Welcome to the FanDuel NBA edition of Picks and Pivots, a fantasy basketball column focused on helping you find the best NBA FanDuel lineup!
The purpose of this FanDuel NBA Picks column is to first identify key building blocks that can be used for any roster construction and then identify pivot points to help differentiate your lineup in hopes of a big payday!
For those of you that are new to Picks and Pivots, we will go through the season tracking trends in this space by looking at the winning GPP lineups each day.
One of the most basic questions when starting out the NBA season is how many points should I be targeting for tournament entries? A good rule of thumb is that you want your players to exceed 6x their salary so on a $60k team salary you are looking for 360+ points. If you spread that out over a roster of 9 players, that is an average of 40 points per player.
A good rule of thumb is that you want your players to exceed 6x their salary so on a $60k team salary you are looking for 360+ points. If you spread that out over a roster of 9 players, that is an average of 40 points per player.
Now it is unreasonable to expect every player to hit that target, especially when you are utilizing value plays but remember that is the average you need over the course of your roster!
To start the year, I would simply build your roster with the simple 6x rule in mine and do the math quickly. Can I see player X hitting 6x their salary? For example, LeBron James is priced at $9,600 so in order to return value he would need to exceed 57 points.
This is not a hard and fast rule, but as we go through the season I will track the trends each night to understand the target multiplier we should use as our baseline.
Over the first 56 slates, we have seen the average winning GPP score at 371.3 a night which means we have needed 6.2x value to win big!
Monday’s Main FanDuel NBA action kicks off at 7:00PM EST with 11 games on the main slate and no shortage of superstars to choose from. Without further ado – let’s get into our top picks for the day!
FanDuel NBA – Top Point Guard Picks
Kemba Walker ($8,000) Welcome to the day after Christmas Picks and Pivots – I hope you all had a great holiday with friends and family and are ready to tackle this massive 11 game NBA slate! Looking over the slate initially, I am leaning towards a more balanced roster construction but keep in mind we have 5 games still without Vegas totals so the injury news should be plentiful throughout the day which may open up value along the way!
The Hornets are one team that regardless of injury news we should look to target aggressively against the Brooklyn Nets. The Nets have given up the most fantasy points this season and are ranked 29th in DvP to opposing PG’s so this is a spot for Kemba at only $8k to simply crush value.
Kemba continues to be a major focal point of the Hornets offense with 15 shots per game, but it is his peripheral stats that make him an ideal DFS target. The fact that Vegas has this game at a 6.5 spread makes me much more comfortable targeting the Hornets as we should get a full complement of minutes from the starters.
Jeff Teague ($8,200) With the news that Chris Paul will be out the next two games, I expect Raymond Felton ($4,000) to be a popular DFS play as most people will go high/low when building their DFS rosters but I like the idea of paying up at both spots tonight in what I believe will be a contrarian strategy.
Teague is absolutely on fire right now, with 5 straight games of 41 or more FanDuel points and gets a favorable spot against Rajon Rondo and the Bulls. In their last meeting, Teague put up 26 points, 6 rebounds and 7 assists for 47.7 FanDuel points and I expect another 40-50 point night for Teague tonight!
FanDuel NBA – Top Shooting Guard Picks
Giannis Antetokounmpo ($10,600) Of all the $10k+ priced players on this slate, the one I am looking to make the salary space for tonight is simply known at the Greek Freak! Giannis comes into tonight’s game with 50+ FanDuel points in 5 of his last 6 games with the only game he “underperformed” totaling 46.5 FanDuel points.
Giannis gets a match-up with a Wizards team he faced the last time the Bucks took the floor and put up 39 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists for 62.6 FanDuel points. With Anthony Davis going up against a slow-paced Dallas team and James Harden in a potential blowout, Giannis is the elite play on the board I am most looking to roster and with a slight discount to those players, it is easy to fit into FanDuel NBA rosters.
Nicolas Batum ($7,500) If you have been playing DFS each day over the last two weeks you have likely noticed the price steadily increasing on Batum and if you have been like me, you are probably passing him over as you can’t possibly imagine spending this much on Batum.
However if you look over his game logs we see that their may actually still be value left in this price as Batum has topped 40 FanDuel points in 4 of his last 5 games including a triple-double in his last outing against the Bulls. Batum gets to face a Nets defense giving up the most fantasy points on the season to opposing SG’s and makes for a great target that will likely be ignored due to his price.
FanDuel NBA – Top Small Forward Picks
Thabo Sefolosha ($4,600) With the salary I am looking to spend at the guard position on this slate, Small Forward is the place I am most likely to spend down at tonight and save some salary. Thabo has been a steady producer for the Hawks playing roughly 30 minutes a night since being installed into the starting line-up and has hit 6x value in 3 of his last 7 games.
Dwight Howard remains a question mark for tonight’s game and although most will look to Paul Millsap in that spot, it is the fringe Hawks players like Thabo and Kent Bazemore that I would look to roster if Howard is ruled out as they should soak up the additional usage.
Michael Kidd-Gilchrist ($4,500) Ok last Hornets player I promise. At this mid-range price point we are looking for guaranteed minutes and sneaky DvP spots and as we already touched on, I want as much exposure against the Nets as I can get!
The Nets are dead last in DvP to opposing SF’s and have the most favorable DRPM match-up on the board as MKG should be able to rack up peripheral stats against the Nets wing players. If you are rostering MKG it is NOT for the points, instead you are looking at his non-scoring stats and in a game where the Hornets see the biggest pace increase on the slate it should lead to more rebounds and steals/blocks!
The Nets turn the ball over at a rapid pace and if you look at MKG’s recent play he is averaging 10 rebounds, 2 blocks and 1 steal per game over his last two contests. If MKG can eek his way to 10-15 points in addition to these stats, he would be able to easily crush 6x value!
FanDuel NBA – Top Power Forward and Center Picks
Jabari Parker ($6,900) Heading back to Milwaukee, I am looking to stack the Bucks two young stars in this favorable spot against the Wizards. The Wizards are 23rd in DvP to opposing PF’s and Parker just dropped 42 FanDuel points in this same spot their last time out!
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Parker has now eclipsed 40+ FanDuel points in 3 of his last 5 games and will be one of the best PF’s options on this slate!
Thaddeus Young ($5,200) It was not long ago that Thad was price just above $4k but his recent production has resulted in a nice little price bump! I still like the value that Young provides at just over $5k considering he is averaging 33+ FanDuel points in his last three games which would exceed 6.3x value at this price point. The match-up against the Bulls is solid as well as they are ranked 20th in DvP to opposing PF’s on the season!
Montrezl Harrell ($4,500) FanDuel has moved Harrell from PF to C which for those of us who had been using him as a value PF will be very disappointed in finding out today! The reality is, the position switch should completely shift his ownership from an overly chalky play to an under-owned bargain!
Harrell has started at Center for the Rockets with Clint Capela out and has hit 6x value at this price point in each of his last two games putting up 27/28 FanDuel points per contest. The Rockets have the highest team total on the board AND see a huge pace bump and Harrell is a great way to get exposure. If he was PF eligible I would expect a 25-30% ownership tonight but the move to Center will likely leave him at single digit ownership and I will be all over him tonight!
Next: College Football Bowl Prediction Series
Good luck tonight in your FanDuel NBA contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR Twitter throughout the day for late breaking roster updates and lineup news!