FanDuel daily picks: Fantasy basketball lineup – April 16

Day two of the NBA playoffs tip off Sunday with three games on the Main Schedule for DFS fantasy basketball contests. Get your team ready for the postseason with FanSided’s FanDuel daily picks.

There are four big games on Day two of the NBA playoffs, including a 1:00 PM ET contest between the Hawks and the Wizards. However, the FanDuel Main schedule only includes the last three games of the day. Thus, this article will focus on those three games, beginning with the Trail Blazers at the Warriors at 3:30 PM ET. The next game is the Bulls at the Celtics at 6:30 PM ET, The night cap is the main event, the Thunder at the Rockets at 9:00 PM ET.

This is the playoffs, so storylines abound. The Trail Blazers are facing the Warriors in the playoffs for the second year in a row. Damian Lillard exploded in last year’s playoffs, getting Portland to within a razor tight game four of tying the series at two games apiece before the Warriors eventually pulled away. Lillard has had a bit more trouble against the Warriors in the regular season, but he finished the season in top form and will be facing a Warriors team still re-integrating Kevin Durant back into the mix after his injury absence.

The Bulls vs Celtics series has a lot of personal storylines, starting with the tragic. Isaiah Thomas lost his baby sister to a car accident on Saturday, and while he’s expected to play this type of tragedy will have unknown consequences on Thomas’ game. Meanwhile, the Bulls will have Rajon Rondo at the point, and he played the best years of his career in Boston with a reputation for stepping up big in the playoffs.

Finally, all eyes will be on the last game of the night as MVP favorites and former teammates Russell Westbrook and James Harden will face-off in Houston. Westbrook has played better than Harden in their regular season games, but the Rockets have tended to win the games. Watching this match-up on the big stage should be a blast.

My favorite plays of the day can be found on the following slides in FanSided’s FanDuel daily picks. Each day in order to offer a variety of price points at each position, you can find two slides for each position–one for high-salary options and one for high-value options. Each pick is ranked on a scale of 1-5 stars to indicate the confidence in the pick. The final slide of this post has more detail on what each level means, but in short, more stars means more confidence in the selection on a points-per-dollar basis.

Important note, every day the goal of this post is not to give you a copy-and-paste lineup. Instead, each selection is given while highlighting the factors you need to consider when building a customized lineup for yourself. If you want to see an example lineup, you can find it on the final slide of the post, but I suggest you adjust your lineup to fit your personal taste.

To keep up with all of FanSided’s DFS NBA coverage head over to the fantasy basketball hub where each day you can find a post like this tailored for FanDuel as well as one specifically designed for usage on DraftKings.  In this post, all salary and “fantasy points” references are to FanDuel scoring system and salaries. If you have any additional questions or thoughts or are looking for updates as we approach tipoff, follow @FanSidedFantasy on Twitter or you can follow my account @ProfessorDrz or find me on my home turf of The Hoops Lab.

Let’s take a look at your best options for both studs and value players at each position.