bathrobeDFS - Daily Analysis for January 11th and Review of January 10th
Hello, everyone! bathrobeDFS here with your daily basketball article. First, I will breakdown my lineup for yesterday’s main slate. Then I will go over tonight’s slate from the perspective of a one lineup player on Draftkings. If you like this information, I provide additional updates, information, and stats on my twitter @bathrobeDFS.
***Yesterday In Review:***
**Lineup-**
Name | Price | DKP | Value | Proj Own | Real Own | Diff
---|---|----|----|----|----|----
Fox| 7600 | 30.75 | 4.0 x | 28.7%| 28.7%| 0!
D. White| 4900 | 46.75 | 9.5x | 11.5%| 9.9%| 1.6
Stan Johnson| 3100 | 22 | 7.1x | 16.8%| 31.3%| 14.5!!
Leuer| 3100 | 27.25 | 8.8x | 56%| 22.1%| 33.9!!!!
Jokic| 10500 | 58.5 | 5.6x | 31%| 46.3%| 15.3!!
R. Jax| 5000 | 13.5 | 2.7x | 30.9%| 45.9%| 15!!!
Hield| 6700 | 21 | 3.1x | 13.3%| 14%| 0.7
Drummond| 9100 | 28.75 | 3.2x | 31%| 45%| 14!!
**Total** | 50000 | 248.5 | 4.97x| | |
**Analysis-**
If you read my analysis, you know I talked about how I wanted to fade the BOS/MIA game in order to have an extra 2 hours with which to play with my lineup. This means I had all 8 spots open so, when the news of Blake being rested broke, my top 3 plays of Drummond, Jokic, and Fox became easier to cement. I loved all 3 in this spot, and I had no reason to get away from them, since no ownership projections I saw had any of the big stars pulling away in that regard. This meant that I also wanted to choose to get both Stan Johnson and Leuer in for almost minimum price, each. Even though neither would start, they would both see more than enough minutes here that I couldn’t turn away from that. I also wanted to get in on Jackson, who I thought would absorb a chunk of Blake’s usage, at too cheap a price. Nothing too fancy, just all plays based on how I projected score and saw ownership playing out. This left me with 2 spots. I had 4 Pistons, so I wanted to select a 2nd King to make a larger game stack. Given Shumpert starting and taking away shine from Bogdanovic, as well as Bagley taking away some shine from Bjelica, and the fact I had Jokic and Drummond, the only other play I could grab was Hield. This left me with 4900. I had to choose between White, Schroder, or Jerami Grant. I didn’t mind all 3, but I thought White would provide me the most raw points here, though I came very close to going with Grant.
***The Daily Slate:***
This is one of the weirder 9 game slates I ever remember seeing. There just doesn’t seem to be a lot of close matchups here, so this is going to be a day where we really do need to ignore a lot of blowout risk and just focus on who the best plays are. The current spreads in the 9 games are: -6.5, -12.5, -8.5, -9.5, -14.5, -5, -9, -6.5, -15.5. Be wary today, it’s going to be interesting and there will be a whole ton of people who don’t get the minutes and don’t reach value today.
***Matchup Specific Ceiling (MSC) Pick of the Day***
Matchup Specific Ceiling is a “quasi-metric” I use to make decisions. [**If you haven’t read my explanation, please check out this link right here**](https://www.reddit.com/r/dfsports/comments/a9ckrh/bathrobedfs_good_chalkbad_chalk_and/)
The explanation begins in the “injury/lineup news” section about halfway down.
In this section, I will pick the player who has fewest factors preventing him from reaching his ceiling, considering spread, pace, O/U, defense, usage, teammate health, and other factors.
**Donovan Mitchell** - On a day when every single game has a spread of -5 or more (and several are double digits), we need to find the advantages where we can. There are a ton of people in great spots tonight, and a ton of high priced people that are going to pull a ton of ownership. But the news of the day is what is going to lead us right to the door of **Donovan Mitchell (7900)**. Technically, the Jazz only have 3 PGs on their active roster- Rubio, Exum, and Neto. All 3 will be out tonight. This means that Mitchell will get all the minutes (and ballhandling) he can handle, assuming they aren’t giving much run to **Mitrou-Long (3000)** (and, honestly, even if they do… how much usage is he going to get since you’ve never heard of him before right now and I could have made up any 2 other last names.) In their last game, the Jazz got blown out by the Magic. It was much worse than the 106-93 score indicates. The reason it got closer at the end was Mitchell wound up playing 37 minutes anyway cause they didn’t have much other choice. He put up 51.5 points and, even though his price came up from 7300, it’s still not enough for someone who will have a real great shot at adding a double-double bonus to his point total tonight. He is also someone who shoots 20+ times a game, so he will have an incredible % of the team’s points coming through him in one way or another (much like a Harden, but 4000+ cheaper). Now for some other stat stuff- the Jazz, who are 16th in pace and have been playing faster this year than people realize, will be going against the post-Lebron/Rondo Lakers who run at the fastest pace in the NBA (now 3rd fastest for the season). Donovan was already the only Jazz player in the top 50 in usage, at 19th, and that should undoubtedly go up this game. This game isn’t projected to stay the closest, or have the highest total, but they are good enough that Mitchell will be the lock for me today here.
