NBA Playoff Odds (Original)
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Updated after Spurs win Game 5 - Heat vs. Spurs 50,000 times:       

June 4, 2013 - After an NBA season that may long be remembered for dominant teams and emerging stars, the 2013 NBA postseason has featured a fair amount of drama and intrigue - at least as much off the court as on. As we stand though, with the Miami Heat set to host the San Antonio Spurs in Thursday's Game 1, the two clear best teams of the postseason and two of the three dominant teams of the regular season will meet in what appears to be a compelling matchup of two very different teams with wildly differing storylines.

Before this NBA Playoffs season began, we projected the San Antonio Spurs and Miami Heat would meet in the NBA Finals 32.4% of the time, which was the second most likely finals matchup behind the Heat and Thunder (after Oklahoma City lost Russell Westbrook to injury and was ousted by the Memphis Grizzlies, a Heat-Spurs series became an astounding 76.6% leading into the conference finals). At that time, the numbers suggested that the Heat would be about 78.4% likely to make it this far and 54.8% - the largest we have seen in the last decade - likely to win it all. Despite San Antonio's impressive run through the Western Conference that culminated in a sweep of the tough, defensive-oriented Grizzlies, Miami is still a prohibitive favorite.

While we could not foresee Westbook's injury, any suspensions or the complete disappearance of Dwyane Wade for most of the postseason up to this point, we can account for injuries, roster changes and even how team depth charts have been utilized throughout the postseason to produce new projections for this specific series. Updating all numbers, the Miami Heat are rightfully favorites, but not quite as significant as the sportsbooks in Las Vegas would suggest.

In 50,000 simulations of the NBA Finals, Miami wins over San Antonio 66.2% of the time. The most likely scenario (as seen below) is a six game series won by the Heat who have home court advantage and would close out that series in front of the home crowd at American Airlines Arena. The current consensus lines have Miami as a -220 favorite to win the series and San Antonio at +190. This would suggest that books think that Miami has a 66.6% chance to win the series. To be comfortable wagering on either side, one would have to be at least 68.8% confident in the Heat at -220 or at 34.5% confident in the Spurs at +190. In other words, this series is not bettable as we agree with the consensus that Miami is about twice as likely to win it all as San Antonio. 

That being said, the Spurs will need to make the most of playing Games 3, 4 and 5 at home. Of all series simulated, 46.1% are won by the Heat in six or seven games. That also means that almost 70% of the Heat's series wins come at home. In total, 66.7% of series go at least six games, while the series gets to a decisive Game 7 31.4% of the time (which is won by the home Heat 69.4% of the time). The exact most likely series outcome - Miami in six games at 24.7% - is more likely than either team winning in a sweep (11.6%) or either team winning in five games (21.8%). 

It's certainly of note that the Spurs have essentially the same chance (10.0%) of winning in exactly five games as they do in six (10.5%) or seven (10.0%), meaning that stealing a game in Miami is of the utmost importance for this rested team. Having home court advantage for Game 7 is significant. Simulating the NBA Finals with the home court advantage going to the Spurs instead of the Heat, Miami becomes just a 58.7% favorite to win the series. 

From a value perspective, the series is not bettable, nor are the exact series results. The closest series result to playable happens to be our most likely series result, which sees Miami win 24.7% in six games and pays 3:1, which requires 25% confidence. That being said, the OVER on 5.5 total games in this series does appear to have some value. As we just outlined, it happens almost exactly two-thirds of the time, which is just greater than the 65.5% confidence needed to wager at -190 (the same can be said for props on the series ending in Miami). 

Here are the results of the 2013 Heat-Spurs NBA Finals played 50,000 times:

Heat vs. Spurs:

How we do this:
The Predictalator plays this best-of-seven series 50,000 times. Each series is played in its entirety and recorded by which team wins and in how many games. The data we use incorporates individual player's statistics, where most recent games are given more weight. This helps us account for player development as well as those who may be playing differently now because of health (good or bad). Playing time and matchup assumptions are made with regards to recent team history, so they are dictated by coaching styles and not necessarily what would be optimal. Relevant statistics include individual and team per-possession statistics as adjusted by strength of schedule of opponents.

NBA Playoff Odds (Original)
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