It’s an epic eight-game NBA slate featuring some of the league's best teams and many of its brightest young talents on Sunday. We zeroed in on a few different star players for our three favorite NBA player prop bets for today’s action.
Read on to see why we think Zion Williamson is going to punish the Denver Nuggets inside, as well as why we like a pair of 3-pointer props for Donovan Mitchell and Jamal Murray. Let’s dive in.
NBA player props for December 4
Picks made on 12/4/2022 at 3:00 a.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.
Zion's realized potential
Few players have come into the NBA with the expectations laid at the feet of Zion Williamson. Not only was the fate of a franchise seemingly foisted on his shoulders, but the NBA itself oriented its marketing efforts around Williamson immediately becoming the next superstar to lead the NBA through the post-LeBron generation.
It’s been an unfortunate series of injuries more than anything that has prevented Zion from reaching those lofty heights so far, but Zion is now playing like a guy worthy of being the torchbearer for the NBA’s next decade.
That might sound absurd to say about a 22-year-old who has played barely over 100 games, but the combination of skill, talent, and physical profile warrants it. Zion is just off playing perhaps two of the most complete, dominant games of his young career — thorough thrashings of the Toronto Raptors and the San Antonio Spurs.
Zion doing Zion things.
— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) December 1, 2022
Unstoppable. pic.twitter.com/83danI7eXK
Williamson’s line against the Raptors — 33 points, 10 rebounds, five assists, four steals, and two blocks on 12-15 shooting ?— was particularly outrageous given that the Raptors are one of the better defenses in the NBA with arguably the best man-to-man defender, OG Anunoby.
But Zion simply overpowered OG, something no other player really can do, forcing him into early foul trouble and obliterating the lesser matchups thrown at him. Zion’s greatest strength is getting to the basket and hitting a left-handed layup. It’s simple and repetitive, but nobody seems able to stop him from getting it over 10 times a game.
Denver is especially poorly equipped to do so, as they’re one of the worst rim defense teams in the league. The Nuggets allow a staggering 70.4% at the rim, the second-worst mark in the association this season. Zion’s usage is also bound to remain sky-high as Brandon Ingram remains sidelined with a toe injury.
Zion Williamson Prop: Over 24.5 points (-118)
Mitchell lights up MSG
Donovan Mitchell, once the apple of many Knicks fans eyes, seems destined to torture the Garden faithful for the rest of his career. Not because it’s personal (though maybe it is), but because his style of play exploits the Tom Thibodeau Knicks’ greatest weakness.
Pull-up 3-point shooting is the skill that separates good guards from the truly elite as it’s proven incredibly scheme resistant over time. It just creates so many problems for defenses and the Knicks' defense has come unglued in the face of opponent perimeter shooting multiple times in recent games.
New York allows the second-highest volume of opponent threes as well as the fourth-most wide-open threes, per NBA.com’s shot tracking data, and opponents are shooting 39.7% on those shots.
The Knicks’ scheme often results in helping off the strong side corner, which is one reason they also concede the fifth-highest number of corner threes of any team. They’re also an abysmal defensive rebounding team, frequently leaving them out of position to contest perimeter shots.
Not that Donovan Mitchell needs any help. He’s shooting a career-high 43.5% from downtown on 9.1 3-point attempts per game. The wild part is that more than half of those attempts are coming off the dribble, where he’s shooting an even better 48.2%.
He’s coming off a 7-11 performance from outside against the Magic on Friday and in his first game against the Knicks in a Cavaliers uniform he went 8-13 from outside. No scheme can stop Mitchell from bombing it from outside right now, it’s just that New York is uniquely ill-suited to even try.
Donovan Mitchell Prop: Over 3.5 made threes (-113)
Jamal's jumper
About a month ago, I was fading Jamal Murray, as he was still struggling to find his legs after missing the entirety of the 2021-22 NBA season. But I suspected it was only a matter of time until he found his groove again.
After all, Murray is one of only four players to have multiple 50-point games in a playoff series. He’s a stone-cold killer, with a combination of craft and audacity that makes him a pain to play and a joy to watch.
26 points for Jamal tonight and @BillHanzlik said it perfectly, "It's great to see him back."@chrisadempsey - @katywinge - @nuggets - #MileHighBasketball pic.twitter.com/tXPBFpnf8P
— AltitudeTV (@AltitudeTV) December 1, 2022
Though his overall lines for the season don’t jump off the page, you can see he’s turned the corner recently by just watching him play and the numbers back it up as well.
Before this recent six-game stretch, Jamal had only hit three or more threes twice this season. But over the last six games, Murray has hit three or more 3-pointers four different times and is shooting over 40% from deep in that same span.
With Michael Porter Jr. still out for Sunday’s game against the Pelicans, Murray will be the primary beneficiary of Jokic’s game-breaking passing, giving him plenty of opportunity to eclipse this line.
Jamal Murray Prop: Over 2.5 made threes (+126)
