NBA DFS: Tobias Harris and best/worst DraftKings daily fantasy basketball plays for Wednesday, May 26th

Welcome to your daily NBA DFS digest at Fake Teams, gents. Every day I’m here with a handful of pro-tips to roster a winning team just a few hours from now. And on top of that, I’ll bring you some statistical trends from the past week of games!

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

• Love: Tobias Harris (SF/PF). This could very well be an overreaction, but there is nothing making me think Tobi can’t at least put on a tasty ROI given his salary and what he did in G1 against the Wiz. It had been a while since the last time (more than two months ago) Tobi put up 50+ FP, but that’s what he did on Monday with his sweet 37-6-2-2 line shooting a monster 29 FGA (!!!) and hitting 52% of them from the floor. That’s sublime. Washington has a bunch of biggies to throw Embiid’s way, but they lack wing-stopping players and Tobi happens to be right on the sweet spot there. Not saying Harris is going to be a series-long 50-FP performer but odds are he keeps racking up points and even some 35-point outing would suffice to return good value.
• Hate: Jordan Clarkson (PG/SG). Somehow J-Clark carries a higher salary than Tobi. Sure, he just snatched the 6MOY award, but I mean... Jordan Clarson projects to a ridiculous 26 points while he’s averaged just 30 on the year compared to Tobi’s 40-FP projection and 37 FPPG on the season. With Mitchell still out last Monday, Clarkson got a bulky 30 minutes of playing time yet all he could do was finish with a 14-3-2 line and a couple of blocks for a measly 23 FP on the night against no. 8 Memphis in a losing effort. Mitchell should be back today, starting, and limiting Clark’s minutes at least a bit. This guy is hot off the pine, sure, but he’s also far from as valuable a play as his salary would lead you to believe.
• Love: Trae Young (PG). For some reason, even though he hit the game-winning shot and was great in G1, the algorithm keeps lowballing Trae. So we gotta take advantage while it lasts, folks. Young went on a tear against New York in MSG last Monday putting up a 32-10 dub-dub to which he added a spicy 7 dimes. All in all, 57 DKFP on the night with a ridiculous 39% usage rate and only one triple made. Trae has tuned down his three-point shooting a bit of late, but we all know he can put on quite a show if he got things right and goes for it. The visits to the free-throw line stay high, he keeps hitting virtually every freebie he takes, and the 30-5-10 are almost a lock coming from Young these days.
• Hate: Clint Capela (C). Hard postseason debut for Clint Capela, who fell one point short of dub-dubbing against New York in Atlanta’s upset victory on Monday. I’m not sure if that Cap is the Cap will see going forward, but at least until we know a bit more about his ways I’m not very comfortable rostering him. Captian Cap turned into Craptain Cap logging a putrid 11% usage rate in 35 minutes of playing time while finishing 9-13 and hitting 29 FP. The efficiency was ground-low at just 0.84 FP/min, and even though teammate Trae Young finished with a double-double on assists it’s not that Cap benefited a ton from those dimes. The truth is, Cap has dropped quite a bit in FP of late, reaching more than 35 DKFP in just four of his 12 games in the last month of games.
• Love: Rudy Gobert (C). Tenth-highest salary of the slate—which is far from a sneaky one—but still low enough to put Rudy in your lineup. The truth is, fouls killed Gob Gob in G1 as he could only log 25 minutes of playing time against the Griz. Gobert was far from incredible, that’s right, but even on such low playing time, he was able to average 1.43 FP/min to the tune of an 11-15 dub-dub with 3 swatted shots. Rudy had not fouled out in any single game this season and has logged above-average per-minute games for one month running. It’s been 13 games played for him doing that, and he’s put up dub-dubs in 9 of those 13 matches. Your great fantasy biggie on a nightly basis, Rudy should bounce back and get into the 40-to-45 FP clip tonight, even more if Donovan Mitchell finally plays and opens chances for the Frenchman.

