Cleveland Cavaliers vs. Memphis Grizzlies best bets

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Wednesday evening, the Cleveland Cavaliers (28-17, 9-13 away) travel to face the Memphis Grizzlies (30-13, 19-3 home), who are tied with Denver for the fewest home-court losses in the NBA.

Making matters worse for the Cavs, the team is expected to be short-handed, and the odds reflect that. With Donovan Mitchell listed as “doubtful”, Cleveland is a seven-point underdog on Wednesday, which equals the largest spread they have faced all season.

The game total was off the board as of late Tuesday night and will likely remain so until Wednesday’s NBA starting lineups become clear.

Cleveland comes into Wednesday amid a mediocre stretch of play. The team is 6-6 straight-up in its last 12 and has alternated wins and losses over its past seven games. Their most-recent appearance was a 113-103 home win over a Zion Williamson-less Pelicans team on Monday as 7.5-point favorites. They maintain a positive ATS record on the year (22-20-3) but that number has come back to earth after an 8-1 ATS start to the season.

The Cavaliers have yet to cover the spread in a loss this year.

Memphis has a nearly identical ATS records as the Cavs, sitting at 22-19-2 on the season. That number improves to 14-7-1 at home, whereas Cleveland is an ugly 7-13-2 ATS on the road.

It’s not certain that Mitchell won’t play, but the odds are against it, so to speak. He suffered a groin injury in the third quarter of Monday’s game against the Pelicans and missed practice on Tuesday. He was described as “unlikely” to play in Wednesday’s contest.

Mitchell’s importance to the team is obvious: he leads the Cavs in scoring (28.4 PPG), minutes (36.1 MPG), and steals (1.4 SPG), and is second in assists (4.8 APG). He’s averaging 3.7 three-pointers per game, which is 1.3 more than his closest teammate (Darius Garland) and at least two more than anyone else on the team.

Cleveland is 2-3 straight-up in his absence this season, beating Detroit (by 24) and OKC (by 8), while losing to Minnesota (by 5), Sacramento (by 11), and Denver (by 13).

All the trends point to Memphis covering on Wednesday. The Grizzlies have a stellar 14-7-1 ATS record on their home court, while Cleveland is 7-13-1 away and has yet to cover the spread in a loss. They are a different team with Mitchell out of the lineup; they managed to beat two sub-.500 teams (Detroit and OKC) but lost by double digitsto the two over-.500 squads they faced while Mitchell was out (Denver and Sacramento).

Even with Mitchell in the lineup, Cleveland ranks close to the bottom of the NBA in three-pointers per game (11.3). Subtracting the 3.7 that Mitchell averages per night, the Cavs are going to have an extremely difficult time keeping pace with the Grizzlies for 48 minutes.

The schedule also hasn’t done Cleveland any favors of late. They were on a five-game west-coast swing from Jan. 6 to Jan. 14, which included games at altitude in Denver and Utah, and then returned home for a single game against New Orleans on Monday before heading on the road to Memphis.

There is no good time to be without your best player, but this is an exceptionally bad one.

Bettors can get actually Memphis at -6.5 at DraftKings Sportsbook as of 1 a.m. Wednesday morning, and I am laying that number here.

Pick: Grizzlies -6.5 (-110)

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