We got a 9 game Saturday slate tonight and I’m also grinding all my NFL content so this article may be a bit shorter. A ton of people will be on the Lakers/Spurs tonight but my favorite game without a doubt is the Hawks vs Bulls. In addition, you can access my CORE-Plays by signing up for an NBA package at dfskarma.com!
AS NBA is a game where last-minute real-life changes are made before tipoff, always monitor breaking news up to last second!
The plays below in this daily article are low owned pivots and GPP plays. This means that these players will be RELATIVELY low owned and ‘contrarian’ relative to the more highly owned, chalky plays of the night.
BALL IN!
Point Guard
Top GPP Play: Trae Young
I’m finally going to buy into Trae Young this season as an inefficient shooter that is a rookie usually has me pretty nervous about his consistency as he usually needs to provide this insane scoring just to pay off his salary. With this being something Young has disapproved partially by adding peripherals to his game I’m confident taking a shot on him tonight in my favorite game on the slate.
Fade: Donovan Mitchell
Mitchell has eclipsed 40 DK points once this season and would need to hit that same mark again to pay off this salary. The usage is definitely there for Mitchell to accomplish 5x but I think his ceiling is a bit capped by this price in addition to the fact this Jazz team is flying cross country for the game. I’m fine fading here and paying up elsewhere.
Shooting Guard
Top GPP Play: Jeremy Lamb
Lamb has looked really good this season shooting at an extremely efficient rate while showing spikes in usage that is key to finding players who can “spike” for a big game here and there. Lamb has a shot to do that today priced very fairly on Draftkings under 5k, where he is projected for over 27 minutes in an up pace game matchup with the 76ers.
Fade: DeMar DeRozan
Again I’ll talk about this basically everyday but recency bias is such a huge thing. With the hoard flocking to this Lakers/Spurs game DeRozan is priced up as a premium and should not be able to hit that 6-8x ceiling we’re looking for. DeRozan is coming off a 27 DK point performance and got a huge price bump for this game. Easy fade for me.
Small Forward
Top GPP Play: DeAndre Bembry
Going back to my favorite game on the slate where we should see Bembry way lower owned than he should be because 99% of the NBA fan population couldn’t tell you what this guy looks like. At only 4.2k we saw 10x upside from Bembry in his last game where he went OFF for 46 DK points. This was partially a result of a spiked rebound rate (16 boards) but doesn’t take away from the fact he’s seeing 28+ MPG and a modest usage rate. In what should be the highest scoring game of the night IMO I think Bembry has another huge game and cruises to value.
Fade: LeBron James
Probably going to be crazy high-owned tonight and at 11.1k I really don’t see a huge ceiling for James who has shown to spread the ball out in this dynamic Lakers offense. This is a major pace-down game for the Lakers and the only time LeBron has hit 5x or more at this price was against the Spurs where they went to overtime and against an extremely fast paced Nuggets team. I don’t think he hits that 5x mark here tonight.
Power Forward
Top GPP Play: Jabari Parker
People are going to be off Parker after he didn’t exactly crush value in his last game as the uber chalk. I’m going to forget about that though and my mouth is watering looking at his 30+ projected usage rate in addition to his minutes projection eclipsing 30. If both of these DFS Karma projections come close to true I think Parker crushes his price tag while providing a 50 DK point ceiling.
Fade: Aaron Gordon
His price is going to get down to a point where we’ll have to play him but still priced up near 7k in a tough matchup with the Bucks could prove detrimental to his value. Gordon has not been seeing that “elite-player” usage rate we like to see and is consistently in the low 20’s while really dipping to around 16% usage in a game this season. At that type of opportunity we can’t consider Gordon at this price.
Center
Top GPP Play: Brook Lopez
On the other side of the Magic game you have Brook Lopez, who’s numbers are very similar to Aaron Gordon except for the fact that his price on Draftkings is almost $2,000 cheaper. With Lopez consistently taking 10+ shots a game and spiking for around 30 minutes in two games this year I believe we have some huge upside given the price. Pace-up game for the Bucks. Loepz should smash in this spot at 4% ownership.
Fade: LaMarcus Aldridge
I’d be pretty surprised if a ton of people used him here as there are so many great center options on this slate. Don’t be that person who does as paying up for Andre Drummond is close to a must for me as well as considering other high-tier centers such as Love/Davis/Embiid. LMA is not paying off this 9k salary.
Written By: Robert Viafora
Twitter: @DF_Advantage
