2024 NBA Finals Odds: Where Do Knicks Stand?
The ball never stops rolling in the NBA: an exciting season hasn't been over for 24 hours and yet countless fans can't wait to follow in the footsteps of the Denver Nuggets, who earned their first championship in 47 years on Monday night.
Count oddsmakers among those excited, as favorites for the 2024 NBA Finals have already emerged: BetMGM, for example, has faith in a Rocky Mountain repeat, placing Nikola Jokić's Nuggets at the top of the list at +500. The Boston Celtics are at +550 after appearing in the Eastern Conference Finals for the fifth time in the last seven seasons while the Milwaukee Bucks (+600) round out the top three despite a shocking first-round loss to the eventual runner-ups from Miami (who are tied with Memphis for the seventh-best odds at +2000).
Rare optimism has followed the New York Knicks into the offseason after winning 47 games and a first-round playoff series, reaching landmarks they hadn't seen for a decade. The emergence of $104 million investment Jalen Brunson as a top offensive option has many believing that the Knicks have built something that can contend for a title with a few offseason tweaks.
The oddsmakers, however, don't share that faith: in the immediate aftermath of the Finals, the Knicks hold the 11th-best odds at +4000. Five teams in the East (including their first-round victims from Cleveland at +2500) rank ahead of them, as do the Dallas Mavericks (+1200) and New Orleans Pelicans (+3500) despite neither team appearing on the Western Conference playoff bracket. The latter teams' chances are likely buoyed by respective stars Luka Donćić and Zion Williamson, but the Knicks proved more than capable of competing with them this season.
New York made some postseason noise, this time around, but now the hard part of defending it begins. Many saw a fifth-place finish in the East as an overachievement for the Knicks, who eventually fell to the aforementioned Miami Heat in six games in the conference semifinals. The Knicks not only have certain decisions to make on some of their current talents but will likely look to get involved in the upcoming free agent festivities. As it stands, the Knicks have no picks in next week's NBA Draft in Brooklyn.
It'd be no surprise to see the Nuggets, a deep group sustained by the efforts of Jokić, Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon, and more, return to the Finals. The team took advantage of its top seeding in the Western Conference and won 10 of its final 11 postseason games.
Rounding out the first list odds are the Charlotte Hornets and Detroit Pistons, each of whom currently stands at +50000.
Geoff Magliocchetti is on Twitter @GeoffJMags
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