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 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: Montrezl Harrell (C). At which point is Los Angeles going to convince—or force, better said—Monty to play from the get-go? The Lakers are hurting big time with both LBJ and AD out. None (we have to assume) is close to coming back, and won’t do so any time soon. Harrell has been absolutely thriving for the Lake Show all year long coming off the pine, but those days seem to be over if only because of a complete lack of warm bodies. Harrell might need to step up his game, but most of all his playing time from his 25 MPG to north of 30 nightly, starting tonight against the Pels. New Orleans has the seventh-worst fantasy D in the league, which bodes well for the biggie man. The 1.20+ FP/min this guy has been averaging in the past month might go down a bit on longer stretches of play, sure, but there is nothing telling me he will stop dropping 20-10 dub-dubs on a nightly basis. Since getting back from the AS break Monty’s at an average 20-8-1-1-1 line, shooting 68% from the floor, and getting to the line a ton. Must-play.
- Hate: Draymond Green (PF). I might end eating this whole, but I’m betting on winning by not playing Dray tonight. See, the Warriors are going to be without Steph Curry, James Wiseman, Kevon Looney, and Eric Paschall. Not that all of those are walking buckets or anything, but still. Green thrives on giving, not by taking. That’s why I think he might suffer tonight as he won’t have a ton of great options to share the ball with while his scoring numbers are always low (I mean, his season-high is 16 points, and he’s reached 12 pops in just two other games...). The algorithm has raised Dray’s salary even though he comes off a putrid outing against Memphis in which all he did was put up a stinky 24 FP. Not wasting $7.5K+ on this fool.
- Love: Tobias Harris (SF). I guess I’ll have to surrender and get back to playing Tobi... The truth is, this fool is no joke. Harris has covered for JoJo’s absence (and Simmons’ here and there, too) quite nicely and then some. It’s been four of the past five games in which Tobi has reached 40+ FP facing all types of foes from Sacto to Milwaukee. He came back to Earth a bit against the Knicks a couple of days ago, but that game took place on back-to-back nights and the FP were low only because Harris couldn’t find a way to drop buckets, hitting just 28% of his 18 FGA on the night. Fluky day, is what I mean. Tobi has turned into a bonafide star this season playing under his former HC Doc Rivers, he’s averaging a magnificent 1.35 FP/min since coming back from the break, and he’s either scored 20+ points or reached 8+ boards in all of his last seven matches. Great play not overly expensive and with tons of upside against a horrid Warriors D.
- Hate: CJ McCollum (SG). Damn son, talk about a struggling CJ. It’s been four games for CeeJay since coming back from his early-season injury, and so far things have not looked any sort of good for him. Mac is still limited in terms of minutes, averaging a low 25 MPG a game, although his usage is rather high at 33%, yet he’s not doing a lot with it. McCollum has been the total opposite to efficient, putting up a stupid 1.03 FP/min that are far from what we expect from him—and that mark is rather false as it is all about his outing against Dallas, which went for a ridiculous 1.66 FP/min... CJ keeps fooling the algorithm into tagging him with high salaries, and although paying $7.4K for him won’t break any bank, the truth is that his fantasy outings are far from good these days with both Dame and Melo carrying the team places. You know the explosion is always at CJ’s reach, but this is still looking like a very very risky play, even with BKN’s D on the other end of the court today.
- Love: Every Starting Laker. I highlighted Harrell above, but the truth is that you can play any starting Laker with hopes of getting a huge ROI from them. None of Harrell, Schroder, Kuzma, and THT have salaries above $6.8K but all of them project to at least 30 FP by my weighted calculations. Even the potential worst play of the day, THT, would yield a nice return given his stupid 5.5K tag if he reaches that FP-mark. As Harrell is now the Lakers no. 1 and best player, Schroder will need to handle the ball more than he’s done in the past twelve years, and Kuzma will need to put on some very serious numbers for the Lakers to stay on the top half of the West playoff picture—and he won’t lack the opportunities to do so. The matchup is also good, so there’s that.
What’s cooking? Statistical trends from Week 11-12 (Mar. 15 to Mar. 21)
- For some with so strong stat-sheet-stuffing tendencies as Russell Westbrook, it is surprising that he doesn’t top the weekly fantasy leaderboard more often. He finally did during the past seven days and four games he’s played. Russ put up an average of 68 FP while keeping up a 28-12-13-1 line in that span. Not bad, even more considering he dropped the most efficient per-minute mark of the week at 1.75 FP/min.
- Luka Doncic is the only other player to break the 65-FP barrier, though his contributions were lower all-around with a 35-8-9-1 line. Giannis, Jokic, and Harden all reached 60+ FP on the week.
- Nikola Jokic tied Russ for the most FP/min (1.75), but he reached that mark averaging four fewer minutes per game, making Russ’ feat more impressive all things considered.
- Among the 60-FP group of players, Luka was the most “stable” one as he logged a deviation of just 9 FP per game. A little less explosive on the total FP leaderboard, yet virtually a lock to hit 48 FP nightly was Jaylen Brown, who logged a stupidly low 2.2 FP deviation in the past four games.
- Only Russ and Giannis were able to close the week averaging trip-dubs, although Anteto did so in just three games compared to Westbrook’s four. James Harden and Trae Young dub-dubbed on dimes, while 11 other players did so on points and boards (Jokic and Julius Randle both came just 1.5 APG short of trip-dubbing).
- Silly cheap values: Moses Brown, Poole, Bullock, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Theis, Len, Lonnie, Satoransky, Danny Green, Grayson Allen, Marcus Morris, Claxton, Looney.
- A little more expensive but still with massive ROI: Joe Ingles, DiVincenzo, Keldon Johnson, Wiggins, Ricky Rubio, Anthony Edwards, Jaylen Brown, Holmes, Aaron Gordon, Thad Young, Buddy, Mason Plumlee, Fournier
- Some very expensive players not doing enough: Trae, LeBron, Sabnois, Tatum, Lowry, Porzingis, Morant, Jarrett Allen, C.J. McCollum
- Cheap points (min. 3 games played): Poole, Loonie, NAW, THT, Bullock, Patty Mills, Bogdan Bogdanovic, Frank Jackson, Marcus Morris, Moses Brown, Alex Len, Isaiah Stewart, Grayson Allen
- Cheap threes: Bullock, NAW, Mills, Poole, Devonte’ Graham, BogBog, Jerome, Kleber, Marcus Morris, Otto Porter
- Cheap boards: Moses Brown, Daniel Theis, Len, Tony Bradley, Markieff Morris, Connaughton, Stewart, Aminu, McGee, Whiteside
- Cheap dimes: Satoransky, Campazzo, Rondo, THT, Osman, Cam Payne, Theis, Saben Lee, Kenrich Williams, Jerome, Caruso, Cory Joseph, BogBog, Mills
- Cheap steals: Campazzo, Bullock, Satoransky, Osman, Neto, Jaden McDaniels, Grayson Allen
- Cheap blocks: Claxton, Moses Brown, Thybulle, Bitadze, Whiteside, Biyombo, NAW, Derrick Jones
- Cheap FG% (min. 8 FGA): Poole, Frank Jackson, THT, Bullock, Loonie, Moses Brow, Marcus Morris, BogBog
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!