NBA DFS Picks and Pivots – Guess Who’s Back? – February 21
Welcome to the Thursday 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.
Welcome back baby! We made it – the All-Star Break is over and we can get back into some glorious NBA DFS as I am sure you all missed it as much as I did. Hopefully you got to check out some other DFS sports – I dabbled in some NHL DFS and some PGA DFS and want to give a huge shout-out to our crew here at Fantasy CPR for helping me and many others navigate these uncharted waters. I have to say, I had a ton of fun digging into both these sports and I will definitely keep playing but I am happy my first love is back – let’s hoop kids.
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 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 – Thursday’s Slate Overview and a FREE ROLL!
What better way to welcome back some NBA DFS than with another NBA Picks and Pivots $50 Free Roll from our friends at FantasyDraft! You know what is even better than one free roll? How about another? Make sure you join the Picks and Divots PGA DFS Free Roll for Thursday’s WGC Mexico contests before it fills!
We get a nice 6 game NBA DFS slate tonight with a ton of stars, some early value and a whole lot of narratives to break down!
To me the clear game of the night is in LA as we get the Lakers-Rockets – Harden Vs. LeBron.
If you step back and look at the stars on this slate in the other games, you start to see a clear path where Harden and LeBron stand out as the top raw point plays in a great correlation spot. Giannis Antetokounmpo gets a tough Boston defense that has held him to “only” 55 and 52 fantasy points this year which at $19K would fail to return even 3X value, Joel Embiid is out, the Golden State Warriors stars are all healthy and sharing in the ball in a game with a 12 point spread.
So put very simply, Harden and LeBron have in my eyes, the obvious top raw point potential and at $20.5K and $18.8K respectively, you still have $10.1K to spend on the rest of your FantasyDraft roster with these two anchoring your squad.
The game logs for James Harden ($20.5K) may look like he is over-priced with only one 60+ fantasy point game in his last four, but he has an elite 43% usage rate even with CP3 on the court the last two weeks and he went for 80+ fantasy points the last time Houston faced the Lakers with both Harden and CP3 available.
With Clint Capela back tonight, I think you take a wait and see approach on the front court duo of Capela and Faried, but I would have no issue running a mini-stack of Harden and Chris Paul ($13.9K) who has gone for 40+ FPTS in three of his last four. The Rockets see the largest pace boost of any team on the slate and face a Lakers team that over the last 5 games is ranked dead last in the league in Def-Rtg.
On the Lakers side, LeBron James ($18.8K) has gone for 70+ fantasy points in two of his last three games and now you put him on national TV against The Beard? LeBron needs only 56 fantasy points at this price to return value, however it is worth noting – he was held to 45 fantasy points in both previous meetings with the Rockets.
LeBron is healthy and is one assist shy of a three game triple-double streak and makes for the perfect correlation if you are playing Harden/CP3 when you consider the 233 total and only 2 point Vegas spread. This is THE late night hammer and the spot in which I think you prioritize the stars on this slate.
NBA DFS – Building Your Core:
With a week-long break to get healthy and with so much time for the DFS sites to adjust to news, you would think we would lack for value the first slate out of the break but we can thank the Sixers and Joel Embiid for unlocking some much-needed value with the news yesterday that he would be out for the next week.
Now, let’s be clear – we have essentially no sample size of how this new look Sixers squad with Tobias Harris will look usage/FP wise without Embiid on the court but the reality of it is, the remaining plays are all priced a touch too cheap for their expanded roles.
Normally in this spot we would just fire up both of Ben Simmons ($14.8K) and Jimmy Butler ($13.8K) and call it a day but with Tobias Harris ($12.1K) on the team now, it is hard to expect the same usage and FP spike as we saw when Embiid has missed games earlier in the season. Also, add-on the fact that this meeting with Miami is one of the slowest paced games on the slate and the only way I am stacking up 2-3 of the “stars” here on Philly is if you are running it back with a Miami stack.
You are going to hear this a lot today – but the fact that it is Australian Heritage Night in Philly is going to make Simmons, without Embiid on the court, a popular narrative play. Now, I point out narratives to bring some fun to the analytics here but I actually think there is something to this one.
Last season, on Australian Heritage Night against the Bulls, with Embiid on the court mind you, Simmons went for 66 fantasy points on the back of 19 points, 17 rebounds and 14 assists. After the game, Coach Brett Brown was asked why he thought Simmons played so well that night – he smiled and said “Because it is Australian Heritage Night.”
I really believe in a sport like the NBA, narratives matter – players can control who has the ball and dominates the game flow and we see teammates feed guys on nights like that. It is why everyone and their mother will play DeMarcus Cousins in the revenge spot versus the Kings tonight. As silly as it sounds – sometimes it matters.
