Welcome to the Sunday edition of NBA DFS Picks and Pivots, a fantasy basketball column focused on helping you find the best core lineup for this slate of DFS action!
For those of you finding us for the first time, the concept behind NBA DFS Picks and Pivots is to give you a first look at the day’s NBA DFS slate, including our top picks, plays and pivots, using FantasyDraft pricing as a reference, to help you build your best line-up and win big!
Picks and Pivots is not a simple “best plays” column but rather it focuses on slate strategy and roster construction to help give you insight into how I will look to play this slate!
Saturday Night’s DFS slate worked out nicely for Picks and Pivots as we loaded up on the Pistons/Bulls game and were rewarded as Andre Drummond (56 fantasy points and top scorer) and Kris Dunn (51) put up top 4 numbers on the night! Marcin Gortat (40) proved once again that narratives are real in DFS as he dominated on Polish Heritage Night in Washington and we moved on with a solid night to start our weekend!
Picks and Pivots is not a simple “best plays” column but rather it focuses on slate strategy and roster construction to help give you insight into how I will look to play this slate! The goal of this article is to dig through the slate, highlight our top plays and go position by position to help you identify the best slate strategy across your NBA DFS line-ups.
As always, we will look to update our final lineup thoughts prior to lock on our twitter account @FantasyCPR so make sure to give us a follow for all the late breaking lineup news.
Without further ado, let’s get into today’s slate!
NBA DFS – Where to start on this slate?
We get a funky set-up in NBA DFS today with two early games and two later games so depending on the site you play on you may have different options to choose from. FanDuel and DraftKings have taken a more traditional approach and put the larger tournament options in two distinct slates – an early slate with has Miami/Milwaukee and New Orleans/New York and a main slate with has Indiana/Phoenix and Minnesota/Portland.
On Fantasy Draft they made their “Main Slate” a three game slate which starts at 3:30PM EST and actually may be my favorite spot to play on because they eliminated the least appealing game on the slate from a DFS perspective in Miami/Milwaukee which has the lowest total and the slowest pace of any game in the NBA today.
The Pacers and Suns have the highest projected total (218.5) and highest projected pace so this would seem the obvious place to start and we have some injury news to monitor here that could add some critical value on a slate without much early obvious value.
The Pacers get the best match-up on the board today facing a Suns team ranked 30th in DvP and 28th in Def-Eff and with Myles Turner ruled out we already know the Pacers will be thin on the front line. The big injury news to watch here is the status of Domantas Sabonis who started for Turner last game, racked up 12 points, 15 boards and 37 fantasy points but finds himself questionable for today’s game with a shoulder injury.
If Sabonis was to miss this game, rather than chase guys like Al Jefferson, I could see the Pacers go small against Phoenix and run Lance Stephenson for major minutes as they did against the Cavaliers. If you look at the game flow you will see Sabonis was routinely subbed out for Lance as the Pacers opted to play small and I could see them employing a similar strategy and trying to force Tyson Chandler off the court for the Suns!
In that game, Lance played 29 minutes and racked up 41 fantasy points and now has 30+ fantasy points in back to back games. At under $5k On FanDuel, Lance is a lock and load SF play for me on this slate as the minutes and pace boost fit perfectly into his style of play!
On the Suns side of the game, it looks like Marquese Chriss will miss another game which means we can unleash the Dragan again! Dragan Bender has played 32 and 39 minutes in his last two games and has put up 33 and 44 fantasy points in those outings while averaging 17 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 2.5 blocks per game. Bender remains reasonably priced at only $4.1K on FanDuel and $9.2K on FantasyDraft which is simply too cheap considering the upside and guaranteed minutes he is playing right now.
Keep an eye on the Suns guard/forward injury news as well as we are awaiting word on whether Josh Jackson and/or Isaiah Canaan will play. Both went through practice on Saturday but have yet to be cleared which could open up more time for Troy Daniels off the bench as GPP punt play. What I love about Daniels is the volume as he has double-digit shot attempts in teo of his last three games and we saw against Houston (with Jackson/Canaan out) how much of the second team usage flows to Daniels as he had TEN three-point attempts. Daniels had the third highest usage rate on the team in that game at 22% but shot poorly, only hitting 27% of his shots which accounted for his sub par game. If Daniels gets hot, with the minutes and volume he is getting right now he could be a GPP difference maker that will be low owned on a four game slate like this!
You will notice I have not mentioned the obvious plays like Victor Oladipo, Devin Booker and T.J. Warren – all of these guys are elite plays on this slate – but you are going to need to find the value plays to fit them in and this game actually may be one of the better value spots on the board with all the injuries we have to sort through!
