Minnesota Timberwolves vs Los Angeles Lakers Prediction NBA Picks 10/4/24

The Minnesota Timberwolves and Los Angeles Lakers meet Friday in NBA preseason action at the Acrisure Arena. Here’s a Minnesota Timberwolves vs Los Angeles Lakers Prediction. This article will include a Minnesota Timberwolves vs Los Angeles Lakers Pick.

Minnesota Timberwolves Betting Preview

The Minnesota Timberwolves won 56 games last season and a playoff series for the first time since 2003-04. The Timberwolves decided it wasn’t enough and made big offseason changes. The Timberwolves just traded away Karl-Anthony Towns for Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo. It puts more pressure on Naz Reid as the backup and provides more room for Anthony Edwards to work. Randle will have to stay healthy for the trade to be successful, but I don’t hate the move in terms of depth and the Timberwolves getting a dog in DiVincenzo.

The Timberwolves haven’t won a playoff series in back to back seasons in franchise history. The Timberwolves also haven’t won 50-plus games in back to back seasons since the 2003-04 season. Minnesota is in foreign territory at the moment.

Los Angeles Lakers Betting Preview

The Los Angeles Lakers won 47 games last season, lost in the first round, and now begin the JJ Redick era. Outside of losing Taurean Prince to Milwaukee, this Lakers roster is the same. LeBron James and Anthony Davis will do most of the heavy lifting, Austin Reaves will be solid at both ends of the floor, and you just hope D’Angelo Russell can be consistent. Getting a healthy Gabe Vincent, Cam Reddish and Jarred Vanderbilt would help the second unit, as they missed a gang of time last year.

There’s reason to doubt the Lakers, as there’s a new coaching staff and there’s no trustworthy players on the roster outside of LeBron, Reaves and AD. However, there’s still hope in LA as long as those 3 are leading the charge.

Minnesota Timberwolves vs Los Angeles Lakers Prediction

I love my free points in meaningless preseason games, but the Los Angeles Lakers have lost 15 of their last 18 preseason games. The Lakers don’t care about these games and often sit their best players. With five more preseason games scheduled, I don’t expect the Lakers to play their key players here either. The Minnesota Timberwolves have a little more questions to answer given their recent moves, and they have fewer games than the Lakers to figure things out. I’ll lay the reasonable line with the Timberwolves.

Randy Chambers's Pick: Minnesota Timberwolves -3.5