What’s up everyone and welcome to Ben’s Building Blocks! If you’ve never read my content before, welcome. To those that have, welcome back. I truly appreciate everyone that reads and supports during NBA season. This article is designed for me to highlight the top plays of the day. Obviously, things can change rapidly in the NBA with injury news close to lock, so I would be sure to subscribe to our premium package for access to our Final Thoughts cheat sheet, our premium discord channel and my core plays. Our Core Plays product gives you the ability to tail all of our analysts in your contests each night. We do the work for you, and you simply plug and play with our premium Core Plays. With that being said, let’s hop into the plays…
Building Blocks
LeBron James
LeBron has been a regular in this article over the last few weeks since Anthony Davis went down, and that won’t change on Monday night. He and the Lakers match up with the Charlotte Hornets, in a game featuring a slate-high 243 O/U. I thought long and hard about making Luka Doncic the top spend-up tonight, but I kind of prefer the savings you get by dropping down to LeBron. Charlotte has been absolutely cooked by primary ball-handlers this season and I think it’s one of the best possible spots for the King. He’s averaging well over 1.5 fantasy points per minute with Davis off the court — and I think he’s a priority in all formats against one of the worst defensive units in basketball.
Donovan Mitchell
A former Cavalier to a current one, Mitchell checks in as a top play in all formats with Darius Garland doubtful. Mitchell dominates this offense without Garland on the floor, but he’s priced like he will be playing tonight. His usage rate spikes almost 5% with Garland off the floor this season, and more importantly he has the ball in his hands a ton. His potential assist numbers from New Years Eve with no Garland were in the mid-teens — up from his average of average of 9 per game this season. I think the match-up is neutral against the Bulls, and he should be taking as many shots as he wants. If Garland is confirmed out, I will be on Mitchell on all sites.
Value Plays
Caris LeVert
With Garland expected out, this will force big minutes onto LeVert who our projections have at 35 minutes tonight. He’s logged 32 and 37 over the last two games, and sees a 3% usage rate increase with Garland out. Overall, this is one of the top values on the slate and he’s projecting as the highest-owned player tonight at over 50% on DraftKings.
Kevon Looney
Looney is not typically someone I want to play in DFS, but with all these Golden State injuries he’s projecting for 25 minutes tonight. Looney is actually right around a fantasy point per minute player, he just rarely sees the minutes to provide much standalone value in fantasy. That being said, with no Wiseman, Kuminga or JaMychal Green he will be forced into a solid minutes floor on Monday. He, like LeVert, is projecting for heavy-chalk but is viable in all formats even on a big slate like this.
OwnersBox Top Play
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Jordan Poole
I was planning on including Poole in the aforementioned section, but I will 100% be grabbing exposure to him on OwnersBox tonight. As I noted above, the Warriors are super-thin tonight and will once again be without Andrew Wiggins and Steph Curry. Poole is approaching a 40% usage rate with them off the court this season — and has chucked up 20+ shots in each of his last four games. He has a tough individual match-up tonight, but is the exact player that can get there on volume alone especially if his shot is falling.
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
