A question for our gambler/stat guys and gals

Not this season.

If you insist on putting money down on them for this year, I'd say now is as good a time as any. If they have any prayer of contending, pieces are still going to have to fall into place (Nurk/Zach returning, another trade for a vet role player), and anything that will improve the Blazers' chances will only lower your (clearly inevitable) payout.

 

I'd say ^this, but also the piece that could probably net you the best is to wait until after the Finals but before the draft and free agency and put down a Futures bet on the 2021 Finals. IIRC, most books won't let you go more than 364 days in the future, and depending on how much we shock the world this post-season you'll be able to get good odds and hedge against us picking up a great pick or doing a trade or signing during free agency. Plus, next year we'll have Dame/CJ/Hood/Collins/Nurk all healthy-ish and under contract, but also have the ability to have some combo of Ant/Melo/Whiteside/draft pick/FA signing/Ariza/traded player filling that out. That's not horrible even if nothing changes, and could be really good.

For instance:
If we miss the playoffs, most books will likely look at the overall NBA picture and believe that most bettors will say that a (say) 36-win team with a #14 pick coming and not much cap space will not be great the next year, and you'll have good odds.
If we make the 8-seed and get housed, even if Nurk and Collins come back and play well, they'll believe most bettors will think the same thing, except change "36" for "43" and "#14 pick" for "#17".
If we somehow make a run like last year's to the WCF, we'll still be considered a longshot to make it back, so it won't be that much of a hit to the odds.
If we win this year, they won't believe we can repeat. You're good!

 

I was being slightly tongue-in-cheek for that, as our success for getting to WCF last year was rewarded in the lines by a -7 to our win total over/under and we're usually underrated nationally. But yeah, you'd expect that if we won the 'ship our Future odds would be a bit lower.

It's interesting, because after making the WCF (so, theoretically, being one of the 4 best teams?) our odds this summer were 10th...not a ton of respect. Now, that's played out so far with 2 major injuries outside of Nurk, but they didn't know that in July.

 

It was a free $5 to open their new sports book.

 

About once every 2 months I'll log some table time at Chinook Winds or Spirit Mountain.

 

Ummmmm... sure.