NBA DFS Picks and Pivots – Sunday March 11
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.
Thankfully that Saturday NBA DFS slate is now behind us because frankly it ended up uglier than I even anticipated when I first went through it. Russell Westbrook was the top scorer on the slate with 53 fantasy points and the only player on the entire slate that went for over 40 fantasy points. To give you an idea of how horrendous this slate was – Dwight Powell was your third leading scorer on the night. Hopefully you all took the night off from NBA DFS entirely or played late and on some cash you can roll forward into a much better Sunday slate!
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 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:
Welcome to a loaded Sunday NBA DFS slate where you will have some varying options depending on which site you play on. On FantasyDraft the slate kicks off at 3:30PM EST with all 8 NBA games available while FanDuel has opted as usual on Sundays to split the slate with four early games and four late games which kick off at 7PM EST.
The slate is littered with major injury news that we will need to monitor as some of the games biggest stars are either already ruled out or are questionable to play.
Stephen Curry remains out for Golden State which means Kevin Durant ($19.1K) will continue to run the show for the Warriors and is one of the top plays available to us today. In their last game against Portland with Curry sidelined we saw exactly what that would mean to KD’s game as he sported a massive 40% usage rate, took a team high 21 shot attempts and went for over 60 fantasy points for the second game in a row with Curry out/limited.
On FantasyDraft where KD is priced at 19K I simply think he remains a lock and load as his floor right now would seemingly pay off that price tag and if you are playing the early FanDuel slate, he is the elite player to pay up for.
Anthony Davis missed last game for the Pelicans but looks like a true game time decision tonight against the Jazz. Considering that AD went through pre-game warm ups last game before being ruled out, it would seem like The Brow is closer to playing tonight than we would have originally thought. With the Pelicans tipping off an hour and a half after lock and the fact the Jazz represent one of the tougher possible match-ups for AD, this looks like the perfect GPP scenario where we may not have confirmation ahead of lock and we can get Davis at insanely low ownership. The Pelicans see the largest pace decrease on the slate so I would only use them in GPP’s today as a contrarian play and that includes Jrue Holiday and Nikola Mirotic who let the world down last game and will likely be over-looked today.
I'm told James Harden will probably sit out vs. Mavs and play Monday against the Spurs.
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) March 11, 2018
James Harden is listed as questionable today versus the Mavericks and if he sits out, along with Ryan Anderson who has already been ruled out, this could become an amazing Chris Paul ($14.1K) as CP3 sees a 10% usage boost with Harden/Ryno off the court this season. With this game being the first game of the “Main Slate” we should have the confirmation on Harden before lock but it looks like beat writers are expecting we will sit out this game.
Over the course of the season, Paul sports a 36% usage rate while putting up 1.74 FP/M and will take on a Mavericks team ranked 24th in Def-Eff in guarding the PG position this season. In seven games without Harden earlier this season, Paul averaged 48 fantasy points per game which would be a 7 point or 17% increase over his season long number. At $14K on FantasyDraft, 48 fantasy points would return 3.4x tournament value while on FanDuel it would return 5.8x value so there is obvious value/upside to be had here with Paul tonight.
Do not overlook the upside that Eric Gordon ($10K and $5.6K on FanDuel) has with Harden off the court as Gordon averaged over 36 fantasy points in the 7 games Harden was out this season which would be a whopping 10 fantasy points higher than his season average and at his price point on both sites, he has the ability to simply crush value with an expected starting role on Sunday.
One early injury to keep an eye on is Dennis Schroder who is questionable to play and thankfully this is the first game on the slate so we should have news here. Tyler Dorsey could get the start here in the absolute perfect match-up against the Bulls who rank 29th in Def-Eff as a team this season.
NBA DFS – Core Build:
The Lakers and Cavaliers – LeBron versus IT – the late night hammer. Regardless of which site/slate you are playing today you are going to want/need exposure to the last game on the slate as it not only has the highest total (228) but it also has the fastest projected pace and only a 2 point spread so it basically checks all the boxes for a potential game stack.
LeBron James ($20.6K) is the obvious top play on the Main Slate on FanDuel and I think even on FantasyDraft you can make the case he is the better play over Kevin Durant if forced to choose only one. LeBron is a 50-60 point lock and with the added narrative tonight, I think he the first player you lock in on tonight as we are going to have easy value we can plug-in around him to make it work.
We do not have to look far for the value either as the Cavaliers tonight will be without Rodney Hood, Tristan Thompson and Cedi Osman and Kyle Korver is questionable to play with a foot injury. A suddenly deep Cavaliers rotation becomes primed for value as Cleveland could run a 6-7 man rotation tonight as they were forced to do against the Clippers the last time they took the floor.
J.R. Smith ($8.2K, $3.7K) would likely become one of the best value plays on the slate after he played 34 minutes with 15 shot attempts (second behind LeBron) and 33 fantasy points. Jeff Green ($6.7K, $3.6K) could end up being the lone man off the bench if Korver misses tonight as we could see Jordan Clarkson ($10.5K, $4.2K) move into the starting line-up for the Cavs in place of Rodney Hood.
With Kyle Korver being the only unknown, I think you can lock these value plays into your line-ups early in the day as we already know Hood/Osman are out and if Korver does sit, it just gives the remaining healthy value plays here an added boost. The Cavs are by far my favorite spot for value on this slate – do not be afraid to use them in a game where they see the biggest pace boost on the slate!
The Lakers side of this game is incredibly interesting as well as we have a team running essentially a 6 man rotation with Brandon Ingram and Josh Hart out and just like the Cavaliers, I think you can use each and every piece here.
Lonzo Ball ($13.9K) and Julius Randle ($13.8K) are the two priciest plays on the Laker side of the ball and although I love both, I would likely side with Randle if I am paying up here as the Lakers big man leads the team with a 1.2 FP/M mark over the last two weeks and has put up 30+ fantasy points in 11 straight games.
Isaiah Thomas ($12.7K) is going to be super popular tonight for the narrative versus LeBron alone but the fact he has sported a team high 32% usage rate over the last two weeks supports the rationale to play him tonight. I love the usage and the narrative but keep in mind that at this price point, he would need 38 fantasy points just to hit value and that is a mark he has only hit one time since joining the Lakers.
Brook Lopez ($10.2K) is playing out of his mind right now with 44, 33 and 35 fantasy points over his last three games and on FanDuel where we are forced to roster a Center, I would have no issue rolling him out at less than $6K tonight.
Overall this game is primed for stacking as a result of the pace/total and frankly from a roster build perspective it is very easy to do with all the value opening up on the Cavaliers side. Do not overlook this game tonight – you will be passed by the field if you do not have ample exposure to it!
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 NBA DFS – Sample Line-Up:
PG: Chris Paul ($8,200)
PG: Lonzo Ball ($7,700)
SG: Eric Gordon ($5,600)
SG: JR Smith ($3,700)
SF: LeBron James ($12,500)
SF: Jayson Tatum ($4,600)
PF: Julius Randle ($8,100)
PF: Jeff Green ($3,600)
C: Brook Lopez ($5,900)
Slate Overview: Looking at today’s slate, there is enough value on the Cavaliers roster to stack up LeBron and any other combination you choose. If James Harden is out, I love the idea of stacking LeBron with Paul/Gordon and then filling the rest of your roster with a Lakers/Cavs stack as shown above. Enjoy your Sunday all – have a great day!
Next: Perfect Landing Spot for Kirk Cousins
Best of luck in your NBA DFS contests across FantasyDraft and FanDuel and stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest DFS news and analysis!