostly favoring the Warriors. Starting Thursday night, we'll see what the two teams have to say about it on the floor.
