Hope you all had a great St. Patrick’s Day weekend. I know I sure did. Traditions never die and and my college friends and I make a point to get together each year to celebrate the holiday. We also had a crazy weekend of college March Madness including the first #16 seed over #1 seed upset! Speaking of basketball, we have a decent NBA DFS slate shaping up tonight which I plan to get involved in. So let’s get started……………
For this first article, we are going to explore tonight’s NBA slate. To keep it simple, I’ve basically split the article between CORE and VALUE plays. CORE plays, as it sounds, are the players I believe are best to build around. VALUE plays are players that offer a decent return on investment but that fall below $5,000 (NBA). Please note that ownership % is not necessarily built into my plays, but is something you should consider.
All pricing will be based off Fanduel’s settings, as this is currently my favorite platform.
Enjoy and please comment with thoughts and suggestions.
Tonight we are looking at a nice 8-game slate. As of this writing, your highest game O/U totals include Milwaukee at Cleveland (224), Charlotte at Philadelphia (222.5), and LA Lakers at Indiana (218.5). Worth noting that all the high totals seem to be the earlier game with the late games having the lowest overall totals. I generally dislike not having players in late games, not for any particular reason other than I hate not having control of points as the night winds down. In my opinion, the end of the NBA DFS season is becoming increasingly difficult. For one, we are approaching the end of the NBA season, so you’re seeing a lot of odd minutes by players with rest and injuries and teams doing odd things to lineups/minutes with young players (tanking). This always makes it a little more difficult and risky, so I’m not going to heavy. Personally, because of these reasons I will likely only be playing small (3-100) style tournaments, trying to build up some bankroll for the start of the MLB season. NOTE: KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR LAST MINUTE LINEUP CHANGES.PEOPLE GET CRUSHED NOT PAYING ATTENTION TOWARDS THE END OF A SEASON.
Photo Courtesy of NBA.com http://www.nba.com/bucks/features/bucks-teammates-fans-congratulate-greek-freak
NBA DFS - Monday, 3/19/2018
CORE
1) Giannis Antetokounmpo ($12,500) – SF (MIL) at Cavaliers
I always love this matchup and we get to see a few times a year now (plus maybe playoffs). The Greek Freak vs. The King. Just pure awesomeness. I don’t think you can really go wrong in either direction tonight as both players will be getting up for this game but if I’m choosing my money is on Giannis. He has almost never disappointed vs. the Cavs and has a decent history to back it up. I think Lebron is just getting a little too overpriced for my liking and I’ll take the $600 discount on Giannis. It’s a great matchup between two superstars on two playoff teams, the highest over/under on the slate, and depending on where The Greek Freak plays, the Cav’s rank towards the bottom of the league in defending the SF position (NumberFire). I’m hoping for a solid 60+ from the Greek Freak tonight in an awesome matchup with the best player in the world. He is my #1 core play for this evening.
2) Julius Randle ($7,400) – PF (LAL) at Pacers
A guy I have been playing a lot more of lately simply because he continues to deliver solid production each and every night, Randle is one of my core plays for this evening. His price hasn’t fluctuated much and as long as he maintains his minute workload, he should find 35-40 FanDuel points tonight. In terms of matchup, the Lakers are traveling and playing an early game against a top 10 team vs. the PF position (NumberFire) but I think Randle’s steady production in a high scoring game should help overcome that.
3) Marc Gasol ($8,500) – C (MEM) at Nets
MISSED SHOOT AROUND WITH ILLNESS - DOWNGRADED SUBSTANTIALLY. LOOK TO DRUMMOND IF SPENDING UP, POSSIBLY HOWARD.
I have to fully admit I messed up in the last article. I totally over looked Embiid vs. the Nets based on price. It was Embiid’s birthday and if there is one odd rule in the NBA it’s play a player on his birthday. My fault and be on the lookout for more late season birthdays!