**Situations to take advantage of (in no particular order):**
****Sixers/Hawks*** - If we are talking game stacking, this is either my favorite or 2nd favorite game of the night. It has the highest projected total, at 231.5 and, even though it is projected to blow out with PHI -12.5, Philly isn’t in the habit of blowing teams out, the Hawks have managed to buck several bad matchups lately, and we don’t really have a choice on this slate, anyway. On the Philly side, in this matchup, anyone who will get minutes is in the running. Atlanta is weak against every position, and they run at the fastest pace in the NBA over this season. **Embiid (11000)** is priced up enough, on a slate that has a James Harden, that too many people are going to ignore his 80 DKP upside, especially in this matchup. **Simmons (8900)** has the easiest matchup on the entire slate, against NBA worst defender Trae Young. I wouldn’t consider **Butler (7600)** unless I was playing cash tonight, regardless of whether **Redick (5500)** sits. If Redick plays, and will not be restricted, he’s at a great price point to let you get exposure from this game without shouldering the risk in case it does indeed get out of hand quickly. If Redick misses, **Korkmaz (3900)** becomes an absolute lock. This is the first game going off tonight, so be ready to get Korkmaz in there just in case Redick winds up being a GTD. I don’t really want anyone else right now, since there will be better value plays than Philly backups (right now). On the Hawks side, I am interested in **Collins (7800)** who is still not priced enough for his ability to get an easy 50 DKP any night, especially in a matchup against Chandler, who is old and whose defense is worsening. Other than that, I would be interested in picking one of the wing fill ins, with Baze and Prince still out. **Huerter (4700)** should be in the best matchup here against Redick, and has been seeing minutes in the high 30s. Even if his PPM is low (and it’s pretty low) he can still get 5x on that without that much effort. This is especially true since the Hawks are going against a similarly fast Sixers team, who is ranked 7th overall in pace this season. **Lin (4600)** and **Bembry (4400)** are both also fine plays, who should be insulated against blowout risk. I would favor whichever of them gets the start so pay attention to the pre-game news.
****Brook Lopez*** - So, what are 2 things we know about the Wizards? First, they have had one of the worst perimeter defenses in the league this season. They are constantly at the risk of the 3. Second, since Dwight Howard went down, they have been criminally terrible at defending Centers. What do we know about the Bucks? Well, we know that this year, in the preseason, they announced they had decided they were going to take a hell of a lot more 3s this season. While these kinds of proclamations don’t always work out, if you check the numbers, you’ll see the Bucks having gone from the bottom to the top of the rankings for team 3s. One of the leaders in that crusade has been **Brook Lopez (4900)**. He’s shooting a career high in 3s a game this season, and the gap between this season and the next is staggering. You are either going to pair him against Thomas Bryant, who is inexperienced, foul-prone, and has seen decreasing minutes the last few games, or Ian Mahinmi, who is old and won’t be able to keep up with Lopez on the perimeter this game. I know I’m going to be surprised by a 50 DKP performance by BroLo here, but I honestly wouldn’t be shocked at all if this game managed to stay as close as Vegas thinks (it’s only MIL -7) and BroLo exceeded 40DKP. That being said- this game has the 2nd highest total on the slate, 231, and anyone on the Bucks who takes 3s is in a great position, specifically Lopez, **Bledsoe (6100)**, and **Middleton (6900)**. **Brogdon (5700)** really doesn’t seem to take any 3s, which means I will focus on other plays from MIL today. I also need to stop typing MILK instead of MIL everytime I try to type MIL. **Giannis (11300)** is a beast and he is always in play if ownership dictates tomorrow. While I am not Vegas, this is one of the games I am cautious about getting out of hand. The Bucks are really, really good. And the Wizards are really, really not.
