NBA DFS: Russell Westbrook and best/worst DraftKings daily fantasy basketball plays for Monday, May 10th

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: Russell Westbrook (PG). Don’t pass on rostering history tonight, folks. Russ is about to overtake Big O for the most triple-doubles in the history of the Association after tying his mark a couple of days ago. It will happen tonight against Atlanta. It will happen. Bradley Beal is missing this game, Russ is the only bright light in the Wiz squad, and he’s been just catching bodies for like hell for a while. This would be Russ’ fifth consecutive trip-dub, and I mean, no single soul will be surprised by it. The average line in May: 26-16-16. Even more impressive is that Russ is shooting 50% from the floor these days while shooting 20 rocks toward the rim nightly. Not even the sky-high turnovers are stopping this bulldozer of a man. God bless Russ.
• Hate: Khris Middleton (SG/SF). The Bucks can still finish second in the East. The Bucks are on a five-game winning streak. The Bucks are 8-2 in their past 10 games. Yet I don’t trust these fools just one bit when it comes to playing time and load management. Sure, Midd has played at least 32 minutes in all games going back to Apr. 25, which is to say he’s played 32+ minutes in seven of those eight Ws. But seriously, I just can’t trust Milly. Midd has gone down a bit in his last two outings with 41 FP against BKN and then 31 against Houston, which me not likes. This guy is always going to hit his good 20 pops and comes with a rather high near-5-5 baseline on the boards and assists cats, but even then I’m not sure he returns that much value to their truthers. He’ll need a 45+ DKFP night against SAS tonight to be a high-ROI play. I’m not convinced it’ll happen.
• Love: Jonas Valanciunas (C). Relegate Ja Morant, because he ain’t more than a lie. It’s about the biggie boyz in Memphis. No lie right there. While Ja keeps disappointing fantasy GMs left and right, both JoVa and JJJ keep at it. Valanciunas has reached 39+ FP in five of his last six games and in the one he could not do it he only played 20 minutes finishing with a nice 9-5-2-2 line. I mean, JoVa knows no foe that can stop him. He’s the Westbrook of the double-double with five in the last six matches he’s played. Valanciunas is averaging 14-15-2-1-2 in May and the Pelicans come to this game with no Ingram, Zion nor Steven Adams. Door open for JoVa to rack up goodies.
• Hate: Collin Sexton (SG). A little bit of a slump that of Sexton in the past three games from May 5 through Sunday as he hasn’t topped 39 FP yet he’s been out there on the court for 34, 36, and 32 minutes every time. The points are good at 20+ per game more often than not, but the rest of the contributions are so shaky that Collins is straight scary. He’s cut down his turnovers from 5 per game in the prior three to 1.6 in the last three, but his low 2.3 RPG and 5 APG are just not going to cut it. The problem with Sexton is that he only gives you below-40 FP nights or above-50 ones, seemingly with no middle ground. Not liking him against a Pacers squad fighting to enter the play-in with the no. 9 seed instead of falling down to the 10th below the Wiz.
• Love: Joe Ingles (SG/SF). Shout-out to the next 6MOY Joe Ausie Ingles. Sorry, J-Clark, it’s a cold world sometimes. Ingles has been scorching hot of late, and although he’s now a starter for the Jazz (12 straight starts through Saturday) he still qualifies for the 6MOY award this season. Ingles is averaging a cool 32 MPG in that 12-game span while putting up 14-3-7 lines on a nightly basis. Treys are Ingles’ mojo, with 3.1 3PG in the past 12 matches and hitting at least 2 in all five games played in May. Ingles has reached 30 DKFP in all of those matches this month, is a virtual lock to hand you some 10-3-7 baseline with upside for more, and for the price he often carries he’s always one of the better values and ROI returners to use while filling the last open spots of your lineups.

What’s cooking? Statistical trends from Week 20 (May. 3 to May. 9)

• Is there any point in updating this section every Monday anymore? A month a half, brothers and sisters. A month and a half of weeks—six, that is—with Russ leading all fantasy players in DK daily slates. It’s just insane. Russell Westbrook closed last week averaging a ridiculously high 78 FPG, which is 15 more fantasy points than the second-best player of the week. Say what!? 22-17-18-1 line on the week through 4 GP and 42 MPG. Bananas.
• Domantas Sabonis put up 63 DKFP while Steph Curry wrapped it up at 60 FP, the only two other players reaching that mark. Too bad for them, none hit the trip-dub average on the week as Dom fell 0.2 APG short of it. Cold world.
• Obviously, nobody was going to beat Russ on a per-minute basis even though he logged the highest MPG mark of the week. That’s what happens when you average a freaking 78 FPG... Russ led all players with a 1.88 FP/min with Curry second at 1.78 and Embiid third down with 1.71.
• Only Russ put up a week-long trip-dub. What a surprise. Sabonis Jr. finished close with a 27-13-9 line, followed by Draymond’s 9-9-11. No other player came even remotely close to pulling the feat off.
• Silly cheap values: Kenyon Martin Jr., Diallo, Dwight Powell, Gallinari, Hayes, Brooks, Vanderbilt, Bane, DaQuan Jeffries, Rivers, Mykhailiuk, Campazzo, Kenrich Williams, Hampton, Seth Curry, DiVincenzo, Moe Harkless
• A little more expensive but still with massive ROI: Delon Wright, Kelly Olynyk, Fournier, Mo Bamba, Bledsoe, Hardaway Jr., Hachimura, VanVleet, Tate
• Some very expensive players not doing enough: Luka, KAT, AD, Tatum, Randle, LaVine, Paul George, Adebayo, Gobert, Booker, Kawhi, Middleton, Capela, DeRozan, Ingram, KPJr., Dejounte Murray
• Cheap points (min. 3 games played): Brooks, Okoro, Seth, Niang, Rivers, Ariza, Bane, Caruso, Hayes, Payne, Lamb, Forbes, Bertans, Svi, Poole, KCP, Moe, Mulder
• Cheap threes: Brooks, Niang, Mulder, Seth, Rivers, Forbes, Danny Green, Bertans, Lamb, Bane, McLemore
• Cheap boards: Howard, Kanter, Dwight Powell, Clarke, Vanderbilt, Biyombo, Looney, Hayes, Reid, Zeller, Gillespie, Connaughton, Gibson, Cauley-Stein
• Cheap dimes: Rondo, Satoransky, Caruso, Saben Lee, Seth, Dwight Powell, Wanamaker, Aaron Holiday, Maxey, Brooks, Rivers, Monk
• Cheap steals: Vanderbilt, Thybulle, Danny Green, Rivers, Brooks, DaQuan Jeffries, Svi, Bembry, Thornwell, Ariza, CarusoDeck, Moe, Patrick Williams
• Cheap blocks: Hayes, Taj, Dwight Powell, Bitadze, Thybulle, Damian Jones, Gafford, Biyombo, Justin Holiday, Rudy Gay, Robin Lopez, Vanderbilt, Cauley-Stein
• Cheap FG% (min. 8 FGA): Hayes, Forbes, Seth, Reid, McDermott, Nian, DaQuan, Moe, Rivers, Brooks, Aaron Holiday

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!