NBA DFS: Anthony Edwards and best/worst DraftKings daily fantasy basketball plays for October 20

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, and players to target/fade if you want to win tonight’s slate of games!

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

Picks at the Guard positions

• Love: Spencer Dinwiddie (PG). The Wiz finally moved on from the Beal-and-Someone model to the Beal-and-Pieces one. Wall wasn’t it. Russ wasn’t it. It’s now multiple guys instead of a 1B to Beal’s 1A, and that, I Love. One fundamental guy for this thing to work will be Spencer D, he of the preseason 14-3-5 line with only 1.5 TOs per game. Not bad, that is what I mean. We have yet to see this go against a proper team in a serious, regular-season game, and tonight could be a good matchup to start the season in the right way against play-in hopeful Toronto. Not the easiest game, but for the silly low price (119th of the slate) you can do much worse than lining Dinwiddie up.
• Hate: Zach LaVine (SG). Not gonna pay a sky-high $8.7K and suffer through ZLV’s Bulls debut. No, sir. Not until we see this really working on a proper environment. Will Zacharias keep his preseason 28.5 usage rate up? Hmmm... Will he still hoist 15 FGA per game, let alone hitting them on 51.7/52.4/89.5 splits? Dubious. I don’t hate this man, I just don’t entirely believe him nor the situation. Yes, the line is ridiculous at 22-3-3-1 but that also means LaVine’s upside comes entirely from his scoring prowess, and his shooting splits are wildly unsustainable at this point and entering the real thing. Detroit sucks, yes, but that might also mean that LaVine is hitting the pine as soon as halftime arrives with Chicago up 43.

Plays at the Forward positions

• Love: Anthony Edwards (SG/SF). I feel for the haters... Ant was a magnificent rookie although they would like you to believe the Wolves screwed it all with this pick pointing to Melo Ball or whatever. Do you know how many rookies since 1990 averaged more than Ant’s 32.8 DKFP last season? 54. Do you know how many rookies played 32.1 or more MPG while keeping up a True Shooting percentage above 52%? 29. And how many of those put up a 19-4-2-1 line with fewer than 2.5 TOs? Zero. That’s the tally. Oh, and Edwards is facing Houston tonight. LOL.
• Hate: Buddy Hield (SG/SF). I’m sorry, but we ain’t gonna be Buddies tonight, B. “Don’t pay attention to preseason numbers”, they say. But I just can’t when they are all flashing red alarms the size of the Kings arena. Hield played three games this past few weeks, and all he did was score 12.7 PPG to go with a 5-3-0-0 rest-of-line. That’s not even the worst of it, not by a mile. Hield has gathered a rather high 23.9 USG% and he’s been shooting the rock almost 14 times a game... while hitting 31.7 percent of those attempts from the floor. (It gets worse.) Hield has shot 11.3 (!!!) 3PA per game (yes, that’s a stupid 82% 3PAr (LOL) and kept his confidence up though he’s hit a measly 29.4% of those treys. If you want to play someone in order to tank the day, then sure, go with this Buddy.

Picks at the Center position

• Love: Jaren Jackson Jr. (PF/C). Absolutely a risky play, this one, but if Triple-J ain’t healthy and playing 30 MPG during the first few days of the season, then when will he? Jaren will man the paint with recent import Steven Adams. Cleveland definitely has a big-men surplus, but how many of those players can stop a healthy, top-level JJJ? Come on. Jaren played 4 preseason games logging a nice 24.7 USG% along with Ja, remember, and his line read 18-7-1-1-1 with 14 FGA per game and a freaking 7.3 3PA a night! The three-pointers were falling a ridiculous 48.3% clip just a week ago, so just imagine what could happen today against the Cavs. Hmmmm...
• Hate: Jonas Valanciunas (C). With Zion out for a while and none other than Ingram (a wing, not an interior paint-eating player) to help take attention off defenders, I have to stay away from my beloved JoVa for now. The upside isn’t bad, and the solid will most probably pop up while not at firework-ish levels of excitement, but all things considered, you’re just not paying some brutal $7.4K for a 30 DKFP guy with doubts surrounding his role, schemes, etc. in a new team he’s played three times for during the PS.s

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!