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 have any additional questions or want to see guaranteed updates in regards to breaking news- I provide additional updates, information, and stats on my twitter @bathrobeDFS. Feel free to throw me a follow cause it’s much easier and more timely to provide updates over that medium. It also should go without saying, this is just a preliminary analysis of the slate: everything can change throughout the day, so make sure you are staying on top of any and all injury news and change your lineups accordingly! I am always available to help with any questions there, as well, even if I can’t do a second article. Let’s get started with the Review!
***Yesterday In Review:***
***My Lineup-*** -
Name | Price | DKP
Rondo | 6200 |
Bayless | 4400 | 31.75
Wiggins | 5900 | 50.25
Jeff Green | 4500 | 21.75
Gobert | 8500 | 37
Okobo | 3500 |
Ingram | 6200 |
KAT | 10500 | 46.5
**Total** | 49700 |
Analysis-
Once again, I am touched by all of the kind words from everyone yesterday. It meant a lot to me. I meant it when I said I would carry it with me forever. I am still having a rough go of it, so I am going to do the pared down version of this again. I haven’t been able to eat in a couple days and I’m just so tired. I locked in KAT, Bayless and Rondo as my 3 plays today. I wanted Vuc really badly, but i couldn’t work him into the main lineup. I put in Okobo for 3500 to open up as much value as I can. With Rose and Tyus also out I wanted to get Wiggins in there. Also, with Mahinmi out, I thought they would go small more and Green would get the biggest boost out of that. I wanted to get Ingram in there in case Kuzma was out, since I figured he’d be low owned. So instead of going Jackson and Vuc I went with Gobert and Ingram to differentiate myself.
The Daily Slate:
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
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.
John Collins - My god this is a terrible fucking slate! There are 5 games. The first, NYK/CHA has a spread of -11.5. The second, GS/IND has a spread of -8.5 featuring an all-star team taking on an Oladipo-less Pacers. The third, BK/BOS has a spread of -10 and has one of the craziest injury reports I’ve seen for a team. The fourth DEN/MEM has the fucking Grizzlies in it. That leaves one game. A game between the Hawks, ranked 6th in pace, and the Clippers, ranked 8th in pace (over the last 15 games). Even though there is no O/U or spread yet, with all of the other games on the slate, I don’t think it matters. If I don’t have 5 or 6 people from this game in my lineup I will be absolutely shocked. I will start with John Collins (8200). If you have been reading this lately, you know that the Clippers are so unbelievably bad against Centers and PFs. They are, by far, worst against C and they keep flipping with the Cavs for last among PFs. What this means is they won’t be able to stop the Hawks where they want to attack them the most, with John Collins. He’s going to get a double-double. He should put up 50 DKP. They have absolutely no one that will be able to hang with him on the roster. This means I also will be locking in Dedmon (5500) who may be my 2nd favorite play on the day. Trae (6700) has also been playing really well lately, and the Clippers are almost as bad against PG as they are against bigs. If you want to take Prince (5400), Huerter (4800), or Lin (4200) please go ahead. They could all far exceed value (but don’t play all 3 at once, obviously).
Situations to take advantage of (in no particular order):
· Collison - As I told you a couple days ago, everyone is going to tell you to take Tyreke. Everyone is going to think it’s a natural progression to just lock in Tyreke. But it is foolish and it will only hurt you in the end (like hemorrhoids). Collison (5900) is the main beneficiary here, as I pointed out last time. He got 36 DKP and he was 1 assist from the double-double bonus, which would have pushed him right to 40. He had a matchup against the slow, defensive Grizzlies, so this matchup against the Warriors is light years better. He should easily get over 40 DKP tonight. The 2nd beneficiary is Turner (6800) who will need to go ape here in order for this to stay close. With one game, and 28 minutes, under his belt, he should be able to push back into the upper 30s. I would also have interest in Bojan (5600) since I think he can take advantage of the weak D of Klay.
· Kyrie/Horford - I know this game is also supposed to blow out, but this is the 2nd best game on the slate anyway, and we can’t be too picky. Kyrie (9600) has been putting up 60+DKP games lately. I think the price might scare people off (we will find out tomorrow). Lately, the Nets have been incredibly weak against PG. With as underpriced as everyone in the ATL/LAC game is, we should be able to fit him in here. Also, we all know how horrible the Nets are against Centers. So I will gladly play Kyrie and Horford (6400) together today. With his last 2 games of 44.5 and 48.75, they seem to have taken off all his restrictions. So I’ll be all over it.
