NBA DFS Picks and Pivots – Tuesday December 4 – Time to Pivot!

Welcome to the Tuesday 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 fantasy basketball 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.

Monday’s NBA DFS slate was led by the Pelicans and Clippers fast-paced high scoring contest where specifically a trio of Pelicans – Jrue Holiday, Anthony Davis and Julius Randle, made up 3 of the top 4 fantasy scorers on the night all sandwiched around Nikola Jokic. The late news that Nikola Mirotic would be scratched pushed Julius Randle into the starting lineup after lock and his massive night came at less than 5% ownership as a result – sometimes my friends, it is better to be lucky than good!

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.

If you are looking to try out a new DFS site, head on over to FantasyDraft and enter my referral code for 10% rake back on your entries.

As always, we will look to update our final lineup thoughts throughout the day 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 – Five Game Tuesday NBA Slate:

Before we start off with today’s slate we have ANOTHER FREE ROLL to announce from our friends at FantasyDraft. Tonight’s Picks and Pivots Free Roll is giving away three $25 Pick and Roll tickets and I really hope you all are taking advantage of this amazing opportunity and getting a chance to try out a new site, or dive deeper into one you may not have played as much. I am very appreciative of what FantasyDraft is offering to our readers and hope you all join and spread the word on these so they fill each night! JOIN NOW!

Now, before digging into this slate you may want to grab a cup of coffee, or a beer or both because my friends, this one is UGLY. Rarely do we see a slate where 80% of the teams on it are getting a pace decrease and in this new up-tempo NBA to see 3 of the 5 game totals under 220, well let’s just say I do not expect scores to be too high tonight in NBA DFS contests.

Not only do we have some ugly Vegas data, but we have a whole lot of injury news to sort through which makes this an even tougher slate to dive into!

• Victor Oladipo remains OUT which means business as usual for the remaining Pacers.
• Devin Booker has been ruled OUT and it looks like teammate T.J. Warren will miss as well in the highest scoring, fastest pace game of the night – hello chalk Suns value.
• The Mavericks have a ton of injury tags but it looks like they will be mostly at full strength against Portland tonight

• Goran Dragic remains out for Miami but it looks like Tyler Johnson will be able to return for the Heat tonight.
• The Bulls are the wild card tonight as they fired head coach Fred Hoiberg on Monday and announced Lauri Markannen will re-join the starting line-up and take the place of Jabari Parker.

Outside of the injury news, this “new” Bulls team with a new starting line-up and new head coach is really a spot to watch as we have no clear indication of how the rotations will change and which players get the biggest boosts. Considering this game is one of the slowest pace spots on the slate and the Bulls have the lowest implied team total of any team in action – can we just take the easy way out, cross them off and take a wait and see approach tonight?

NBA DFS – A Night of Chalk:

If you read Picks and Pivots with any regularity, you know this is a first look column, written at 5AM EST each day before my “real life” starts but I always try to give you my first reactions to a slate as I dig in.

Tonight’s slate feels like a cash game players dream as the chalk feels so obvious.

Let’s start with the Suns-Kings in a game with a 226 total and the fastest pace of the night all bundled around a whole lot of value with the Suns down Devin Booker AND likely T.J. Warren. What this means for Phoenix is we will likely see a starting five of DeAndre Ayton, Trevor Ariza, Josh Jackson, Mikal Bridges and Elie Okobo – the same starting five that began the second half against the Lakers after Booker was ruled out.

There is not a single player over $12.5K on FantasyDraft from this Suns team. Not one.

The Kings on the other side have the highest total on the board at 116 and you can easily lock in their core pieces like De’Aaron Fox, Willie Cauley-Stein and Buddy Hield without any issue. No seriously, you have so much money left over.

You know what this all means? Damian Lillard is going to be nearly 100% owned.

Wait, what does Dame have to do with the Suns and Kings? On this slate – everything.

Lillard is priced at $18.3K, a full $2K more than any other player on the slate in his own pricing tier and normally we would have to debate whether to pay up for him but with SO much value in the best game environment of the night – you can stack the Kings/Suns and lock in Dame and still have money left over. Don’t believe me?

So go ahead and try this – click in Dame and now stack up Suns/Kings with the most expensive options in that game – WCS/Fox/Hield on the Kings side and run it back with Ayton, Jackson, Ariza and Okobo.

Notice something? You still have $1.3K left over.

This just feels too easy and in cash games it makes all the sense in the world to go here as the Suns/Kings value has great point per dollar upside and you can stabilize it with the best player on the slate in Dame. If you are playing GPP’s though – I would argue, let’s cross these guys off our player pool entirely. You with me?

NBA DFS – Pivot Plays:

On a night where the chalk seems obvious, I am completely shifting focus and looking to pivot plays across the board. You want to eat the Suns chalk in cash games, go for it, but this is a team that has failed to score more than 100 points in three straight games. Trusting the Kings is about as much fun as stacking the Knicks and you better hope that Dame has a big game because he needs 55 fantasy points just to hit value.

