The Oklahoma City Thunder are one of the biggest betting favorites in an NBA Finals across the past 20 seasons.
The Thunder opened as -750 favorites over the Indiana Pacers in the Finals at ESPN BET. The Pacers opened as +525 underdogs on Saturday.
Since 2005, only the 2017-18 Golden State Warriors (-1075 versus the Cleveland Cavaliers) had shorter odds heading into the Finals than this season’s Thunder.
Game 1, for which the Thunder opened as 9-point favorites, is slated for Thursday in Oklahoma City.
OKC took care of the Minnesota Timberwolves in five games to return to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2013. The Western Conference champions will face a Pacers team that began the season at 50-1 to win the title but went on a run in the playoffs and finished off the New York Knicks on Saturday in Game 6 of the East finals.
The Pacers, at 50-1, would be the biggest preseason long shots to win the title in the past 40 years. History is against them, however.
Over the past 50 years, only two teams that were at least +200 underdogs to start the NBA Finals — the 2003-04 Detroit Pistons at +500 and the 2018-19 Toronto Raptors at +230 — went onto claim the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy, according to betting archive SportsOddsHistory.com.