What’s cooking? Statistical trends from the Regular Season

• Nikola Jokic is about to become the reigning MVP... in the NBA, but not in the fantasy world! Russell Westbrook, who has been on a tear for the last month-and-change, is the one on that front, folks. Westbrook closed the season averaging 58.2 FP per game, good enough to edge Nikola Jokic by a measly 0.6 FPPG!
• On a pure counting basis, though, Jokic gets the edge as he played seven more games than Russ. The final tally is Jokic 3,914 FP, Russ 3,548 FP. No other player crossed the 3,400-FP mark on the year.
• The most efficient player of the season was Giannis Antetokounmpo, who posted 1.72 FP/min in 57 games averaging 33.5 MPG. Both biggies Jokic and Joel Embiid rounded up the top-3 with similar scores of 1.62 FP/min.
• It is reasonable to expect centers to top the Points Per Shot leaderboard as they operate in the paint most of the time. The top-3 players were Rudy Gobert (1.84 Pts/Shot), Jarrett Allen (1.78), and Dwight Howard (1.76). But there is a clear outlier among the top scorers: Kevin Durant with 1.70 Points Per Shot. That’s absolutely bonkers for a non-center player. If we don’t count Zion as a wing (he’s a biggie to me given his shooting profile), then Durant is the only qualified non-center in the top-20, with Jimmy Butler at no. 21 but already down at 1.51 Pts/Shot.
• As stupid as it sounds even if nobody wants to acknowledge the feat anymore: Russ has just wrapped up his fourth season averaging a triple-double. What the hell, dude? Russ closed it on a 22-11-11 average line. Bonkers.
• Silly cheap values (min. 30 games played): Kenyon Martin Jr., Ty Jerome, JaVale, Stewart, Brunson, Melton, Hart, Rudy Gay, Portis, Nunn, Robert Williams, Reiz, Cody Zeller, Whiteside, Diallo
• A little more expensive but still with massive ROI: Olynyk, Garland, Thad Young, Plumlee, McConnell, Dray, Harrison Barnes, Derrick White, Lonzo, Holmes, Rose, Anunoby, Nurkic, Ant Edwards, Haliburton, Bobby Portis, Kemba
• Some very expensive players not doing enough: Anthony Davis, Simmons, Booker, Ingram, Porzingis, Drummond, John Collins, Nance, Aaron Gordon, Kuzma, Harrell
• Cheap points: McDermott, Monk, Quickley, Lonnie, Bacon, Reid, Poole, Bullock, Mills, Jerome, Grayson Allen, NAW, Monte Morris, Lamb, Forbes, Gary Harris
• Cheap threes: Danny Green, Ellington, Bullock, Mills, Forbes, Monk, Jerome, Grayson, Shamet, Cam Johnson
• Cheap boards: Willy Hernangomez, Stewart, Noel, Mo Bamba, Whiteside, Tony Bradley, Birch, Vanderbilt, Favors, Taj Gibson, Biyombo, Kleber, Bruce Brown, Kenyon, Baynes, McGee
• Cheap dimes: Satoransky, Rondo, McLaughlin, Ish Smith, Tyus, Jerome, Saben Lee, Campazzo, Cam Payne, Cory Joseph, DJ Augustin, Monte Morris
• Cheap steals: Thybulle, Danny Green, Campazzo, Neto, Caruso, Melton, Okeke, Noel, McLaughlin, Bazemore, Vanderbilt, Nwaba, NAW, Okoro, Cory Joseph, Iggy
• Cheap blocks: Noel, Gafford, Mo Bamba, Bitadze, Stewart, Whiteside, Biyombo, McGee, Gasol, Thybulle, Taj Gibson, Reiz, Favors, Len, Pokusevski, Derrick Jones, Eubanks
• Cheap FG% (min. 8 FGA): McDermott, Reid, Monte Morris, Bullock, Jerome, NAW, Cam Johnson, Jaylen Nowell

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!