So let’s pivot kids shall we?

Game Stack:

The Jazz/Spurs game is not one I expect will be overly popular with a total of 214 that sits right smack in the middle of our choices tonight and with the lowest projected pace, I wouldn’t think folks will be tripping over themselves to build around this game but why not?

We have two teams with clearly defined rotations that lean on a core group of players for the majority of their usage and fantasy production. On the Spurs side, it is really a two-man show with DeMar DeRozan ($15.2K) and LaMarcus Aldridge ($14.4K) soaking up all the usage and FP/M production and this is a match-up with the Jazz that LMA went for 65/54 against in his previous two meetings with Utah last season.

The Jazz really though are where I think you build your stack tonight for a few key reasons. First this is a starting five that is going to be locked into 30+ minutes a night as we saw last game against the Heat where the Utah bench gets minimal run in competitive games. Secondly, this is actually an elite match-up against the Spurs.

Wait, what? Yes, the pace is down but there is a reason the Jazz have the second biggest point bump on the slate as the Spurs rank second to last in the entire NBA in defensive rating and over the last 5 games they are the worst team by a considerable margin.

So, we get a team projected to score more points than their season average, in a close game (6 pt spread) and we can all but lock in 30 minutes from their starting five. I found my stack.

Rudy Gobert ($15.7K), Donovan Mitchell ($14.5K), Ricky Rubio ($12K), Joe Ingles ($10K) and Jae Crowder ($9.9K) ….. come on down! No seriously, I think you can stack all five here tonight.

One additional note – look at the prices for the Spurs duo and the Jazz starters – you are getting guys who sit in kind of no man’s land on FantasyDraft – well below someone like Lillard but well above the Suns/Kings players and at similar price points to guys like Vic/Whiteside who should command ownership in this range as well.

Old Value Versus New:

With so much focus on the shiny new Suns value, do not forget the “old value.” Think of it this way, if we just got news yesterday that Victor Oladipo was going to be out, wouldn’t the Pacers value be the buzz of the industry today? It has been 7+ games since Dipo went down so people in NBA DFS have moved on and I think that could be a mistake tonight against the lowly Bulls who find themselves in turmoil.

The Bulls play at a top 5 pace and have a bottom 10 defensive rating this season – normally a recipe for success in opposing offenses and with Dipo’s 33% usage rate off the court, the Pacers value looks to be an incredible spot that I suspect will be over-looked.

Go ahead and pick your poison here – Damonatas Sabonis, Myles Turner or Darren Collison if you are looking to pay up but what about the value here? Tyreke Evans ($10K) is priced at the same spot at Josh Jackson ($10.2K) for example and Cory Joseph ($8.2K) is just a tad cheaper than Elie Okopo ($8.9K).

What is your guess – the Suns guys are owned at twice/three times the rate of these Pacers players?

This is where I think you can gain an advantage tonight. The Bulls are worse than the Kings defensively, the Pacers are missing their biggest offensive piece just like the Suns are but the Vegas data and “newness” of the Suns value is going to make them considerably more popular. Feels like the perfect night to pivot.

NBA DFS – Sample Lineup and Slate Overview:

This sample lineup is not meant to be a plug and play lineup and is meant to be illustrative only: 

More from FanSided

• Cardinals Rumors: Surprise extension, Dylan Carlson-Yankees link, Rays trade idea
• USWNT vs. Vietnam: Key takeaways before they take on the Dutch
• NFL rumors: 49ers trending toward contract drama with defensive star
• Steelers avoid any camp drama with latest roster move
• MLB Rumors: Potential Braves reunion, Lance Lynn no-trade clause and Orioles deadline intentions

G: DeMar DeRozan 

G: Donovan Mitchell

G: Ricky Rubio

F/C: Rudy Gobert

F/C: LaMarcus Aldridge

F/C: Jae Crowder

UTIL: Tyreke Evans

UTIL: Cory Joseph

Slate Overview: I could absolutely see me sitting down to write Wednesday’s article and looking back at this slate with disgust as the Suns/Kings chalk goes nuts and I am left wondering why I stacked the Jazz/Spurs but I honestly think it is the prudent path this evening for tournaments. Are we so sure the Suns “value” is good?

Elie Okobo has played 28 and 29 minutes the last two games and has not hit 20 fantasy points – in fact in four games that Booker has missed this season, Okobo has only gone over 21 fantasy points one time. At nearly $9K on FantasyDraft, Okobo needs 27 fantasy points just to hit value tonight and my guess is he will be one of the most popular plays on the slate.

Can we actually count on the Kings rotations? This feels like a spot where the ownership on that game will be so over concentrated and push roster builds to look and feel the same that basically ANYTHING outside of that approach is viable for GPP’s. I think you can make the case to stack up Miami/Orlando or play the leverage game and stack up Dallas/Portland but leave Dame out. For a slate I hated at the outset, I kind of love it now. Let’s go!

Stay tuned to Fantasy CPR for all the latest NBA DFS news and analysis across FantasyDraft, FanDuel and DraftKings each and every day!