The new week of NBA action tips off with a light slate. There are just four games on the board but that doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty of basketball betting value in the player props market.
Gordon Hayward will look to keep taking advantage of his added minutes in tonight’s matchup against the Pistons. Julius Randle is heating up and has been a matchup nightmare for the Celtics all season. And CJ McCollum should let it fly tonight against the Magic.
Here are my best NBA player prop picks for Monday, February 27.
NBA player props for February 27
Picks made on 2/27/2023 at 12:45 p.m. ET.
Click on each pick to jump to the full analysis.
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Today’s best NBA player props
The odds widgets below represent the best odds currently available for each betting market at regulated sportsbooks.
Minutes maid
The Charlotte Hornets are having a bad season. But not as bad as the Detroit Pistons.
The Pistons are 15-46 for the season, and the tank is on, with the team going 3-13 straight up over its last 16 games. That decline in play is really being seen on the defensive end of the floor. The Pistons' defensive numbers are pretty ugly. They rank 28th in defensive efficiency, 28th in opponent field goal percentage, and give up the second-most points per game.
That means there should be scoring opportunities for a Hornets team that takes the third-most field goal attempts per game. And my favorite player to back to get some buckets in this matchup is Gordon Hayward.
The oft-injured Hornets’ small forward is fully healthy (for now), so let’s take advantage. Hayward is averaging 14.5 points on 47% shooting this season. But as I said, he’s healthy again and some of his teammates aren’t, meaning he is logging 32.4 minutes per game over his last five games.
Those added minutes have helped him find his good shooting form. Hayward is shooting 58.3% from the field, including 57.1% from 3-point range over that stretch. And he’s put up at least 21 points four times during those five games.
The Over 16.5 points for Hayward looks like a solid play against the Pistons tonight.
Gordon Hayward prop: Over 16.5 points (-113)
No handling Randle
The New York Knicks have won five games in a row and a big reason is that Julius Randle is on a hot streak. He’ll need to keep that up if the Knicks hope to continue their run against the conference-leading Boston Celtics.
Randle has been a beast over the last six games, averaging 29.7 points on 50.4% shooting, including 40% from beyond the arc. He’s also been a big matchup problem for the Celtics this season.
Randle put up 29 points on 10-of-19 shooting (52.6%) against the Celtics back on Nov. 5 and followed that up with a 37-point performance where he went 13-for-25 from the floor (52%) at TD Garden on Jan. 26.
We’ve just seen Joel Embiid and Myles Turner put up 40-burgers on the Celtics in each of their last two games. Randle’s point total for this one is set at 25.5 and has hit the Over on that number four times in the last six games. I like him to do so once again tonight.
Julius Randle prop: Over 25.5 points (-110)
Pels bells
A season that started full of promise is quickly slipping away from the New Orleans Pelicans. At one point the top team in the Western Conference, the Pels are now just a half-game out of falling out of the final play-in spot.
New Orleans needs to get back into the win column quickly and a date with the Orlando Magic on Monday night might do the trick.
The Magic are 25-36 this season and feels a little like Paolo Banchero has hit a bit of a rookie wall. The Magic also have some issues on the perimeter. Orlando allows the second most 3-point attempts and the third most makes per game. Enter CJ McCollum.
The Pelicans' shooting guard is coming off a rough shooting night against the New York Knicks where he went 6-for-19, including 1-of-9 (11.1%) from 3-point range. But McCollum is one of the most reliable shooters in the NBA.
He's draining 38.2% of his attempts from deep this season. And prior to the poor shooting performance vs. the Knicks, McCollum had been shooting 39.4% over his previous five games, hitting three or more threes four times over that stretch.
McCollum should have plenty of opportunities to find his good shooting rhythm against this Magic team. And I’m backing him to do just that.
CJ McCollum prop: Over 2.5 3-pointers made (-120)