The difference with Boogie and Simmons though – Boogie still as to share the usage with a fully healthy squad of stars while Simmons has the benefit of the teams biggest usage play being on the bench. I think the best way to attack this Sixers team tonight is to take one of the three stars, with Simmons being the top play, and pair him with the value that exists on the team.
Boban Marjanovic ($6.8K) has been Embiid’s direct back-up in every game he has played for Philly and while we cannot expect 30 minutes of run – we all know that Boban is a PPM beast and with this being the first game we should get confirmation of the starting lineup before lock. Boban is chalk, but on a night where you want to get LeBron and Harden, he is the right chalk to use.
J.J. Redick ($10.2K) tends to be the forgotten man in this Sixers starting unit, but it is worth noting he has had a 6% usage bump this year with Embiid off the court and SG is actually the best place to attack the Miami Heat as they rank 24th in Def-Rtg against the position. We saw in the week before the break – opposing SG’s like Klay Thompson and Buddy Hield have 35+ fantasy points outings against this Miami defense, with Klay nailing 6 three’s in that game – and that is what you are targeting with Redick tonight.
T.J. McConnell ($7.2K) is one of those plays that whenever Embiid is out, tends to get the boost in playing time and production that not many end up using. Go back to the last game Embiid sat where both Simmons/Butler played – it was against Atlanta on January 11, and McConnell played 33 minutes off the bench with 33 fantasy points.
Everyone will look to Simmons, Butler, Harris and Redick for the usage and FP/M boosts tonight and rightfully so, but these guys are already playing starters minutes so the real court time boost will likely fall more to guys like TJ and Boban to soak up the 35+ minutes of court time that Embiid is missing.
NBA DFS – A Pivot Game Stack….or stay away?
Stepping back and looking at this slate, of the six games, I start to cross spots off pretty quickly.
- Bucks/Celtics – great actual NBA game – but both teams fully healthy, there is not much profit potential on the plays in this game.
- Kings/Warriors – The Warriors are at full strength, at home with a 12 point spread – outside of the Boogie narrative, which will likely make him over-owned – can you really pay for the stars here other than to be contrarian?
- Suns/Cavs – Two awful teams, slowest pace game of the night and the slates lowest total at 219.
With my intentions to focus on the Sixers and Lakers/Rockets – it really leaves me one game as a pivot and frankly, it all hinges on one thing – the health of Damian Lillard ($15.8K). Dame is questionable to play against Brooklyn with a left ankle sprain that most assume was suffered in practice and not the All-Star game and frankly his ability to play changes completely how I look at this game.
If Dame is in – this game becomes far less appealing, but if he is out – well, this becomes a prime spot to build around. The last and only game Dame has missed this year was against the Hawks, where Seth Curry ($6K) drew the start, played 31 minutes and got 36 fantasy points – this one is not hard, at minimum price if Dame is out – Curry is player #1 in your builds.
CJ McCollum ($12.1K) has always been the biggest beneficiary of Dame being out, and he proved it against Atlanta with a 60 burger. Jusuf Nurkic ($13.1K) dropped 40 fantasy points in that same game and you get the “Centers versus Brooklyn” spot we have attacked all year.
You start to see how this unfolds – if Dame is out, I think 2-3 Portland guys become core plays but if Dame is in it almost wipes them all out.
On the Brooklyn side, this team is healthy and any time Coach Kenny Atkinson has a full roster, I am hesitant – and that is coming from someone who LOVES to use D’Angelo Russell. Here is the issue, Caris LeVert is back and healthy and the usage we saw for D-Russ is going to start to scale back – do not overreact to the game logs either for Brooklyn – D-Russ needed a 3 OT game against the Cavs to get 55 fantasy points last time.
The only way I am going to use the Nets tonight is in a game stack IF, Dame is out and you are using multiple pieces from Portland.
UPDATE – As of 12PM EST – Damian Lillard is expected to play per reports – this may end up being a game to cross off as a result.
NBA DFS – Sample Lineup and Slate Overview:
Please note – this sample lineup is meant to be illustrative only and should not be used as a Plug and Play lineup.
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G: James Harden
G: Ben Simmons
G: Seth Curry
F/C: LeBron James
F/C: Boban Marjanovic
F/C: Jusuf Nurkif
UTIL: CJ McCollum
UTIL: TJ McConnell
Slate Overview: In my mind, this six game slate can be boiled down to 2 or 3 games depending on how the Damian Lillard news breaks. If Dame is out – this becomes a clear Stars/Scrubs slate as you could lock in two sub $7K guys in Curry/Boban who have 30+ fantasy point upside and allow you to easily fit in the priority plays like Harden and LeBron.
If Dame is out, I believe McCollum and Nurkic become similar priority plays but if Dame is in – I would argue you can almost cross this game off and push more exposure to the Lakers/Rockets or another Philly piece.
For the first game back to have so much unknown/value already is a bit unique – but take advantage of it – NBA is back my friends, resume the chaos!
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