Guard
James Harden- We get the same situation for the Rockets tonight against Denver that we saw over the weekend — John Wall, Boogie Cousins and many more players are ruled out for tonight’s game. This situation resulted in predictably massive usage for James Harden, and it also came with 20 potential assists. The Nuggets are known for great defensive prowess, but they actually have been dreadful defensively for the last half a year. Those poor defensive tendencies have crept into this season, and I see no way for them to slow the Beard on Monday night. He is the definition of a building block for me, and will be locked into my optimal core plays on both sites. Our projections portal has him projected for 61 DK points.
Forward
Caris LeVert- LeVert has been a building blocks staple in the last few seasons, and we get a chance to fire him up tonight with Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and Spencer Dinwiddie all out for the Brooklyn Nets. LeVert is someone who has posted 30+% usage rates in years past when guys are out, and we saw the Nets run the offense through him in the bubble with Kyrie and Durant not playing. There is no high-usage players to take the ball out of his hands, and he is clear value with all of these guys out tonight in a good matchup vs Memphis.
Center
Christian Wood- Our second Rocket is Christian Wood, and is someone I’m going out of my way to pair with Harden. Wood was a DFS stud in Detroit last season, and has the skillset to be a second-option given the short-handedness of this roster. Over the last few seasons he has been over 1.2 fantasy points per minute, and was second on the team with a very solid 27% usage rate in their first game. I think that Nikola Jokic is a bad matchup for Christian Wood defensively, but I also think Wood is fast enough to give Joker some fits on the other end. His price didn’t rise enough and our projections have him at 44 DK points tonight.
Value Pool
We have a very obvious trio of building blocks today, and plugging them all in will put us in need of some value. Luckily, with all of the guys out on this slate, there is plenty of value to go around. My favorite spots for cheap plays are Detroit, Brooklyn and the Lakers. Delon Wright, Killian Hayes, Josh Jackson and Sekou Doumbouya are all in play for the Pistons with Derrick Rose and Blake Griffin sidelined. Timothe Luwawu Cabbarot is someone I expect to get a bump with Durant out, and he was super productive in the bubble. I think he is a better play than the likes of Jeff Green and Taurean Prince, who are projecting for higher ownership. And on the Lakers, it feels to me like LeBron will sit tonight after AD got the night off on Sunday. This would bump preseason favorite Talen Horton-Tucker into my cash game pool at only $3,100 on DK.
Written by Ben Hossler (Follow @BenHossler on Twitter)
