Lakers' Championship Odds Just Hit 300-1, and It's Getting Ugly in Los Angeles
The Los Angeles Lakers are in freefall, and the betting odds don't lie. After a pair of brutal losses to the Dallas Mavericks and Oklahoma City Thunder, the Lakers have plummeted to 300-1 to win the NBA Finals this season. That's a stunning collapse from where they started the week.
How Bad Has It Been?
It's been a nightmare of a stretch in LA. Before Friday, the Lakers sat at 30-1 odds. Then Luka Doncic went down with a major injury and things got worse real fast, moving the needle to 100-1. But that wasn't even the worst part. When Austin Reaves suffered a major injury, the odds stretched even further to 120-1. And then consecutive losses to Dallas and OKC sent them tumbling all the way to 300-1. The Lakers miss the perimeter shooting that Reaves provides, and without him and dealing with Doncic's absence elsewhere, they're looking like a long shot to compete for the title.
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While the Lakers crater, the Oklahoma City Thunder are doing the opposite. OKC moved from +135 to +120 over the last week and continue to approach odds-on favorite status. The Denver Nuggets improved slightly from +950 to +900, and the Cleveland Cavaliers also saw a modest bump, moving from 16-1 to 15-1.
The San Antonio Spurs had a brief scare when Victor Wembanyama left Monday's game against Philadelphia with a rib contusion, though the injury is not thought to be serious. Still, their championship odds lengthened from +450 to +550. There's another wrinkle here too: Wembanyama needs to play 20 or more minutes in one more game to be eligible for All-NBA teams and awards, which matters since he was the massive favorite for Defensive Player of the Year before the injury.
San Antonio remains one of the largest championship liabilities at BetMGM, but the Lakers have actually taken over as the biggest liability at the sportsbook, especially after public bettors piled money on those longer odds following Doncic's injury. The Nuggets pulled the most handle with 17% of the action over the same period.
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