Welcome to your daily NBA DFS digest at FakeTeams, gents. Every day I’m here with a handful of pro-tips to roster a winning team just a few hours from now. On top of that, I’ll bring you some news, statistical trends from the past few days, some studs/duds from the last slate of games, and much more!
Hoop Land Times: News and notes from around the Association
- Sucks a bit, but Jaren Jackson Jr. will be out for a couple of weeks. Adjust your rotations and fade Triple-J in DFS contests for the time being.
- Remember when Houston appealed their loss against San Antonio earlier in the season? Well, this is turning into an All-Texas thing now with Dallas protesting their loss against Atlanta a couple of days ago. Won’t probably go nowhere, but oh boy are these Texans crazy about their Ws.
- We keep waiting on Ben Simmons status, with more MRIs coming today and the most probable outcome going through the sitting-out-for-a-while path.
- Mere hours after cutting DeMarcus Cousins in order to make room for Markieff Morris’ addition to the roster, the Lakers seem to be interesting in singing and bringing back DMC as a free agent in the summer...
- It’s all pointing to Tom Thibodeau when it comes to the next New York Knicks head coach. All pointing meaning that he won’t coach the Knicks, because you know how this goes: whoever linked to the team never ends there. Some things won’t ever change.
Duds and Studs: Last night slate roundup
- A couple of monster performances, then nothing, then a bunch of pretty nice outings. C.J. McCollum led the slate yesterday to the tune of 76.25 DKFP. The line read a massive 41-9-12-1 with 6 triples to CeeJay’s name and just one board shy of the trip-dub. Yikes. Bradley Beal had another 50-burger by dropping 53 pops against the Bulls, which he paired with a 5-4-2-1 rest-of-line for 70.25 DKFP on the night.
- Nobody in the 60-to-70 DKFP clip, with six in the 50-to-60 though: Jayson Tatum (57.25 DKFP; 41-5-2-1-2 in 36 minutes), Anthony Davis (56.75; 32-13-3-0-2 in 39), Jrue Holiday (56.75; 23-7-15-0-1 in 38), Kyle Lowry (55.25; 16-7-11-5-1 in 31), LeBron James (53.5; 29-8-9 in 25), and Hassan Whiteside (50.25; 16-17-3-0-4 in 38).
- If finally happened yesterday, folks. Juan Toscano-Anderson became the first Hispanic to be crowned ROI King and he is now out there representing us all in the Association. Props to Juan! JTA did it by rewarding his bettors with a sweet 37.5 DKFP at just $3.3K with a 16-8-3-1-2 line in 27 minutes.
- Two more players providing quite high ROIs yesterday: Chris Boucher (34.25 DKFP at $3.1K; 9-11-2-0-4 in just 17 minutes) and Ky Bowman (40.5 at $3.7K; 15-6-7-3-1 in 32). As you see, no one gives a crap about the Warriors so they are values no matter what happens because their prices are often ground-level.
- And the DOTS Award goes to... Pascal Siakam! He accrued all of 29 DKFP while entering the slate with the fifth-highest price at $9.2K! So good. 21-2-3-0-1 line in 30 minutes.
- Other pretty nice duds from yesterday’s slate: Fred VanVleet (20.75 DKFP at $7.6K), LaMarcus Aldridge (13.75 at $7.5K), and DeMar DeRozan (20.75 at $7.2K). There was definitely something going on in Toronto and San Antonio...
- Weird night when it comes to dub-dubs. We only had 11 via points and rebounds but up to five players missed on it by just between one and three points with four more by a rebound, yet we saw six dub-dubs via points and dimes with two players falling just one assist short. Shouts to Nerlens Noel for blocking 5 (!) shots on the night.
What’s cooking? Statistical trends from the past seven days
- Coby White exploded for 33 points yesterday hitting 5 triples on the effort. See, White might not be the best rookie to ever play in the NBA, but as some of them do he can score and he shoots the rock like there was no tomorrow. He’s a must-add to me in any sort of season-long league and a good under-the-radar, cheap play in DFS with great potential ROIs. In his four last games he’s playing 32.5 minutes off the bench while averaging a very delicious 23-4-4-2-1 line while scoring 3.5 triples per game. That’s crazy.
- Juan Toscano-Anderson won’t win you the league but his returns have been great (10-5-3-1-1 in 21.7 minutes) as his price and availability are nowhere close to expensive. Montrez Harrell isn’t that expensive either, yet he’s getting good numbers with a 17-10-2-1-1 line in 31.7 mpg on his last three.
- A little more expensive but still with massive ROI: Steven Adams (15-13-2-3-2 in 29.5 minutes), Tristan Thompson (18-10-2-0-1 in 25.3), and Lou Williams (24-4-5-1-1 in 36.3).
