NBA DFS: Bradley Beal and best/worst DraftKings daily fantasy basketball plays for Sunday, Mar. 1st

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

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• Finally! We made it! It’s Sunday, which means... nothing. Steph Curry’s comeback has been pushed back without a set date. Bummer, although reasonable considering Golden State is fighting for nothing and therefore it’d be stupid to take any kind of risk. Gotta keep waiting, folks.
• Nothing to worry about ROS, but Philly might be thinking about moving Al Horford this summer in order to bring more shooters to go with both Benny and JoJo and help them reach higher heights. The Sixers are weird as hell, are banged up, and things don’t look any good for their Process Completion Project this season.
• Zion is nuts. He became the first rookie to drop 20+ points in 10 straight games and he goes against Bron—of whom he said he has no relation with—again tonight. Fireworks are coming.
• The Lakers might start to forget about getting Moe Harless, as MoMo seems to be determined to remain a Knick for the rest of the year. Today is the final day for buyouts to be eligible for playoff rosters, so keep an eye out there on Woj’s Twitter feed just in case something pops.
• A couple of names being bought out: Anthony Tolliver and Allen Crabbe. Not the most appealing of names, and there are still no teams making the rumor mill as potential acquirers, but we’ll see if some franchise go grab any of them. I mean, they’d sign for the league minimum and both supposedly bring some long-range shooting on paper, but if they’ve been bought out that’s for something...

Duds and Studs: Last night slate roundup

• Really big slate helping getting plenty of good performances around the league. Three fools entered the 60-DKFP realm yesterday with Jayson Tatum leading the night with his 64.75 fantasy points. Jay-T did it to the tune of 32 points, 13 boards, 5 assists, 2 steals and 2 blocks with a stuffed line but a rather putrid shooting night hitting just 33.3% of his shots from the floor (27 fga).
• The other two 60-DKFP performers: Russ with 62 and a 41-8-5-3 line and Andre Drummond (finally!) with 60.25 and a 27-13 dub-dub to go with 4 dimes, 4 steals and a block to spare.
• Up to seven players in the 50-to-60 fantasy points clip yesterday: Ja (59.5 DKFP; 27-6-14-1), Domas (55.25; 18-13-9-2-1), Trae (53.5; 25-4-15), CJ McCollum (53.25; 35-5-5-2), Smart (51.75; 26-5-7-4), Valanciunas (51.5; 22-20-2), and John Collins (24-10-4-1-2).
• Oldie but goldie for the ROI King award: Rudy Gay. The Spur went off and reached 39 DKFP (19-6-4-1-2 shooting 58.3%) in under 30 minutes while priced at just $3.3K. Another Spursie, Trey Lyles, played 40 minutes and was also super-valuable with 44.75 DKFP (20-9-2-4-1) at just $3.8K. Closing the trio of best value-returners is Elie Okobo, who got a bounty of 30.25 fantasy points (14-7-5) at only $3K in just 20 minutes.
• And the DOTS Award goes to... Nikola Vucevic! Vuc played all of 36 minutes yet he could only get 26.25 DKFP while tagged at $8.8K. Crazy inefficient. Other slate-breakers: Aaron Gordon (24 DKFP at $8.5K), Caris LeVert (25.25 at $8.2K), and Devin Booker (23.5 at $8.1K).
• Night for the nerds yesterday’s. We saw 13 dub-dubs via points and rebounds (Theis and PJ Tucker missed on it by one or two points, other seven players by a single board), and five double-doubles mixing points and dimes (DeRozan missed by just one assist).
• Domas Sab Jr. (18-13-9-2-1) fell just one dime short of completing a trip-dub. LeBron James (19-8-10-1-1) missed on the feat by just a couple of boards. JoVa’s 22-20 was just the 23rd 20-20 of the season so far. Trae’s 15 dimes are tied for the fifth-most this season (he already dished out 16 and 18 on Jan. 24 and Jan. 30 respectively though). Thaddeus Young 5 steals helped him lead the slate alone in that cat. Same for Myles Turner in the blocks department with 4 to his name.

