Fantasy NBA Best Plays To Win – Sunday, January 13

Welcome to the Sunday edition of fantasy NBA best plays to win. Today we are going to review and analyze the evening 4 game slate.

We also have 2 good NFL games today, and if you follow our NFL DFS best plays to win update, we missed on the Luck recommendation but we put ourselves on Prescott and more importantly faded Goff.  The Sunday fantasy NBA best plays are there to check out.

This NBA slate is fascinating today because this important question must be answered – can we fade James Harden and in so doing afford to play stronger mid-tier players?

The short answer for me is – no.  Last game Harden secured 88 DraftKings points in only 30 minutes in a blowout game.  His production is nearly unbelievable.  He does not have a problem stacking up points on the road either, as 5 games back he posted a 91 spot at Golden State.

In addition he is allowed to play as much of the game as is necessary.  In that Golden State game Houston won 135-134 in overtime with Harden seeing 44 minutes of court time, more than any other player from either team except for Clint Capela.

In multiple roster tournaments, say 20 entries max and up, I am going to use Harden in about 70% of them.  It certainly is prudent to have some without him as this is the lowest game total on the board and Houston plays at home to Memphis on Monday.

However fading him as a strategic move seems wrong to me.  Making him a core play, rostering good mid tier selections and using injury vacancies to insert strong sleepers is the path I am going to try.

So let’s take a look at options fading and playing Harden to see how strong we can make our lineup.

Fantasy NBA Best Plays To Win – Sunday, January 13

Stephen Curry ($9800) and Kevin Durant ($9600), Golden State
In those lineups without Harden, this stack seems very strong to me.  Dallas does not defend well, Golden State has the highest implied team total on this 4 game slate, and both players are in solid form.  If you decide to play only 1 of these 2, I would lean toward Curry.

Klay Thompson ($7200), Golden State
He can be used as a standalone with Harden or in conjunction with Curry or Durant without Harden.  This will still give us enough salary room to roster worthy players while giving us crucial exposure to the Warriors who are implied as a team to outpace all others.

More from FanSided

• Caesars and PointsBet Promo Codes: $1,750 Bonus For ANY World Cup or MLB Game!
• Thunder projected lineup and rotations heading into 2023-24 season
• NWSL Challenge Cup news: Courage ruthless against Washington, Racing remain perfect
• 2023 Women’s World Cup: Ary Borges and Brazil showed the entire world what they are about
• Trea Turner’s rough season goes from bad to worse

CJ McCollum ($6600), Portland
Denver cannot defend the guard position well at all, so exploiting this with either Lillard ($8600) or CJ is a must.  The latter provides us with a bit of a salary break, and the last time these 2 teams met CJ far outpaced Lillard scoring 33 points along with 4 rebounds.

Aaron Gordon ($6500), Orlando
He’s becoming a force in the Orlando offense, posting 47 DraftKings points last game at home vs Boston.  He consistently receives minutes in the mid 30’s and is taking plenty of shots.  Only when he shoots less than 30% from the field does he fail to make salary based expectations.

Terrence Ross ($4300), Orlando
He’s been getting plenty of minutes for a bench player, he’s excellent from the foul line and is a huge favorite to beat his low salary expectation.

Michael Beasley ($3800), LA Lakers
Not often do you find a player priced this low who nets well over 1 DraftKings points per minute while getting good minutes off the bench.  The way he has played since the injury to Lebron James makes him a very strong candidate to be a fantasy NBA best plays key sleeper.

Jusef Nurkic ($8300), Portland
He’s been on a tear recently and loves to play well against his former team, Denver.  He frequently exceeds 1.5 DraftKings points per minute and when he plays 30 minutes or more, as he usually does, the $8300 cost is far outpaced by his value.

Clint Capela ($7800), Houston
Steady producer that for whatever reason plays stronger on the road than at home.  The only 2 dependable strong point producers in the Houston lineup are Capela and Harden.

Kevon Looney ($4400), Golden State
Very steady DraftKings producer averaging between 22-30 points while seeing about the same court time.  His team has the highest implied total so mixing and matching the starters, including a lower-cost one, should net you positive returns.

Good luck to us!