NBA DFS Picks and Pivots – Friday March 16
Welcome to the Friday 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.
Thursday’s NBA DFS slate like a million slates before was dominated by LeBron James who put up 70 fantasy points as the top scorer on the night with Nikola Jokic (68) not far behind. Overall, seven other players scored 50 or more fantasy points on a relatively well-balanced NBA DFS slate where other than LeBron, the big dollar studs like James Harden and Anthony Davis “only” scored 40-45 fantasy points which meant that going with a more balanced roster (except in the case of King James) was generally the roster build that helped you stay in the green on this night.
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:
After a horrendous stretch of slates with double-digit games one night followed by four games with zero plays we actually get a solid six game slate tonight to dig into and play some NBA DFS to kick-off our weekend.
Although this slate looks fun on the surface, the absolutely chaotic uncertainty that surrounds it due to injuries/rest makes roster build nearly impossible early in the day and this is exactly what you can expect over the final few weeks of the NBA regular season.
Let’s start with the Warriors as we already know Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson are out tonight and now Kevin Durant is listed as questionable making this an absolute mess to sort through in a game that Warriors should handle easily versus the Kings.
Injury report for tomorrow's game vs. Sacramento: pic.twitter.com/hy7HeKswj4
— Warriors PR (@WarriorsPR) March 15, 2018
The Warriors have clinched the Pacific Division and against Sacramento it would not shock me at all to see Golden State play it safe with Durant here and let him rest. If you take Curry, Klay and Durant off the court this season, Nick Young ($7.4K) sees a massive 11.5% usage increase, leading the team with a 30% usage rate while putting up a FP/M of production. I just cannot see a scenario where Swaggy does not get 15+ shot attempts here as he was second on the team last game behind Durant with 13 FGA and a 22% usage rate which would seem like his absolute floor if KD decides to rest. My take – Young is in play regardless due to his role and price point but if KD is out, he becomes a lock and load in all formats tonight.
The other huge piece of injury news here we are waiting on is on the Thunder as both Paul George and Steven Adams are questionable to play against the Clippers tonight. The Thunder are in the 4 spot in the West right now but only 2.5 games ahead of the Clippers who sit one game out of the playoff picture right now so to say this game has massive playoff implications would be a understatment.
With that in mind, it would seem like PG13 and Adams would try to give it a go assuming they are healthy enough even with their questionable designations. It is worth noting that Paul George thought he would be ready for this game when asked a few days ago and with this game starting an hour after lock, I would expect we have the news before we have to settle on our rosters.
Paul George said he feels alright and expects to be ready to play Friday against the Clippers.
— Royce Young (@royceyoung) March 14, 2018
Personally my interest here is less about Paul George or Steven Adams and more about what these injuries could mean to Russell Westbrook ($21.9K) who is the only player besides KD priced over $20K on this slate and if KD were to miss would be the lone stud to pay up for.
This season with PG13 and Adams off the court, Westbrook sees a 12% usage boost, leading the team with a 48% usage rate and just under 2 FP/M. If George is out, Westbrook is an absolute must play and I would be extremely tempted to make this a core game stack due to the concentrated usage and production across the rest of the lineup.
Carmelo Anthony ($11.5K) is a guy I rarely ever play but with George out, he would be tough to ignore with a 33% usage rate and 1.1 FP/M this season combined with the fact he steps into this game with 34 fantasy points in back to back games.
There is a path here where you can stack Westbrook and Melo and run it back with the Clippers core of Lou Williams, Tobias Harris and DeAndre Jordan (especially if Adams is out) but really it all depends on news. If the Thunder are short-handed then I love the game stack potential but my gut says that because of the importance of this game and the early week optimism, George and Adams find a way to play and it bumps this spot down to a set of good plays but not necessarily a must have core.
NBA DFS – Core Build:
With so much uncertainty early in the day the “safest” game core is probably the Sixers and Nets as we have a game with the highest projected pace and a solid 218 game total. We also get the benefit of the Sixers being in must win mode as they sit in the 6 seed in the East just 2 games from jumping to the #3 seed and conversely only 2 games from dropping down to the #8 seed.
This game just happened on March 11th so we have some very recent and real game logs to anchor to when picking out plays here. Joel Embiid ($17.5K) and Ben Simmons ($16.7K) are priced up and both need 50+ fantasy points just to pay off their price points which is interesting considering that no Sixers player topped 40 fantasy points against the Nets a few days ago and in fact it was a balanced effort where 5 players put up 33-40 fantasy points. In the first game earlier this season, Embiid put up 49 and Simmons put up 39 so although these are solid games, frankly the price points are too high for me outside of a full on game stack.
Personally I would shift down a tier and look at some of the guys in the mid-range, specifically Robert Covington ($12.2K) who put up 40 FP against the Nets on March 11 and has gone for 34+ fantasy points in three of his last four games so he feels fairly priced for his recent play and match-up.
On the Nets side, the injury to watch is Allen Crabbe as we could see Caris LeVert ($9.8K) enter the starting line-up. LeVert is honestly in play regardless as he is locked into 25-30 minutes a night and has hit for 30+ FP in two of his last three games so Crabbe being out would only boost his potential role.
D’Angelo Russell ($12.1K) is my favorite play here as his price point is just flat-out too cheap as he looks to be back to his early season role as a usage hog. The last two games, Russell has put up 48 and 38 FP (that game against this same Sixers team) but what really stands out is that he is back to putting up 37% and 33% usage rates in those games. Russell is an elite play in any format and can be used as a one-off play here or as part of a larger game stack – either way – I would lock in on DLoading tonight!
NBA DFS – Pivot Plays:
The Celtics remain extremely short-handed as they will likely be without Kyrie Irving and Marcus Smart again tonight but we should see Al Horford return to the starting line-up tonight. Keep in mind this Boston team is coming off a double OT game versus the Wizards so the game logs/minutes are wildly skewed if you are simple game log watching!
With Kyrie and Smart out, I simply see no reason not to go right back to Terry Rozier ($14.5K) here even with his elevated price point. Rozier is coming off a 50 burger against the Wizards and now tonight gets the best possible match-up outside of the Suns as he will take on a Orlando Magic team ranked 28th in DvP and Def-Eff as a team this season.
Orlando has been a bit better recently, ranking 20th in Def Eff over the last 15 games but let’s not pretend this is an elite defense and locking in the few healthy bodies on the Celtics tonight may be an interesting path and could even argue a potential game stack here.
The Magic last game without Aaron Gordon and Evan Fournier (both unlikely again tonight) saw their “core three” offensive weapons all put up big nights as Nikola Vucevic (54), Jonathan Simmons (44) and D.J. Augustin (41) all had monster games against the Bucks and there is merit here on a slate with some uncertainty to locking in a Magic/Celtics game stack tonight solely based off the amount of injuries and core usage across a handful of players on both sides.
On the Celtics side, with Horford back it should put a damper on Marcus Morris one game outburst but I would have no issue going back to Jayson Tatum in this spot as he is coming off a 33 and 35 fantasy point game in his last two outings and would make for a nice cost-effective mid-range play here as part of a game stack.
Normally I end my articles with a sample line-up and slate overview but on this slate, at 7AM EST, I cannot even give you an idea without knowing the status of guys like Durant/George tonight as their status will completely alter how you play this slate. I will update my thoughts as the day goes on at Twitter @2LockSports and please feel free to ask me questions. Good luck tonight all!
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!