Welcome to our NBA DFS Building Blocks article! Each day, we will dissect injury news and breakdown our favorite plays at each position. We also provide Core Plays nightly for our subscribers, as well as projections and a premium discord channel. You can sign up for access to today’s Core Plays and projections by clicking HERE — and can get access to a single day pass for just $5 HERE. Now, let’s get into today’s slate…
Injuries
- Jalen Suggs – Q
- Otto Porter – Q
- Isaiah Roby – Q
- Gary Payton – D
- Rajon Rondo – Q
- Chris Duarte – Q
- Lance Stephenson – Q
- Jaden Mcdaniels – Q
- Goga Bitadze – Q
- Cam Thomas – Q
- Brandon Ingram – Q
Even for a small 6 game slate their isn’t much injury news we’re waiting on. It looks like Jalen Suggs missed shoot around so I’m leaning towards him not playing, therefore the Magic players will see a bump, although they get a tough match-up with Phoenix. We also have Brandon Ingram as a late add to the injury report for the Pelicans, which could open up some usage. With 3 of the 6 games starting at 7:00 PM and an island game at 10:00 PM in the late night time slot, I don’t see a big late swap edge on this slate. In fact, it could get you in trouble with only one game starting after 8:30 tonight limiting your options.
GUARDS
At Guard my favorite play is again Cam Payne, who Draftkings just refuses to give a big bump in salary too. Payne is no longer on whatever minutes restriction he may have been on when he came back from injury. The Suns are also again without Devin Booker and Chris Paul, so Payne should see big minutes once again. With Paul and Booker off the floor Payne is at 1.17 fantasy points per minute and 29% usage. He played 35 minutes his last game and I’d expect similar minutes tonight with the Suns so shorthanded. Phoenix also gets an easy match-up with Orlando, so I don’t see many ways Payne can fail at a grossly under priced $5,300 price tag. For GPPs another guard I like is CJ McCollum. We’ll need to wait on the Brandon Ingram news but if he’s ruled out McCollum massive bump in rates. With Ingram off the floor, CJ is at 1.46 fantasy points per minute and 32% usage (which is a 4% bump). He’s priced appropriately at $9,100, but the other thing I like about CJ is he has Shooting Guard eligibility on DK. Shooting Guard is extremely weak tonight so getting a solid spend-up like CJ could help create a unique roster construction for GPPs. It’s a tough match-up but that should help keep ownership in check. Should we get Ingram out and I’ll be getting well overweight on McCollum in GPPs and like bringing it back with Ja Morant from the Memphis side in hopes the game stays close.
Forwards
At Forward we have a lot of plays from Cleveland that have opened up with Jarrett Allen being ruled out tonight. If we look at the 2nd half rotation from the last game Cleveland played (in which Jarrett Allen went down in the first quarter), we see that Cedi Osman started the 2nd half and saw a bump in minutes. We also see less big bodies available, which paves the way for Kevin Love to see more minutes off the bench. If we take Allen off the floor, Love has a 1.3 fantasy point per minute rate on the year. I’m expecting 26-28 minutes tonight at a $5,800 price tag in a game vs. Indiana with a 223 point implied Vegas total. Love will be chalky but I’ll still be getting overweight in my GPP allocations and he looks like a no-brainer play for cash games. Another Forward play I’ve been having a lot of exposure to lately is Jae Crowder. The Phoenix situation hasn’t changed much tonight with Booker, Paul and Cam Johnson all out yet again. This leads to big minutes and a bump in production for Crowder. Jae has been over a fantasy point per minute producer with this trio off the floor and if we look back over the last 2 years it’s no fluke as he’s been right around a fantasy point per minute producer with Booker and Paul off the floor. The price tag is still too cheap at $5,100 on DK. He’s going to be somewhat chalky tonight but I still like the play.
Center
I’m not sure what happened with the DK pricing algorithm but all the Suns seem too cheap yet again. My favorite Center play is Deandre Ayton at $6,600 on DK. In looking at the same 2 year sample with Paul and Booker off the floor, Ayton is at 1.2 fantasy points per minute. The minutes seem to be trending up as he’s played 32 and 34 minutes his last 2 games. This tag is much too cheap for Ayton’s role on this depleted Suns team. In GPPs I have my eye on the Isaiah Roby news. He’s currently listed as questionable and if we get late news that he’s playing I love him for GPPs at what should be discounted ownership against the Bucks. This is strictly a GPP play as this game has a decent chance of blowing out but should it stay competitive we can expect 30+ minutes from Roby. On the season Roby is at .95 fantasy points per minute with Giddey and Dort off the floor and it seems like the coaches want to get him extended minutes to end the year as he’s played 34 and 37 minutes his last two games. Hopefully he gets ruled in after lock and in that case we’d see extremely low ownership on a guy with 40+ fantasy point upside, sign me up!
I love six game slates as it feels like just the right amount of options. There are some glaring pricing errors on this slate, so for cash games we can expect very similar builds making it a 1v1 or a 2v2, which isn’t ideal for cash games. I’ve been focusing more and more attention on GPPs and it seems to be paying off as cash games are getting too tough this late in the season. I suggest focusing on low dollar GPPs and single entry double ups if you do choose to play cash tonight. Keep an eye out for my GPP cores I’ll post closer to lock accounting for any news that drops this afternoon. Hope everyone is having a great week.
Max
