The quick read
- The Thunder and Spurs are co-favorites at +270. Nobody else is close.
- The champion Knicks and the 76ers are tied for third at +900, the best odds in the East.
- Boston is fifth at +1300, and a pack of five teams sits at 25-1 or shorter behind them.
The season tips off this week, and the oddsmakers have already drawn up the bracket in their heads. Two teams sit on top, two more are tied right behind them, and then there’s a drop.
The order makes sense when you look at it like a coach would. The top two have the best players and the most continuity. The next two have the champion’s experience on one side and the summer’s biggest makeover on the other. Here’s who’s on the board in our analysis for title favorites, and why.
Title odds at DraftKings
- +270 Oklahoma City Thunder
- +270 San Antonio Spurs
- +900 New York Knicks
- +900 Philadelphia 76ers
- +1300 Boston Celtics
- +2200 Cleveland Cavaliers
How to read it: +270 means a $100 bet pays $270 in profit. The smaller the number, the bigger the favorite. Odds as of late September. Source: DraftKings, via Sports Illustrated.
The co-favorites: Thunder and Spurs
These two met in last season’s West finals, and it went seven games. San Antonio won it. So the books have them dead even.
Oklahoma City went 64-18, the best record in the league, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander won his second straight MVP. The Thunder won the 2025 title, so a win here would be their second in three seasons. The worry is depth. They traded Lu Dort, Isaiah Joe and Aaron Wiggins this summer, and those three took about a quarter of last season’s minutes with them.
San Antonio went 62-20, beat the Thunder, and then lost the Finals to the Knicks in five games. Victor Wembanyama was the unanimous Defensive Player of the Year, and he signed a five-year extension this summer. Around him is a young backcourt that’s only getting better: De’Aaron Fox, Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper. About 94% of last season’s minutes are back, the most in the league.
The title odds are tied, but the win totals lean slightly toward OKC: 62.5 wins for the Thunder against 60.5 for the Spurs at DraftKings. They’re the only two teams in the league projected to win 60.
Tied for third: Knicks and 76ers
New York is the defending champion. The Knicks went 16-3 in the playoffs and won their first title in 53 years. Their starting five is back, with Jalen Brunson coming off a Finals MVP. So why only third? Two reasons. Repeating is hard, and nobody has done it in nine years. And they lost Mitchell Robinson, their backup center and best rebounder, to Boston.
Philadelphia had the summer’s biggest makeover, and the odds moved with it. The 76ers were 60-1 before they traded Paul George to Boston for Jaylen Brown. That deal moved them to 20-1. Then LeBron James signed a two-year deal, and they jumped all the way to +900, tied with the champs. With Brown and James next to Tyrese Maxey and Joel Embiid, this is the most talented roster in the East on paper. The questions are health and how fast four stars learn to share one ball.
Fifth: Celtics
Boston traded Brown, and the Celtics are still fifth at +1300. The books are betting on two things. The first is the system. Boston won 56 games last season with the second-best offense in the league. The second is Jayson Tatum, who is back from his Achilles injury and says he’s healthy. Add Mitchell Robinson from New York, and the Celtics still have a top-four team in the East.
The next tier
Behind Cleveland at 22-1, four teams sit at 25-1:
– Denver has Nikola Jokić and had the No. 1 offense in the league last season. – Minnesota went big this summer, trading Julius Randle and Naz Reid for LaMelo Ball to pair him with Anthony Edwards. – Toronto made a trade to bring back Kawhi Leonard, the Finals MVP of its 2019 title team. – Detroit rounds out the group.
Sports Illustrated also flagged Indiana, at 40-1, as one of the most underrated teams entering the season.
Coach’s take on title favorites
Odds tell you who has the best roster in October. Titles go to the team that’s healthy and connected in June.
Coach’s whiteboard
Here’s how our season previews see it. In the West, we have the Spurs edging the Thunder. Wembanyama changes every possession on defense, and San Antonio kept its whole rotation together while OKC thinned out its bench.
In the East, we like the Knicks to come out on top again. Philadelphia has more stars, but New York has the same five guys who just won four rounds together. That counts for a lot once it gets to May and June.
That sets up a rematch of last June’s Finals. The books say the Spurs or Thunder should win it. We’re not ready to bet against the champs.
Watch for: how fast the 76ers’ four stars click, whether OKC’s thinner bench holds up over 82 games, and Tatum’s minutes in the first month.