****Otto Porter*** - While I still love and respect Operation: Run **Trevor Ariza (5700)** into the ground, I have to acknowledge that it seems that **Porter (5800)** will be facing his normal amount of minutes, and a hell of a lot of responsibility on a post-Wall-and-Morris Wizards squad. While Ariza is a fine play, if I am picking one player from the Wizards, it will be Porter. His price hasn’t caught up with the fact he’s back to seeing minutes in the mid-30s. He was priced 5200 three games ago and got 42.5 DKP in 24 minutes. Read that again. This caused him to come up to 5600 but, because the way the pricing algorithm works on DK, even though WSH got blown out and Porter only saw 19 minutes, his price increased to 6000. The price decrease he should have gotten from the blowout came after this last game, even though Porter got back to 33 minutes and put up 36 DKP. What this means is we need to take advantage of this error since we will see his price climb into the mid 6000s for the next game WSH has. I expect he starts this game but, even if he doesn’t, he is a fantastic play. Bonus: He will also be going against the position MIL defends worst. While no one is going to argue the upside **Beal (8600)** has, he will be seeing the really good defense of Bledsoe, which I think will limit him. Plus, as I mentioned above, the Bucks are really, really good and the Wizards are not so I would like to get my exposure to this game from mid-priced players that have a good shot at getting to 8x if everything goes right.
****Serge Ibaka*** - Are the Nets playing today? Yep! Are they playing against a team that has a Center that we can count on for 30+ minutes? Yep! Is that Center reasonably priced and facing reasonable ownership? You betcha!! Please come to the stage, **Serge Ibaka (6200)**, you are one of the best plays of the day. I love when stuff is so simple.
****Kurucs/Ed Davis*** - Whoever is playing PG, SG, and SF will be seeing the Ds of Lowry, Green, and Kawhi. This means I want to attack TOR with PF and C (if possible). If I’m going to spend that kind of money for someone like **Jarrett Allen (5500)** I want a guarantee of more than 20-25 minutes a game. This means I really like both **Kurucs (3900)**, who will start at PF and see 30 minutes due to the lack of depth the Nets will have, and **Davis (4000)** who will see the other 23-28 minutes that Allen isn’t allowed to play for some reason. Let’s also not forget that the 2nd unit guards of Toronto are also exceptional defenders, which removes some of the shine off of **DInwiddie (6100)** as well.
****Doncic*** - At the ridiculously young age of 19, **Doncic (8400)** has proven he can take over a basketball game and provide a lion’s share of the production for his team. When DSJ is out, he is tasked not only with scoring, but distributing, giving him a higher floor and a crazy ceiling with triple-double potential. Well, guess what? DSJ has already been ruled out for tonight! This was the only other player I was considering for MSC pick of the day besides Mitchell, and he will be the 2nd one I lock in tomorrow. This game has a great O/U of 222 and the closest spread on the slate with MIN -5, so Vegas thinks it carries the least blowout risk of the 9 games here. Doncic is playing the position MIN is weakest against. Everything points to him. My love for him and Mitchell will drive me to a balanced lineup tomorrow, I would guess, since I can’t imagine not locking either of them in.
****Teague/Wiggins*** - While Rose was originally supposed to return to action tonight, they have since called him Doubtful meaning the lion’s share of minutes will once again fall to **Jeff Teague (6700)**. Additionally, with Covington still out, and KAT facing the top-ranked defense of Deandre Jordan, **Wiggins (6800)** should also see another bump in production. It’s not often I consider Wiggins as anything more than a cash game play, but we saw what kind of fits a good defender can give KAT last game, and Okogie and Taj aren’t going to eat up the usage that KAT will leave behind. If you want to get on the Wolves side of this game, the best places to attack Dallas are PG and SF and, in this game, both Teague and Wiggins are there, at excellent prices, ready to outperform value. I know Wiggins had a great game last game (much for the same reason I like him this game), so if this leads to crazy high ownership, I will very quickly look elsewhere.
****The rest of the Jazz*** - Another game I love stacking for today, we already know how much I love Donovan already. What we need to understand, though, is Rubio, Exum, Neto, Allen, Sefolosha, and Tony Bradley have been ruled Out for tomorrow. That leaves the following players - **Gobert (8000)** who is going against the team with the worst D against C in the last 2 weeks **BY FAR**, Donovan, **Ingles (5700)** who will get some ballhandling and a bunch of shots up, **Favors (5200)** who still seems overpriced, **Crowder (4400)**, **Korver (3500)** who is a fantastic punt today, **O’Neale (3300)** who never gets enough usage to warrant playing. That’s only 7 people so far. If I keep going I get down to **Ekpe Udoh (3100)**, **Cavanaugh (3000)** and **Mitrou-Long (3000)**. This game is going to have a lot of points scored, and it is supposed to be close enough. I know most of those will come from Donovan, but look at those names. Get on this game, all over the place, as much as you can.