· Nuggets vs. Grizzlies - I know this sucks, but this may wind up being the 2nd closest game, meaning the 2nd most likely for starters to get their minutes. I know it’ll have the lowest O/U, but the DEN -5.5 is what I like. Over the last 15 games, Memphis is 29th in pace and Denver is 27th, so that 209.5 total may be generous as it is. With Murray OUT for Denver, and some injury news for the Grizzlies (Temple OUT, Anderson Questionable, Casspi Doubtful, Green Probable), we can still find some plays. Without Murray, I don’t think there is any way Jokic (10800) doesn’t get a triple double tonight. If we can get Jokic, Dedmon, Collins, and Horford in one lineup, we have an incredible core to start from. With Murray out last game, Barton (6900) got the start at PG. But him, Morris, Beasley, Harris, and Craig have made it difficult to trust anyone until the main 2 start getting back into the 30s in terms of minutes. Plumlee (3900) is cheap enough, and gets enough guaranteed minutes, he could be worth the punt. On the other side, Conley (7700) would be in the best spot against the Nuggets here, though I’m not sure I can get there today. With all of the injuries, we could see another Mack (3600) and Bruno “Fucking” Coboclo (3400) game.
· Clippers - In a matchup that could be close, that should be high scoring, that will be fast, and that won’t feature any sort of defense, all of the Clippers are in great shape tonight. Gallo will still be out, which means Harris (8000) will get the majority of the usage in the starting lineup (along with PatBev (4500)). When they switch up, LouWill (7400)and Montrezl (7100) are both in a spot to drop an easy 40+ DKP. Honestly, all of them could exceed value tonight. If you want a punt, Bradley (3700) should be fine enough.
Situations to be careful of(in no particular order):
· Hornets vs Knicks - I tried to find something I liked here, but I just find it really hard. I will go into some stuff but there’s a lot of caveats. Kemba is Probable, so he should be fine. As I talked about earlier, this game is projected to blow out. I wouldn’t be shocked at all. This means that, while Kemba (8900) has a fine matchup, we have to be careful. The same goes for all of the Hornets starters. I wanted to put one of the Hornets backups in the other section as well, but they have a deep enough roster and no one is injured. So, if it blows out, we have to split Monk, Graham, Parker, Bridges, MKG, and Bacon still exists. Also, the Knicks like playing small with Vonleh (6200) at Center, so they could move Marvin (5300) to the 5 a bunch and not play either of the 2 terrible Centers. Both Centers are among the worst defensive Centers in the NBA though, so, if we are going to go anywhere on the Knicks, I wouldn’t mind starting the conversation with Vonleh. I won’t play him, probably, but I will consider him. Mudiay is OUT and Frank N had to leave the game and could not return last night. I would call him questionable, but I’m not sure if he will be able to play at all. With both of those guys out, Burke (4200) would be the best play since he would get both backup and blow out run. Ditto Dotson (3600).
· GS Warriors - I just don’t know who to pick here. You know how it’s been - they all cannibalize one another. They are in a pace down spot against a really slow, defensive Pacers team who have all the reason in the world to go slower with Oladipo out. They are projected to blow this out. The only Pacer who isn’t in the top 10 in DRPM for their position is Bojan, who is actually the 4th worst SF. This means I will favor Durant (9400) over anyone else here. If Cousins (6500) is priced fine if he gets 24 minutes. If they up it to 28, he is underpriced. Similarly, the one Warrior who produces the most across the spectrum is Dray (6300) so he can always be considered if he’s under 7k.
Situations to monitor:
· Nets Injuries - Ok, so here is what we know right now: Dinwiddie, LeVert, Crabbe, Musa, and Dudley will be OUT. Right now, Joe Harris and Treveon Graham are QUESTIONABLE. RHJ had to leave last game and we don’t know his status for tonight. This would leave almost no one left on the roster. Russell (8600) would be risky, but the safest play here by far. Carroll (4700) is back to getting 30 minutes, so he would be underpriced. Napier (4600) saw a price increase, but he would still be locked in. Pinson (4400) had the game of his life last game. I would think that is his ceiling, so be aware. He would still get a ton of minutes tonight, and has a chance to get to that ceiling again. Kurucs (4000) is too expensive for me. Mitch Creek (3000) just signed a 10 day contract. If EVERYONE up there is out, he should be forced into some minutes and we may want to give him the old Bruno Caboclo treatment tonight.
Ok. I’m gonna go see if I can find something to eat and then maybe try to sleep early. Thank you all, again, for everything. It means the world to me. I will be attending the funeral in a few days, so I won’t be able to do some writing there for a bit. I know you all understand, but I just wanted to let you all know I will gone for a couple of days in the middle of this week. I will update the lineups and stuff later tonight or tomorrow when I get to my computer.