- The Boston Celtics will face the Golden State Warriors in the NBA Finals.
- Game 1 will be played at the Chase Center in San Francisco on June 2, 2022.
- The Warriors have opened as a series favorite to win their seventh NBA Championship.
It’ll be the Golden State Warriors and Boston Celtics competing for the NBA Championship this year. The Celtics won a close Game 7 against the Miami Heat at the FTX Arena in Miami to reach the finals for the 22nd time in franchise history. Should Boston win, it would be their 18th championship in franchise history–that would be the most in NBA history and break a tie at 17 with the Los Angeles Lakers.
The Celtics could set a record of a different sort with a NBA Championship victory. ESPN’s David Purdum reports that the Celtics started the 2021-2022 regular season as a 50-1 longshot. A Boston victory would make them the biggest preseason longshot to win the title in the past 35 years. Since ESPN has a deal with Caesars Sportsbook, I’m assuming that Purdum is quoting the futures price from their book. SportsOddsHistory on Twitter indicated that they closed the preseason at 35-1 ‘via BetMGM’:
The NBA blog 82Games lists the 2014-2015 Warriors as a +2800 preseason favorite. This would make them the biggest preseason underdog to win the title in the ‘modern era’ of the NBA (since 1979-1980). The sports betting website TheLines also has the Warriors +2800 as the biggest longshot. BasketballReference.com quotes SportsOddsHistory’s data indicating that the 2021-2022 Celtics were +4000 to win the Championship before the season. They don’t indicate a book so I’m assuming this is a ‘consensus line’. On the other hand, SportsOddsHistory’s Twitter says something different entirely. On July 22, 2021 we reported the futures prices from BetOnline.ag and they had Boston at +3300. The 1993-1994 Houston Rockets were the lowest seeded team (sixth) to ever win the NBA Championship but SportsOddsHistory.com has them as a +1200 preseason choice. 35 years ago would have been 1986 or 1987 and between 1980 and 1988 the Boston Celtics and LA Lakers combined for eight titles with the Philadelphia 76ers winning in 1983.
At any rate, the Celtics would be the biggest longshot in the modern era to win the championship or the biggest longshot in at least 52 years. I’m going to do some more research but it’s not easy finding archived odds information back that far.
SERIES PRICE
ESPN quotes Caesars Sportsbook where at the time of their writing Golden State was a -160 series favorite with takeback on the Celtics at +140. Same price at BetMonarch in Black Hawk, Colorado. At Betfred Sports, BetMGM in Colorado, Golden State is -160 with takeback on the Celtics at +130. DraftKings, BetWildwood (CO), EliteSportbook (CO), Pointsbet, Westgate Superbook and BetOnline.ag offshore has Golden State -150 with takeback on the Celtics +130. BetRivers in Colorado has Golden State -155/Boston +130. MaximBet in CO is showing Warriors -169/Celtics +140.
GAME 1 PRICE
Most places are showing GS -3.5. The exceptions at the time of this writing are FoxBet (-4) and EliteSportsbook (-3). Total is 211 or 211.5 with BetMGM, DraftKings and PointsBet at 210.5. Moneyline is somewhere between -150 and -175 on Golden State with takeback on the Celtics anwhere from +125 to 146. Best price I found on Golden State was -150 (Elite Sportsbook) and on Boston +146 (BetOnline).