****Kuzma*** - If you checked my Good Chalk/Bad Chalk a couple days ago, I mentioned how Kuzma was incredibly underowned due to a freak 4-20 shooting game that could have had to do with rust. Well he showed in this last game the rust wasn’t going to last long, shooting 16-24 and putting up 41 real points in 29 minutes. This only amounted to 45 DKP though, cause Kuzma got 0 blocks, 0 steals, 0 assists, and only 2 rebounds somehow. While we can’t expect him to get another 40 point game, we can expect him to get better stats in the other categories, meaning his price is still far too low for the usage he gets without Lebron on the court. This is going to be a thin Jazz team tomorrow, and if Kuzma is going to get some normal minutes, he could take real advantage of some of those backups I listed before. It’s going to be interesting to see how it all shakes out, but, given the pricing, I want Kuzma as my play from LA. My 2nd favorite play on the Lakers is good ole **Mikey Beasley (3400)** who has been working back into some serious minutes, with some serious PPM numbers.
**Situations to be careful of (in no particular order):**
****Rockets vs Cavs*** - Listen, I get the argument for not predicting blowouts. If you ignored that the other night, and played Brow against this same terrible, terrible Cavs team, you wound up getting a great score at low ownership. It worked, and you played it well. But for someone that plays one lineup everyday, and is not trying to manage ownership %s across 150 chances, I need to take everything into consideration. So when a red-hot Rockets team, that still plays at one of the slowest paces in the NBA, is matching up against the 2nd-slowest Cavs team in a game with the 2nd lowest total and 2nd highest spread, I am going to be cautious. Especially since **Harden (12500)** is starting to creep closer to fair pricing. If this game manages to stay close, Harden could put up 100 DKP tonight. If Houston wins by 14.5, like Vegas predicts, Harden could eat up 25% of your entire roster’s salary in one position and get you 50 DKP. Apart from **Capela (7600)**, no one else in this game is priced high enough that it should scare you off. **Clarkson (5700)** is in a fantastic position again, and has shown he can get run regardless of the situation. With Nance being out, I also think **Tristan (5800)** is far too cheap for someone who could be forced into 30+ minutes against the meh D of Capela. If you expect this game to blowout, I would get on **Zizic (3300)** who will be getting both the backup C minutes and the blowout run.
****Bulls vs. Warriors*** - The other game to be wary of, not just because of the massive GS -15.5 spread here, but because the Warriors have TooManyCooks, are all too expensive by 1000, and shouldn’t need more than 3 quarters tonight. If you want to play the Warriors, run it back with **LaVine (6400)**, cause if this game is worth playing, it will be on his back. The only play in this game I really like tomorrow, based on my expectations, is **Looney (4100)** who will either see starting minutes and blowout run, or backup minutes and blowout run against a terrible Bulls team that won’t be able to stop him.
**Situations to monitor:**
****Collison/Turner/Kanter*** - All 3 players are Questionable, though with wildly different issues. **Collison (4800)** is playing through the leg issue that almost kept him out of the last game. He still wound up seeing a normal run before the game got out of hand (which, let’s be honest, a game against the Knicks always has the potential to do as well). If they decide to rest him because Knicks, **Cory Joseph (3400)** becomes an absolute lock. If I made 150 lineups I would remove my cap for Cory Joseph tomorrow. If Collison plays, Joseph may still be a fine play, considering any potential limitations Collison may have, the blow out risk, and his price point. **Turner (6700)** is still nursing the sore shoulder that has kept him out the last 3 games. If he plays, I would be wary of any potential limits he may have. I don’t know why they would rush him back against the Knicks, though and, if they decide to hold him out one more game, **Sabonis (7500)** is expensive enough he doesn’t become an absolute lock, but **O’Quinn (3700)** sure as hell will. I’m not one for the ole’ revenge game narrative, but I look forward to seeing what will happen if O’Quinn gets some run in MSG tonight. If both Turner and Collison are out, **Oladipo (8200)** becomes a really great play, regardless of if this game blows out, at too low a price. **Kanter (6200)** wanted to prove he could eat 8 hamburgers and he did and got sick. If he is ruled out, I will give serious consideration to **Vonleh (5800)** who is already going to be matched up against IND’s weakest position, as well as **Kornet (4400)**, who might finally see another 30+ minute game.
That does it! This is going to be an interesting slate! I wonder how many of these games blow out and how many chalk people go down because of it. It’s gonna be really interesting to see.
Either way, best of luck to all of you!!