The Locks
Lauri Markkanen- Markkanen has been on fire for the Bulls topping 40+ FanDuel points in four of his last five games, and now will be set to run the offense alongside Zach LaVine with Kris Dunn and Otto Porter both listed as doubtful for this game. LaMarcus Aldridge is cheaper and in a fantastic matchup against the Nets, and while I think LMA may end up being more popular, I can’t get away from Markkanen with the injuries the Bulls are dealing with.
Eric Bledsoe- With Giannis Antetokounmpo looking unlikely to play tonight, we are going to be focused on the secondary Bucks players, starting with Eric Bledsoe. Bledsoe sees a near 6% usage spike with ABC off the floor, and has put up almost 40 fantasy points per game this season in his absence. He is priced like Giannis is playing, so it’s only right to take advantage of the price decrease tonight.
Kelly Olynyk- We never can really trust the minutes for Olynyk, but he should start tonight and with Johnson, Winslow and Mcgruder all unlikely to go for the Heat the workload should be somewhat stable, and it won’t matter anyways since he is under $4,500 on both FanDuel and DraftKings. You can pivot in GPPs, but for cash games it’s hard to avoid him.
Derrick Jones Jr (FanDuel)- Jones is min-priced on FanDuel and should see playing time rise with James Johnson and Justise Winslow set to miss for the Heat tonight. We are able to lock him in at that price and not worry about his production given the low-score drop scoring format on FanDuel. He’s still a viable option on DraftKings, but much more risky and better suited for GPPs with other quality value plays present.
Secondary Options
Jonas Valanciunas- I’m actually not sure if this is going to be a super popular play given his price, but 100% he is one of my top plays on this slate and it’s hard for me to get away from him against this poor rebounding Lakers team. He’s averaging almost 1.5 FPPM this season and saw 29 minutes for the Grizzlies on Saturday night.
Zach LaVine- Given price, I’m not sure LaVine will be as highly-owned as he normally would in this spot especially with Bledsoe/Middleton available as well. He’s going to dominate the usage alongside Markkanen and remember that LaVine was one of the best fantasy players the first month or two of the season when the Bulls were dealing with similar injuries.
Luka Doncic- This might be my top overall play on the slate, even over Markkanen the more I have researched. Luka gets a great matchup in terms of pace against the Clippers, he’s in the last game of the night, and I think people are going to overlook him given he has missed a few games due to injury. I don’t see them easing him back in and I expect full run tonight, and it’s important to remember he boasts over a 30% usage and assist rate since Dennis Smith Jr was traded to New York.
GPP Plays
Hassan Whiteside- Another Heat player that we can’t trust, but Whiteside should absolutely smash in this matchup. The question recently hasn’t even been performance, it’s just the minutes, and with these injuries he may be a little bit more secure than usual. The Suns are a terrible defensive team, and Ayton is still extremely raw defensively setting up for a potential classic low-owned Whiteside 7x game.
Ben Simmons/Tobias Harris- With Joel Embiid out, it’s funny we aren’t on Simmons/Tobias as much as we should be but with the Bulls/Bucks/Heat situations they were moved to an afterthought. I love them, as well as Boban in GPPs and this is a borderline elite matchup against the Pelicans.
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
