The Core
Karl-Anthony Towns- Birthday narrative aside, if you have read this article at all this season you know that Towns has pretty much been my highes-owned player this season, and he is affordably priced once again on Friday night against the Washington Wizards. This is the best game on the slate and it’s not even close, it boasts a massive 242.5 O/U and both of these teams have run at a top-eight pace so far this season. Towns owns a near 1.7 fantasy point per minute mark, with over a 28% usage rate. Andrew Wiggins has stolen some of his thunder in recent games, but Towns is still capable of an 80 fantasy point outing and he isn’t priced like it once again, especially considering how good this game is. My best guess is I end up with multiple pieces from this game in my optimal build.
Note: For now, I’m leaving my core section with just KAT. It’s known that I, and most, like to play stars and scrubs in NBA DFS and that’s the way pricing has pushed us early on this season. I will likely add one of James Harden or D’Angelo Russell alongside Towns as we get closer to lock, and check our NBA core plays if you are a subscriber to see where I ultimately land tonight.
Value Plays
PJ Tucker- Tucker is never a sexy fantasy play, but he’s my favorite value play on this slate with the Rockets dealing with a wealth of key injuries. Clint Capela and Eric Gordon are out, with Danuel House unlikely to play either. Tyson Chandler should pick up some extra minutes as the backup center, and I think he is viable in tournaments, but what should happen is the Rockets go small quite often in this game pushing Tucker to center. He actually owns 0.7 fantasy points per minute through the first few weeks of the season, nothing crazy, but a solid number when we consider that he should be in line for over 36 minutes of action tonight. We also need to monitor if Russell Westbrook sits out or not, even if he is in, Austin Rivers is a decent value play at his salary as well — this team will be really thin tonight.
Cory Joseph- Joseph is very much like Tucker, not someone you are excited to roster in DFS, but he will once again be in play on Friday with De’Aaron Fox out. He was extremely high-owned the last time the Kings played, and put up a pretty gross fantasy game, but the good news is he played 38 minutes and shot just 1-6. Six shots is probably about what you will expect from him tonight, but he still should be able to make more than one and regardless I will take nearly 40 minutes of action from someone his price in cash games, to allow me to fit in the studs that I want.
Draymond Green- It’s pretty clear that for now, Draymond Green is not the player that he ONCE was, but that also doesn’t matter for fantasy, especially when he is priced at just $5,300 on DraftKings…this price is egregiously low. Dray already flashed his upside with a 50+ DK point outing against the Pelicans earlier this season, and he’s just south of 1 FPPM. I think we can easily project him to beat value at his price as long as this game stays close, and my bold call for the day is that he posts a triple double with at least 15 points, dimes and rebounds. Don’t forget about Dray on Friday night…
Shai Gilgeous Alexander (DK)- The theme of this article this season has been bad price tags on DraftKings, and we get another one with Shai falling below the $6K mark here. He’s coming off a bad game where he shot just 3-12, but he also still leads this team in usage at 25%, with one fantasy points per minute and averaging nearly 35 minutes per game in competitive contests. The spread is just 3.5 points tonight, so we should expect a full allotment of minutes from SGA, and is someone I will be overweight to in all formats.
Note: Andrew Wiggins was just ruled out, which will push even more ownership onto the Wolves players. Guys like Jeff Teague, Robert Covington and Josh Okogie can likely be bumped into the cash game pool, while KAT is cemented as the top overall play. He owns a massive 2.2 FPPM mark with Wiggo off the floor this season.
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
