Getting a late start to the article today and we have a 13 game slate, which is brutal for research purposes. Last night was a down night, although the plays listed in the article all did hit value. My fade was Korkmaz and unfortunately I didn’t listen to my own advice as I played him in cash. In addition, I had way to much Mccollum which sank most of my lineups. With so many games tonight we will have to be constantly monitoring news and be by our computer. On future big 10+ game slates I may start solely playing the late night games to make my process/research a little easier.
+EV Strategy:
- On a slate this size, the way to get +EV on your entries is to sit by your computer and adjust for news. The later that news breaks the lower owned that play will be. This strategy worked out last night as Huerter went off and was a great example of why we leave slots open on our lineups to late swap. For those of us not wanting to sit around all night for news I suggest playing turbo or showdown slates as I’ve been focusing more on this lately and it has been profitable. Note for tonight: The DK algorithm really priced up the stars tonight. I actually like what DK has done to salaries, this way we don’t just have stars and scrubs slates every night. This could be a night to look to the mid range more but this will depend on what value opens up with news.
Game Stacks:
- Minnesota v Golden State – This is my favorite game of the night barring some injury news that throws the slate upside down (which is what usually happens). This should be a fast paced game as evidenced by the high 220+ total. There are a lot of ways to go here for stacking purposes. On the Minnesota side I like the mid range plays in Edwards and De’Angelo Russell. KAT looks slightly overpriced to me. In addition we have Pat Bev at an affordable price tag. There are also some low owned bring backs on the Warriors side. Steph has a high price tag but unlimited upside so I’m fine going here. We also get an affordable $6700 tag on Draymond and Jordan Poole offers tons of upside at a mid range price tag. The reasons I like this game so much is all the pieces are projected for single digit ownership and this is one of the last games of the night so your roster can be flexible for any late news throughout the evening.
GPP Plays:
- Monte Morris – There are so many options tonight that it’s hard to narrow down your list to a favorite few for GPPs. Monte Morris should be one of the lower owned options on the Denver side. What I love most about him is the price tag. At $4400 he has a safe floor and a lot of upside. Without Jokic, Murray and MPJ last season he was at 1.03 fpm with 22% usage. I’m expecting 30ish minutes from Monte tonight and he gives leverage off some of the chalkier Denver pieces (Barton/Gordon). At a projected ownership under 10% I’ll be well overweight in GPPs unless there is a lot of late news opening up more value.
- D’Angelo Russell – D’Angelo Russell always is a good large field GPP play since he has ridiculous upside. Just look to last game in which he had 53 fantasy points as evidence of that. As I mentioned above, I love this game and DAR has a very affordable mid-range price tag on this slate. Stacking him with Curry or Poole makes a lot of sense, if this game stays close I see a lot of plays getting there.
- Cade Cunningham – Cade has put up 19+ field goal attempts in his last 2 games and the usage has followed. He’s been above 30% usage in both those games so it looks like the offense is starting to flow through him. The price tag on him at $5200 is much too cheap for the upside he brings and initial ownership projections show him hovering around 10%. The cherry on top is the match-up, Detroit faces off against Houston tonight in a game that should stay competitive as these are some bad teams, however that doesn’t mean there can’t be some fantasy plays we like.
Fades:
- There is a lot of condensed ownership on Rubio and the Denver team as a whole. I think we can get away with fading some of this Denver chalk but the hard part is who do we fade? My initial lean is to come underweight on Aaron Gordon. I know projections love him but we have almost no sample size with Gordon playing without Jokic and MPJ. He hasn’t had a big game yet this year but this is mainly and ownership play. If he is going to be upwards of 50% on a slate this size I’ll be fine coming in at half that ownership in my GPP builds. This doesn’t mean he isn’t a good play, I just feel there is risk here that isn’t getting baked into the ownership.
This is the first slate in quite some time that my initial lean is to a more balanced build for GPPs, as we don’t have great low end value and the spend ups are all priced up. I’ll leave it at that for tonight’s massive 13 game slate but check my core play tags as I’m sure major news will shake things up.
Good luck tonight.
Max
