Will Indiana Pacers finish over or under Vegas’ win-total odds next season?

Las Vegas released their official predictions for each teams’ projected wins/losses next season. Will the Indiana Pacers finish over or under their predicted win number?

Trying to figure out what we should expect from the Indiana Pacers next season is a bit tricky. The team has undergone major changes this summer, Victor Oladipo won’t be back in action till winter, and no one is sure if the team’s whole Myles Turner/Domantas Sabonis experiment is actually going to work.

Still, the friendly gambling folks in Las Vegas have to do their best year in and year out in order to predict just how many victories they think every team in the NBA will win in a given season. In regards to the Indiana Pacers, Caesars Sportsbook has wagered that the team will finish 4th in the Eastern Conference in 2019-2020.

As you can see, they’ve estimated that the Pacers will win 48.5 games this coming season. Clearly, you can’t actually win half a game, but Vegas does this in order to allow people to make a bet about whether or not the team will over or under this number. Think Indy wins 48 or fewer games? You’d bet the under. If you think they’ll win 49 or more, you bet the over.

Now, don’t use this article to help make a decision on how you should place a bet if you’re a gambler. That’s not the purpose of the piece, and there are tons of factors that go into making a decision on a bet like this.

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Still, it’s interesting to see how high Caesars has Indiana ranked in the East despite some things they already have working against them.

For two consecutive seasons now, the Indiana Pacers have finished with 48 wins and have been the 5th seed in the Eastern Conference. It seems Vegas is counting on the Pacers maintaining their consistency in terms of wins.

However, there are more question marks going into 2019-2020 than there were last season. A staggering 7 key players for the Pacers are now gone. The team has been overhauled. Everyone will have to rebuild their chemistry with one another as new guys are integrated and players like Sabonis figure out how to play in a new role.

Oladipo might not be himself once he returns. T.J. Warren has his own issues staying healthy for entire seasons. Malcolm Brogdon has had some injury concerns with his foot. The list goes on.

While the Indiana Pacers should almost certainly be a playoff team next year, 48.5 wins feels aggressive. The team will probably still finish over .500, but somewhere in the 42-46 total win range feels a bit more likely with how many things are currently unknown and up in the air.

If everything goes according to plan for the Indiana Pacers, there’s a very real chance the team could be better than they were a year ago. But regardless of what happens this season as the team works out some inevitable kinks, the future is still plenty bright in Indiana whether or not they live up to the Las Vegas predictions.