What’s cooking? Statistical trends from the past seven days

• Rudy Gay’s bold night propelled him to the top of the value leaderboard. Gay is averaging a 12-6-3-1-1 stuffed line in his 22.3 mpg during his last three games at an underground-level price and availability. Check him out if you need depth.
• George Hill is playing 22 per game with a nice all-around 12-3-3-1 line. Jerami Grant is absolutely undervalued while posting 20-3-1-1 lines nightly in his 25.7 mpg. Shake Milton has made the column recently and keeps doing so, because his 15-4-5-1-1 line is quite nice for his price and he’s playing up to 31.3 minutes a night!
• Silly cheap values: Brandon Knight (16-2-4-1 in 22.7 mpg), Bismack Biyombo (9-7-2-0-2 in 23.3), Royce O’Neale (9-7-2-2 in 28.3), Trey Lyles (11-7-2-1 in 27)
• A little more expensive but still with massive ROI: Mitchell Robinson (13-10-2-1-3 in 28.3), Kevin Porter (16-5-4-2-1 in 32.5), Terrence Ross (22-6-2-1 in 30), Marcus Smart (17-5-5-3-1 in 36.5), Tomas Satoransky (10-4-9-2 in 29)
• Some very expensive players not doing enough to help their owners: Devin Booker (21-3-7 in 37.5), Nikola Jokic (20-7-4-2-1 in 27.3), Jamal Murray (15-3-5-1 in 31.3)
• Cheap points (min. 3 games played in the past seven days): Jerami Grant (20.3 ppg in 25.7 mpg), Austin Rivers (14 in 23.3), Brandon Knight (16 in 22.7)
• Cheap threes: Shake Milton (3.3 in 31.3), Nicolo Melli (2.7 in 24), Furkan Korkmaz (2.7 in 26.7)
• Cheap boards: Donte DiVincenzo (7.7 in 22.3), PJ Tucker (7 in 29), Bismack Biyombo (7 in 23.3)
• Cheap dimes: Cody Martin (3.7 in 25), Shake Milton (4.7 in 31.3), Shabazz Napier (4 in 25)
• Cheap steals: Dennis Smith Jr. (2.3 in 18.3), Justin Holiday (2.3 in 21.5), Ky Bowman (2 in 29)
• Cheap blocks: Bismack Biyombo (2 in 23.3), PJ Tucker (1.7 in 29), John Henson (1.3 in 20.7)
• Cheap shooting: Shake Milton (61.9 fg% on 9.3 fga), Jerami Grant (54.4% on 13.3), Bobby Portis (53.2% on 9.3)

Gotta Win The Day: Best/Worst DraftKings plays for tonight’s slate

• Love: (SG/SF) Bradley Beal, WAS ($10400, at GSW): Hate me all you want. I know, I know. You already knew Mad Brad is the real Deal, I mean Beal, but whatever. Go pay the man and let him win you the slate today. You can’t lose here. Build your lineup around BB, for real. Beal is hotter than a stove these days, folks. It’s been five games since coming back from the ASW break and he’s dropped a combined 206 points in that span. Just this last week he’s had two 50-burger games and another in the 40s. The triples are raining with Beal averaging 5.75 three-pointers per game in the last four. Same with the boards (4.25 per) and dimes (5.5). The usage since Feb. 21 is at an impossible 40.2% on offense and he even reached 46% in back-to-back nights against Chicago and Milwaukee. If you’re just into fantasy numbers, well, Beal’s last four tallies read 70, 62, 51, 71 and he’s finished as the 2nd, 4th, 12th, and best player of the slates he’s been part of lately. Bonkers.
• Hate: (SG/SF) Buddy Hield, SAC ($5800, vs DET): Is Buddy tanking his season so maybe Sacto flips his role back to a starter? My buddies won’t let you know, I’m afraid. Hield’s price has plummeted lately and that is somehow still keeping his value sorta-high no matter his production, but even with that the risks are heavy as he’s playing under 30 minutes (under 25 if you push me) and not even hitting 20 pops a night these days. Was it not for a bunch of triples, his numbers might be earth-shattering, on the bad-side of things. The dimes are just non-existent (he gets off the pine, so yeah, he’s all about shooting ‘em rocks) and he can grab some boards here and there but it’s not that he cares a ton. Let’s say Buddy is your ultimate boom/bust play with upside to getting to the 40s or even 50s DKFP with a superb night, but a real threat to leave you with just 20 fantasy points if things are not of the smooth variety.
• Love: (PG) Derrick Rose, DET ($6600, at SAC): How would I call Rose? Reverse-Hield, that is. Rose was a reserve all season long until mid-January and he’s started every game since but one—he was coming back from injury on that one, though. Rose’s January run well merited getting him on the starting lineup, even more considering how little amount of talent is around Motown these days. Rose went off the charts to kick off 2020 by averaging 37 DKFP in January, and although he hit a wall this month he also can be forgiven as he has been banged up in most of those games. Now he’s all the way back and running in full force. The minutes have gone from 23 to 27 to 30 since the break as he seems to be finally recovered for an early-February injury and the fantasy goodies are going D-Rose’s way. He went all the way to reach 45.75 DKFP in his last outing two nights ago in Phoenix by dropping 31 on the Suns while stuffing the line with 3 boards, 4 dimes, 2 steals and a block, all of that shooting 62.5% from the floor and hitting a three. That’s not your everyday Rose, but you can easily pencil him in for 35+ DKFP any day, which at his current price isn’t bad at all.
• Hate: (PG/SG) Fred VanVleet, TOR ($7800, at DEN): Vleet has missed time here and there, but it’s been quite some time since the last missed game now and there are not many excuses to not call him out a bit for his underperforming levels of play. For someone going at almost $8K the return is just not cutting it. FVV has averaged just 31 DKFP in February with a 16-3-5 line that doesn’t merit paying the extra for his services. The usage is rather low at under 20% in a team featuring a bunch of much more established options on offense, and although the minutes are high (35+ mpg in the last nine games) he’s not producing a ton on the court. Even more concerning is the fact that in his last couple of games he’s finished the day with back-to-back 20-DKFP performances against Indy and the Bucks (priced at just $6.8K in that last one) yet his price has for some reason sky-rocketed back up. The algorithm went crazy. Don’t fall for it.

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!