Table of Contents
Top-rated sportsbooks have released their odds for Saturday’s slate of Olympics competition.
My three best bets for Saturday’s slate cover basketball and swimming. For basketball, I will recommend investing in Puerto Rico and South Sudan. For swimming, I will recommend Robert Finke in the 1500m freestyle.
Basketball Picks
- Puerto Rico +33.5 (-110)
- South Sudan +14.5 (-112)
Swimming Picks
- Finke ML (+300)
*All odds provided by BetOnline (visit our BetOnline Review)
Puerto Rico vs. USA (basketball)
Saturday, August 03, 2024 – 11:15 AM at Pierre Mauroy Stadium
Team USA’s Last Game
I want to talk about Team USA’s most recent match, a 103-86 win against South Sudan in which the Americans did not sniff the 29-point spread because it says a lot about them.
In that game, Team USA was clearly the better side. If there was ever any doubt that it was the better side, its 25-4 run provided quite clear proof. That 25-4 run took place in the first half and contributed to Team USA’s 19-point lead at halftime.
However, the Americans actually lost the second half. After proving that they were the better side in the first half, they basically coasted the rest of the way by playing about even with their opponent.
Why This Result Matters
Team USA is going to do the same thing against Puerto Rico.
In order to cover the 33-point spread in this game, it will be the case that the Americans will have to lead by over 34 points at halftime, which is an absurd thing to expect from any basketball team.
The Americans don’t have a reason to push for a larger win in the second half. They are not looking to beat up bad teams that aren’t capable of threatening them. Instead, they are trying to conserve their energy for gold.
American Characteristics
A caustic way of saying this is that the Americans are kind of lazy. They are not doing much more than the bare minimum it takes to win gold.
We saw this laziness in the final two exhibition games, which they clearly found superfluous to their endeavor to tune-up for the competition that counts, when they struggled to get back on defense and to otherwise play at a decent level.
They didn’t take South Sudan and Germany seriously in those two exhibition games, which is why they nearly lost both games despite the fact that they were favored so heavily.
In the rematch with South Sudan, they had to win, so they essentially won the game in the first half before relaxing as much as they could in order to still win comfortably.
Takeaway
In a game with such a large spread, you have to talk about psychology, about things like motivation and effort.
It is obvious that Team USA is the more talented side, but its tendencies and its motivational disposition strongly suggest that it won’t put that talent on full display. It won’t have to showcase even a quarter of its talent in order to handle Puerto Rico.
If this game proceeds differently than the last one against South Sudan, then what would happen is that the Americans, overconfident in their abilities, maybe take a bit longer to get going. The bottom line is that they won’t sniff the thread, because the motivation is not there to do so.
Basketball Best Bet: Puerto Rico +33.5 (-110) at BetOnline
Serbia vs. South Sudan (basketball)
Saturday, August 03, 2024 – 03:00 PM ET at Pierre Mauroy Stadium
Oddsmakers Can’t Figure Out South Sudan
When it comes to deciding what the spread should be for South Sudan’s games, oddsmakers have been way off.
It’s hard to blame them: they can’t be experts about everything, and South Sudan’s players are largely unknown quantities in the global landscape. After all, most oddsmakers probably couldn’t point to South Sudan on a map.
When Team USA beat South Sudan by a single point in the exhibition, the Americans were favored by 42 points. Oddsmakers knew they had to make a big adjustment, so they favored the Americans by 13 points fewer in the rematch. However, South Sudan still covered the spread with ease.
South Sudan has been covering other games with ease, too. In its other group stage game so far, this team beat Puerto Rico by double digits despite at one point being the underdog.
Because South Sudan is constantly being severely underrated by oddsmakers, we should invest in this team.
Basketball Best Bet: South Sudan +14.5 (-112) at BetOnline
1500m Freestyle (swimming)
Saturday, August 03, 2024 – 05:30 AM ET at La Defense Arena
Take the Underdog
Daniel Wiffen is clearly favored in the 1500m freestyle, and I think oddsmakers have this completely wrong. There is too much good competition to take Wiffen at this price.
Bobby Finke will be Wiffen’s best challenger, and I think there is great value with the American.
Finke did not compete with Wiffen in the 2024 World Aquatics Championships’ 1500m event, but based on Finke’s time in the 2023 rendition, where he swam about three seconds faster than Wiffen in 2024, Finke might very well have won.
Finke is in good form, having nearly caught up to Wiffen in the 800m, so he has a great chance to beat Wiffen.
I would like Finke at +105, so +300 feels like an amazing grab to me.
Swimming Best Bet: Finke ML (+300) at BetOnline
*The line and/or odds on picks in this article might have moved since the content was commissioned. For updated line movements, visit BMR’s free betting odds product.