- Some very expensive players not doing enough to help their owners: Andre Drummond (11-11-1-1-1 in 22.3 minutes), Fred VanVleet (15-4-4-2 in 32.7), and Rudy Gobert (15-13-1-0-2 in 35.3).
- Cheap points (min. 3 games played in the past seven days): Kent Bazemore (18.7 ppg in 26.3 mpg), Cam Reddish (17.3 in 33.7), and Jordan Poole (16.7 in 32).
- Cheap threes: Landry Shamet (3.3 3pm in 39), Nicolo Melli (3.3 in 22.8), and Cedi Osman (2.7 in 33).
- Cheap boards: Ivica Zubac (9 in 17.7), Cedi Osman (7.7 in 33), and Naz Reid (6.7 in 25).
- Cheap dimes: Jordan McLaughlin (5 in 19.7), Tyus Jones (5 in 16.7), and Derrick White (4 in 24.3).
- Cheap steals: Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (2 in 28.3), James Johnson (2 in 26.7), and Cam Reddish (2 in 33.7).
- Cheap blocks: Chris Boucher (2.7 in 13), Maxi Kleber (2.7 in 23.3), and Jakob Poeltl (1.7 in 26.7).
- Cheap shooting: Maxi Kleber (59 fg% on 9.3 fga), Kent Bazemore (54.6% on 11), and Nicolo Melli (50.4% on 9).
Gotta Win The Day: Best/Worst DraftKings plays for tonight’s slate
- Love: (PG/SG) Lou Williams, LAC ($6300, vs MEM): Sweet Lou keeps going nuts no matter who the Clipps add to the team or who the Clipps face on the court. It’s impossible to see Will drop under the double-digits in scoring and pretty hard to see him fall under the 20-mark, which he’s beaten three times in his last four games. The triples are always there (2 per game in his last four), and he always finds a way to add at least a 5-5 in the boards and dimes cats. Coming off the bench, the usage is obviously sky-high at 30% or more on offense, which helps him rack up fantasy goodies nightly. Memphis is a young thriving team, but Ja has been a little shaky as of late and even if he excels he might not be dancing with Dog Lou for long. The price is way low for the expected return, so you know what to do.
- Hate: (PF) John Collins, ATL ($8800, at PHI): Never hate on a big man, because he can always crush your living soul, but here we are. Collins goes against Embiid tonight, and Embiid goes with Simmons on the lineup. If there is someone primed to log big minutes that’s JoJo today. And if there is someone having a monster season, that is JoJo every day. Collins isn’t bad, don’t get me wrong. He’s on a 21-10-1-1-2 average on the season playing more than 32 minutes per, but JoJo is also playing masterful ball, averaging 1.55 DKFP per minute on the court, blocking 1.4 shots and stealing 0.8 rocks per. He isn’t your best three-point shooter, but he can stretch the floor and make you run, which tires your bones. I’m talking to you, JoCo. Play Collins and you’ll more than probably getting a sealed and delivered dub-dub, but the upside and potential ROI at his price isn’t really high. Add the fact that Collins’ been a little down in three of his last four games (averages of 19-6) and I’m not liking him.
- Love: (SG) Donovan Mitchell, UTA ($7500, vs PHO): DoMi has had a few meh-meh performances lately and that has put his price a little down, which is something we should be happy with. This kid still has all of the mojo inside of him, so that’s a beautiful discount to take advantage of. Phoenix ranks in the bottom half of fantasy points allowed to the opposition, another thing to like, and Spida already had a great night after the break dropping 31 on the Pocket Rockets a few nights ago. He finished with a nice 31-7-3 packed-line and is averaging a 22-5-4 one since the start of the month. Gotta love his long-range prowess as it’s been now eight games in a row hitting at least one triple and topping at 4 of them twice, against Miami... and Houston on Feb. 9. That last time both teams met DoMi finished with another sweet 24-5-6 condensed line and 40 DKFP. Nothing to hate for this price.
- Hate: (C) Andre Drummond, CLE ($8100, vs MIA): As incredible as it might sound, since moving places and getting his body traded to Cleveland Drummond has had three games in a row scoring fewer than 38 DKFP. Not once had he suffered such streak of bad games earlier in the season, and oh, in case you didn’t know, he had his worst game this campaign just three nights ago against... Miami. That’s right. He played south of 25 minutes, scored 6 points, grabbed 6 boards, and called it a night. For some reason the Cavs traded for Dre before the deadline, supposedly hoping to re-sign him this summer or at least find a sign-and-trade partner come July, but who knows what the hell this team is doing. What is clear these days is that the bigs around the paint are creating a mess that every other team is solving nicely and preventing them from getting good fantasy tallies. Fade Dre. Actually, fade every Cav alive.
If you have any comment or question about the daily column, tonight’s games, players involved in them, or even season-long fantasy NBA topics, just drop it below or reach out to me on Twitter at @chapulana and I’ll get back to you as soon as I grab a keyboard!