NBA Free Picks – Nuggets vs Jazz

It was shaping up to be one of the best series of the first round but with one team losing two players to injury and the other getting one back from a long absence, the balance has tipped in the Denver Nuggets-Utah Jazz series. With Andrei Kirilenko and Mehmet Okur out with injuries, the Utah Jazz will have to figure out a way past the Denver Nuggets who welcomed back Kenyon Martin.

The basketball betting line for this game has the Denver Nuggets favored by -6½ while a straight up bet on the underdog Utah Jazz will pay basketball bettors +265 on the moneyline. The predicted betting total for the game is 212 points.

Basketball Betting Odds
April 19, 2010
Utah Jazz +6½ +265
Game Total 212
Denver Nuggets -6½ -325

Location: Pepsi Center – Denver CO
Game Time: 10:30 pm
TV: TNT

Mehmet Okur suffered a torn ACL and that will not only leave him out of the playoffs but the World Championships and a good portion of the 2010-11 NBA season. But the Jazz are missing him now, without Okur the Jazz are without another playmaker that spreads the defense and opens things up for Derron Williams and Carlos Boozer.

The loss of Andrei Kirilenko has a bigger effect on the Jazz’s defense, without Kirilenko they lose the ability to play Carmelo Anthony man-to-man defense, sending the double creates opportunities for other Nugget players. In game one, J.R. Smith was able to go off for 18 in the fourth. The Jazz need to find an answer but there is a glimmer of hope, the Jazz were without Andrei Kirilenko the entire game and lost Mehmet Okur in the first quarter, they hung with the Nuggets until eight minutes left in the fourth when the score was only 102-98; Denver pulled away after that.

The Denver Nuggets exploited the loss of Andrei Kirilenko from the Jazz’s lineup, along with the aforementioned Smith’s big finish; Carmelo Anthony was able to score 42 points on 72 percent shooting from the floor. Along with their big nights, the Nuggets got a solid performance from Kenyon Martin, Martin who missed about a quarter of the season with knee injuries, came back, scored 7 points and grabbed 12 rebounds.

The loss of Okur in the middle allowed Martin’s dominance and Nene to have a big game of his own with 19 points and six boards.

If the Jazz are to come back and win this series, they will need to find an effective defender to put on Carmelo, they need someone physical that can force ‘Melo into unfamiliar territory on the court and not give him the easy looks he had during game one. If can roam freely as he did in game one, don’t be surprised if he averages 42 a game for the series.

In game two, the line is only 6½, if it were much higher, I would stay away but considering it’s on the right side of 7 points and the injuries Utah has to deal with, the Nuggets should have no trouble covering the spread against the undermanned Jazz team.

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