In a similar spot tonight is Marc Gasol at the Nets. The Nets have simply been one of the worst teams against the C position for years and this year is no different as they rank literally dead last vs. the position according to NumberFire. Basically big men eat the Nets. Gasol has been an elite big man in the league for a few years now. This year the Grizzlies simply are awful and fighting for a lottery ticket with only 19 wins. This makes the Gasol pick very risky considering the Grizzlies don’t want to win games. If you check out his game log you can see that his minutes are all over the place. I wish his price was a bit lower but it is still reasonable if we can lock in a normal Gasol 30+ minute game. He should own the Nets but again that’s the problem, the Grizz really don’t want to win so we could see Gasol all over the place in terms of minutes. I hope I am right here because I really like the spot but we have to be smart towards the end of the season and realize there are other factors influencing performance. I’m going to give it a shot and play Gasol tonight but please be fair warned, he could very well play 20 minutes and kill us.
4)Quinn Cook / Nick Young ($5,200 / $5,500) – PG / SG (GSW) at Spurs
Of course Cook is priced $200 over and Young $500 over what would qualify them as a value plays but I still like them for tonight’s matchup vs. the Spurs. The Spurs are a pretty stout defense at home, so that does limit their upside but these two have been getting insane minutes with Curry, Thompson, and Durant out with injury. Cook has played admirably in place of the injured Curry and has raked up exactly 40 minutes in each of the last two games. Young similarly just raked up 40 minutes starting at SG. Regardless of who you are playing, mid-5k pricing playing 40 or more minutes, I will take it. They may not reach 40+ FD points like other starts but I fully expect them to reach 5x + in tonight’s matchup. Disclaimer, based on matchup and implied team total, I would not play both Nick Young and Quinn Cook together. If I had to choose, I would play Cook in this matchup.
VALUE
1) Wayne Ellington ($4,000) – SG (MIA) vs. Nuggets
The Ellington play simply comes down to price and minutes. He has consistently played 30+ minutes in each of the last 3 games and should see a similar run vs. a high paced Nuggets team tonight. 25 FD points doesn’t seem unreasonable at all and thus Ellington makes my top value target for tonight.
2) Jeremy Lamb ($4,800) – SF (CHA) vs. Sixers
Jeremy Lamb makes for a great low priced target tonight vs. the Sixers as he should see an expanded role with Nicolas Batum out with an injury. Lamb has done pretty well in the past when Batum has sat out and expect a solid performance tonight. If we can get the Lamb start and upwards of 30 minutes, we should see a solid 5x value in a game that has the 2nd highest over/under total on the slate.
3) Kevin Love ($3,500) – PF (CLE) vs. Bucks
Ok, this one is very risky and highly dependent upon if Love plays as he was just upgraded to questionable for tonight’s game. Love hasn’t played since 1/30/2018 and even coming into that game wasn’t putting up much production especially with the new addition of Kuzma. But………Love was sitting around $7,000 at that point in time and today is listed at the bare minimum price of $3,500. It’s almost a mistake as he is still stuck in the injury pricing. Regardless of how good or bad Love has been this season, that price is just stupidly low for him. For value at that price we need 15-20 points. If Love plays 20 minutes we should get that. If Love somehow (though unlikely) plays 30 minutes we should blow past value. I don’t really know how likely he is to play nor do I have an idea of how much time he would get if he does play, but I will be taking advantage of his price if we see him active tonight. It's been confirmed that Love is starting tonight but will be on a minutes restriction. Take note of this, as he may still be in play, considering he is a measly 3,500 and only needs 15 FD points for value. If you are risk adverse, consider BAM ADEBEYO who is only 3,600 and should see more guaranteed minutes at PF for MIAMI.
4) Cameron Payne ($4,900) – PG (CHI) at Knicks
This one just squeezes under the value category of $5,000. Payne got the last start and majority of the minutes for Chicago with Zach LaVine sitting out and may again draw another start tonight. Don’t’ get me wrong, the Bulls are pretty terrible this year and are rocking a lineup of just bad bad players but for tonight it doesn’t matter. We need cheap value and if Payne draws the start, can lock in another 30 minutes on the floor, we should see 25+ FD points vs. an average at best Knicks defense.
Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed. Good luck tonight and let’s win some money!