NBA DFS – Stack in MSG
If you are playing the three game slate on FantasyDraft, the chalk spot to stack will be Indy/Phoenix but for my money, I would opt to pivot to the Pelicans/Knicks who have a game total of 218, just a half point behind the Suns and Pacers and we can build around a star-studded trio with slate breaking upside.
DeMarcus Cousins ($19.3K) and Anthony Davis ($19.6K) are pricey investments but on short slates like this I will always prioritize raw points and the likelihood that these two are at the top of the “MVP” leaderboard on FantasyDraft is quite strong in this spot against New York. These two teams played just a few weeks ago on December 30th and we saw both Boogie and Brow dominate the Knicks interior as they racked up 63 and 52 fantasy points respectively in that game! The prices are by far the highest on FantasyDraft but this pairing has the ability to set the slate’s cash line in the first game of the night and I simply see no way that Enes Kanter and company are able to stop the Pelicans dynamic duo from getting whatever they want inside!
Kristaps Porzingis ($15.4K) was every bit the star Boogie/Brow were in this last meeting as he put up 52 fantasy points of his own and he makes for an excellent correlation play if you are stacking the Pelicans big men. The Pacers will likely get all the attention today but the Knicks are actually the team I am most interested in building around as they get the second largest pace boost, the largest projected point boost over their season average and will face a New Orleans team ranked 25th in DvP and 25th in Def-Eff this season!
Ok, let’s not bury the lead here – this is Picks and Pivots after all and something major happened the last time the Knicks took the court that needs to be addressed. The single greatest player in the NBA returned after a lengthy injury absence and I must now by Picks and Pivots law inundate you with Tim Hardaway Jr. news and notes.
As any Picks and Pivots reader knows, I have a love affair with THJ so you can take my recommendations with him (and Jamal Murray for case) with a giant grain of salt but I do actually think he makes for a great play today. Hardaway ($11.3K) came off the bench for the Knicks but it is only a matter of time before he moves back into the starting line-up, which could come as early as today! Hardaway played 25 minutes in that game, shooting the ball 13 times and sporting a 27.3% usage rate which is exactly what we can expect from him when he is on the court – a high volume scorer who soaks up a ton of usage! Prior to his injury, THJ was really hitting his stride and sporting 50-60 fantasy point upside so this is a spot where I want to be overweight against the field against a Pelicans defense ranked 26th in DvP versus opposing SG/SF this season!
I cannot believe I am saying this but Jarrett Jack ($9K) may be one of the best PG plays on the board today – yes I wrote that and I actually feel dirty. Just when we thought the Knicks would start to integrate rookie Frank Ntilikina more into the offense, it has been Jack who has taken his game to the next level – playing 40 and 33 minutes in his last two games while racking up 48 and 33 fantasy points including a triple double against the Bulls.
Overall – I love this game as a stacking spot especially where it serves as a pivot off the Suns/Pacers game. The raw points upside of Boogie/Brow/KP combined with the Knicks back court value in THJ, Jack and even Courtney Lee, give you an intriguing game stack to build around!
NBA DFS – Slate Overview and Sample Line-Up
Please Note: This is NOT an optimized line-up, it is simply illustrative to show the type of roster build we can have using the logic previously laid out in Picks and Pivots. My actual line-up may differ from the line-up shown here.
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FanDuel Sample Line-Up:
To make this more apples/apples – I will build a FanDuel roster using the 3:30PM EST three game slate which would mirror the FantasyDraft offering.
PG: Jarrett Jack ($5,100)
PG: Jeff Teague ($5,500)
SG: Courtney Lee ($5,700)
SG: Tim Hardaway Jr. ($5,000)
SF: Lance Stephenson ($4,900)
SF: Maurice Harkless ($3,500)
PF: Anthony Davis ($10,600)
PF: Kristaps Porzingis ($8,700)
C: DeMarcus Cousins ($11,000)
Slate Overview: Slate/contest selection is going to make this a tough nut to crack if you are playing NBA DFS today. Personally, I hate two games slates so have no interest in playing those especially the early offering which includes Miami/Milwaukee as it makes the Knicks/Pelicans the chalk spot to build around. The three game slate in my opinion is where you should focus on and although the Suns/Pacers game may be the best Vegas spot – for my money, I would rather build around the stars in MSG. The one game we did not touch on is Portland and Minnesota and frankly this game feels like a secondary spot on any slate you choose. This game has the lowest total and slowest pace of the three “later” games and the price points on the stars are high without the same upside of comparable stars like Boogie/Brow/KP/Oladipo/Booker. Play light and smart today – this is not the slate to go all in with your bankroll but take some shots and have FUN!
Best of luck in your NBA DFS contests and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest DFS news and analysis!