NBA Basketball on TNT: Free Thursday Night NBA Picks

LA Lakers (-4) @ Miami Heat (3-4: 8:00 PM ET – TNT): The bottom line here is that I don’t think the Heat are very good. I know they can play well from time to time, and they have one of the best players in the NBA, and probably the most underrated star in the league in Dwayne Wade. But the Lakers have Kobe Bryant and an All-Star cast. Andrew Bynum is a very good young center, Pau Gasol is probably one of the best all-around centers in the league, Ron Artest is a defensive force, and he can be very good offensively as well, and Lamar Odom does all the things the Lakers’ offense and defense needs him to do. And they have dynamic players coming off the bench that would probably start or play major minutes for the Heat.

When you add that to the fact that Miami has lost 4 of the last 5 games and their only win came at home against the Golden State Warriors, the Lakers look like an even better bet. LA hasn’t been good ATS this season, sitting at 26-32-3, but there’s a lot to like about them here – they’ve won 3 of their last 4 on the road, and they are coming off a blowout of the Pacers where they got plenty of rest. I’ll take the Lake-show in Miami.

Utah Jazz (+1.5) @ Phoenix Suns (3-4: 10:30 PM ET – TNT): The Phoenix Suns have been playing solid basketball of late, and most of that has to do with Amare Stoudemire waking up one day and deciding that he was going to try. Not to long ago, he was averaging about 20 and 8 per game – which is unbelievable poor for a 6’10 player with all the skills and explosiveness you could ever want, in and offense that is tailored to his style. Please, David Lee is putting up better numbers in the same kind of offense on a team without nearly as many good players. But Amare has 14 rebounds in 3 of his last 10 games. He has at least 8 in all but 2, and double digits 6 times. He has turned into more of a shot blocker of late, and he’s shooting the ball really well while scoring 30 or more 4 times in those 10 games, 41 once, and at least 19 in each game. He’s beginning to play like a guy that is trying to win.

But all that being said, the Jazz are still the better team. They’ve struggled on the road lately, sure, and they are historically a bad road team, but they won 4 straight on the road in mid-February, and against some teams playing some pretty good basketball. They are just coming off a loss to the Clippers, and at Sacramento – but Utah will be up to play against the Suns, and Deron Williams should be huge in this one. He’s what you’d call a “match-up nightmare” for Steve Nash. Utah wins this one.