Market Insights: How to play NBA on Christmas Day

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Merry Christmas! On behalf of the VSiN Market Insights newsletter I would like to wish you and yours a happy, healthy and merry Christmas! May your sweats be minimal and your tickets all cash. 

In recent years Christmas Day has become famous for all-day NBA betting full of primetime showdowns between marquee teams. It's also a great day to bet against the public because there are no other sports to bet on today. The NBA is only game in town and every matchup is nationally televised. Each game is extremely heavily bet and loaded with recreational money. 

 

The oddsmakers know that millions of families will be home watching NBA games and as a result, they will shade lines toward favorites, knowing that public bettors will gravitate toward popular teams. This provides excellent buy-low value for brave contrarians to back unpopular teams.

According to Bet Labs sports, Christmas day teams receiving less than half of spread bets have gone 35-23 ATS (60.3%) since 2005.

Christmas Day unders have also been highly profitable, going 38-22 (63.3%). Oddsmakers know that the public wants to see high-scoring, entertaining games with lots of points scored and will shade totals toward the over, providing heightened contrarian value for savvy under bettors. 

If the total stays the same or falls, Christmas Day unders improve to 22-7 (76%). 

Here are the matches for today

Nuggets-Pelicans
Warriors-Rockets
76ers-Bucks
Raptors-Celtics

Be sure to check all of the updated Christmas Day lines from our free VSiN NBA Live Odds page. 

The VSiN Market Insights Podcast with Josh Appelbaum will be off today. We can't wait to be back at it starting on Friday.