Posted:
#1
In the nine postseasons since 2004 (the “Dwyane Wade era”), the Heat are 13-3 in playoff games reffed by Dan Crawford and 48-40 in all other playoff games in that span. To control for effects like home/road or playing better/worse opponents, it may be better to look at the expected win-loss for the Heat in those games given the pre-game point spread (betting line) for each game.
Historically, the spread has been shown to be an accurate predictor of what happens in a game – that is, teams are generally .500 against the spread over large samples of games. The Heat are 11-4-1 vs the spread in those 16 playoff games reffed by Dan Crawford since 2004, compared to 41-44-3 vs the spread in the other 88 games.
For more read here https://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/miamiheat/post/_/id/14698/dan-crawford-the-heat-and-the-1-9-percent
I would rarely if ever bet just because of such a stat, and really Im not. I think the Heat can and will win at home, and Altho I think the spread should be 3.5 given this history with this ref. and the On/Off switch. Ill swallow the extra 2.5 for tonight
Not only is crawford under the helm, but the pacers defense is nowhere near what it was last year, nor is its offense, especially on a consistant basis. The pacers will not score 100 points. The heat generally tend to regardless the caliber defense they come across (given the game actually means something, not talking regular season here)
Ill ride the lebron vs stephenson show tonight, and I think in the end lance will get put in his place, and have a great game 4 at home.
Heat -6
0
Hot Forum Topics
