Hawks vs. Heat predictions: Target the Heat with these two player props Tuesday night

With the NBA play-in tournament set to get underway, we have player prop predictions for the Atlanta Hawks vs. Miami Heat.

I already had some difficulty picking a side in this matchup, and then I saw that Miami could be without guard Kyle Lowry.

Of course, with the NBA, it’s no surprise that there are differing opinions on his status for the game. I’ve seen Lowry listed anywhere from questionable to doubtful across different publications.

The veteran point guard suffered a knee injury in the regular season finale, but now it’s just being described as soreness.

Whether that’s just gamesmanship on Miami’s part remains to be seen. Lowry has been in and out of the lineup this season, starting 44 of the 55 games he played.

As a result, I plan to focus on the Heat roster when evaluating player props for this game.

» READ MORE: Hawks vs. Heat prediction: How to bet Tuesday’s Eastern Conference play-in battle

I’m all in on Caleb Martin for this game, as this number feels too low at 7.5. Martin has the team’s second-best 3-point percentage (35.6%) for players who average at least three attempts.

The Nevada product averages 1.2 3-pointers per game, which would put him almost halfway to going over this prop. He scored at least 20 points in two of the four games against Atlanta this season, averaging 15.75 in the series.

Moreover, he made at least two 3-pointers in three of the four games.

Atlanta will sell out to try and stop Butler, who averaged 30.5 points against them in the first round of the playoffs last season. That season was Martin’s first with the Heat, so there was still a feeling out process.

Martin averaged 12.3 minutes in the series after starting 12 of 60 games during the campaign.

This year, he’s started 49 of 71 games while averaging roughly seven more minutes (29.3 minutes per game) during the regular season compared to the previous campaign (22.9 minutes per game).

Butler is the kind of player who, as a teammate, you have to earn his trust. Martin’s done that, and now he’s ready to contribute.

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Even if Lowry is still nursing the knee injury, we can’t automatically expect Vincent to pose a similar scoring threat. After all, the Heat have enough options offensively that they won’t need to rely on him to put up shots.

Vincent exceeded this prop number only once in his three games against Atlanta this season. Moreover, he fell below this number last year in the playoffs (averaged 8.4 points in the series) against the Hawks.

While Vincent did have two games with 11 points, those performances grade out more as outliers when you look at his overall body of work.

If we use this current prop as a guide, he’s gone under 9.5 points in 39 of the 68 games (57.4%) he played this season.

One thing about Miami is that it has multiple ball handlers who can run the offense, as seven players averaged at least two assists per game.

As a result, we’ve seen a slight drop in Vincent’s usage rate from 17.8 to 17.5%. I would need that number to be higher before I consider backing him to reach double figures in this spot.

» READ MORE: Full sports betting coverage from The Philadelphia Inquirer